[To the online textbook Psychology: An Introduction (2017) by Russ Dewey]
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Revised 11/23/2016. Welcome to the self-quiz on the Human Nervous System. These questions accompany Chapter 9 (Motivation and Emotion) of the online textbook Psychology: An Introduction). They are general enough to be useful for students using other textbooks as well.
Read the question and click on an answer. You will jump to a correction or (if the answer is correct) a confirmation.
This page is from https://www.psywww.com/selfquiz/ch09mcq.html
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[The remainder of the page is not meant to be read sequentially; it consists of answers and explanations separated by stretches of nothing. You will jump back and forth to these as you click on possible answers of the questions.]
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nausea
No, that is not typically one of the ways people respond to excess calories (unless they are bulimic...)
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body temperature rises
Yes. The body temperature increases as one of several compensatory mechanisms for burning off the extra calories...which makes it hard for people like this to gain weight.
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the set point is raised for a day or two
No, the set point usually does not change this quickly.
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body temperature falls
No, if body temperature falls, less energy is consumed, and the person should get fatter. This does not happen to a person with a low set point, who is "naturally skinny."
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extreme sleepiness
No, that would tend to conserve energy. A person whose body is "defending" a low set-point should experience body reactions that tend to consume energy, not conserve it.
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reaching the bloodstream
No, satiety (the feeling of "fullness" after eating) occurs too quickly for this to be the correct explanation.
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reaching the large intestine
No, food does not reach the large intestine until long after a meal. Satiety (feeling "full") occurs sooner than this.
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being transformed into glucose in the bloodstream
No, that would take too long; it cannot explain satiety (fullness) after eating.
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passing through the mouth and throat
No...experiments show if nutrients are removed by a tube after a rat swallows but before the nutrients reach the rat's stomach, the rat keeps eating and does not become "full."
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lingering in the stomach
Yes...the dominant influence on satiety (feeling "full") is having food in the stomach.
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"voodoo death"
No...there actually is a concept called "voodoo death" but it is apparently not what it seems to be... Once it was thought that people could die through suggestion, for example, if a voodoo "curse" was put on them. Later investigations showed that cases of voodoo death often involved very sick people who were not fed by those around them and were thereby allowed to starve to death. In any event, the voodoo death concept is not very relevant to motivational conflict!
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depression
No, depression can be caused by imbalances of brain chemicals, or it might be triggered by experiences of powerlessness and helplessness. But this is not really the same thing as "motivational conflict."
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lethargy or sleepiness
Well, there are probably animals which go to sleep when they are in conflict—hedgehogs, maybe?—and some humans react to stressful situations by sleeping more...but that is not the best answer of the five here.
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vacillation
Yes. Vacillation means "going back and forth." For example, if a woman was dating two men who she liked, and was forced to choose between them, she would be in an "approach/approach" conflict and might well vacillate about which one she preferred...sometimes one, sometimes the other.
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getting "stuck" on the first decision
No, it is more common to go "back and forth" between different decisions, in a situation of conflict.
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it leads to a "can-do" attitude
Yes. Self-efficacy means "belief in one's ability to make change," which could be described as a "can-do" attitude.
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it contradicts the idea of optimum complexity
No, self-efficacy really has nothing to do with "optimal complexity."
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it traps people in self-defeating behavior
No, just the opposite. A person needs feelings of self-efficacy in order to feel that change is possible.
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it sometimes makes simple problems seem complex
No, in fact, problems are more likely to seem complex and overwhelming when one does not feel self-efficacy, in other words, when one feels helpless.
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it makes a person feel cut off and lonely
No, self-efficacy is a feeling of "being able to make a difference" and normally that makes a person feel involved with life, capable of "making things happen."
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without knowing the outcome of their behavior
No, few psychologists would say that. (In fact, "knowledge of results" usually improves performance.)
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in response to "optimal stimuli"
No, not unless by "stimuli" you mean "arousal," and the two are not equivalent terms. Some stimuli are boring, for example.
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while at an optimal level of arousal
Yes...Hebb proposed that motivation would be highest when animals are neither sluggish and sleepy nor panic-striken and anxious. [Ironically, the original Yerkes-Dodson research does not support the idea of an "optimum" level of arousal...it shows greater motivation or performance with greater levels of stimulation, which was electric shock in the original research. Hebb made the perhaps-reasonable assumption that, at some high level of stimulation or shock beyond that tested by Yerkes and Dodson, behavior would be disorganized...therefore motivation would be optimized at medium levels. This has not received much research support.]
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to reduce stimulus inputs
No, in a situation where animals are motivated to reduce inputs, they are probably being overstimulated, and this would not be the ideal conditions for performance.
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to maintain complexity
No, you may be thinking about the "optimal complexity" theory. The Yerkes-Dodson Law is sometimes related to Hebb's notion of "optimal arousal" which is different.
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"optimal complexity"
No, cognitive consistency is more likely to be associated with theories like Festinger's theory of Cognitive Dissonance. This does not relate directly to optimal complexity.
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"stimulus-seeking"
No. The concept of "stimulus seeking" is studied by psychologists (and Zuckerman developed a whole theory about it) but this is not the same thing as "cognitive consistency."
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social support
No, social support feels good, and no doubt we are motivated to obtain it, but this is not the same issue as cognitive consistency.
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"congruity"
Yes. "Congruity" means about the same thing as "consistency." Think of the word "incongruous" which means "strange, odd, out of place." A thing which is "congruous" or which "has congruity" is a thing which fits, which makes sense, whch is consistent with other things that are happening.
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"ludic behavior"
No, "ludic behavior" was Berlyne's word for playful behavior or behavior that reflects curiosity. That is not the same thing as cognitive consistency.
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excessive stimulation
No, the cognitive dissonance theory is not specifically about levels of stimulation.
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contradictions between behaviors and beliefs
Yes. In most examples of cognitive dissonance theory, there is some clash between behaviors and attitudes. To eliminate the unpleasant feeling of contradiction or dissonance, people change one or the other. Often they change an attitude in order to bring it in line with a behavior.
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rebellious or negative reactions
No, rebellion can be a form of "dissonance" but cognitive dissonance theory is not about rebellious behavior.
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music which is not harmonious
No, music is sometimes called "dissonant" when it uses unusual combinations of notes which sound harsh, but this has nothing to do with cognitive dissonance as a theory.
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people who are argumentative
No, perhaps you are thinking of "dissent" which is a word that might be applied to a person who disagrees with an argument. That is not the same thing as cognitive dissonance.
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to preserve Maslow's theory forever
No...it is probably true that Maslow's "pyramid" will be cited in textbooks for many years to come, because it is a somewhat vague and common-sense idea which appeals to a lot of people, despite the fact that it has not generated a lot of research and there are many obvious exceptions to it (such as people who fast for religious purposes). But durability was not the idea behind Maslow's pyramid.
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as one takes care of basic needs, the "higher needs" become more relevant
Yes. Maslow was pointing out that motivations come in many varieties, from the "basic" motivations of obtaining food and water to the "security" needs such as obtaining shelter and physical safety, on up to the "higher" motives involved with self-actualization. People are more likely to pay attention to the higher needs when they have taken care of the lower needs. For example, a person who has fame and fortune, but is still unhappy, might start thinking seriously about the meaning of life and how to obtain fulfillment of spiritual needs.
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the road to enlightenment consists of many small steps
No. Climbing a real pyramid would undoubtedly take many steps, but this was not the main point of Maslow's pyramid diagram (which typically showed only five layers). It would be more accurate to say he was trying to show that "higher" motives build upon or follow upon the satisfaction of lower motives.
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it was a sort of temple or meeting place for his students
Not exactly. The pyramid was just a diagram, not a physical place, although that might be an appropriate monument to Maslow on the Brandeis campus where he taught.
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it showed the three factors underlying self-actualization, one on each corner
No, the pyramid showed different motives at different levels, not on the corners.
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you feel emotion, then a bodily reaction
No, just the opposite. James and Lange pointed out that sometimes you react first (for example, dodge out of the way of a vehicle) then, a few moments later, you feel a wave of emotion...as if the body reaction triggers the emotion.
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you react with your body first, then you feel emotion
Yes, that was the James—Lange theory in a nutshell. The body reacts quickly and automatically, and a few moments later one consciously feels the appropriate emotion. There are some situations in which this seems to fit, but the theory has not been supported by research, on the whole.
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the somatic nervous system is the seat of emotion
No, most psychologists (even in James's day) knew that the autonomic nervous system was more involved with emotions than the somatic nervous system.
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emotion is adrenalin plus context
No, that was the Schachter/Singer theory, not the James-Lange theory.
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emotions and visceral reactions are simultaneous
No, James and Lange felt that one came first, then the other.
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Ekman found the genetic locus of emotion
No, this was not the thrust of Ekman's work.
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Ekman's system allows precise coding of facial expressions
Yes. This allows other researchers to specify a particular facial expression, by using Ekman's system. Ekman identified all the muscles which can make up a facial expression. By identifying which muscles are activated, one can describe an expression very precisely...for example, one can distinguish between several different types of smiles.
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Ekman showed emotion was a prime factor in speciation: the formation of species
No, this was not the thrust of Ekman's research.
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Ekman showed research with babies was practical
No, Ekman worked mostly with adult facial expression.
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Ekman founded emotogenetics
No, there is so such discipline as emotogenetics. Ekman did confirm Darwin's idea that emotional expression is natural and "built in" (i.e. genetic).
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