WGU D685 OA Final Exam Test Bank 2026/2027 – Practical
Applications of Prompt Engineering – Objective Assessment
Complete Questions & Detailed Verified Answers
SECTION 1: FOUNDATIONS OF GENERATIVE AI AND
PROMPT ENGINEERING (Questions 1–60)
Question 1
What is an AI hallucination?
A) A language model generating plausible but false or misleading information
B) An AI system refusing to make predictions on unfamiliar input
C) An error in converting data types
D) A model failing to retrieve relevant knowledge from its database
Correct Answer: A) A language model generating plausible but false or misleading
information
Rationale: Hallucinations occur when Large Language Models generate factually incorrect
information that sounds grammatically correct and plausible. They are a significant
ethical concern because they can mislead users.
Question 2
When an AI generates a confident but completely false statement, such as inventing a
historical event, this is known as:
,A) Algorithmic bias
B) Data drift
C) Hallucination
D) Overfitting
Correct Answer: C) Hallucination
Rationale: Hallucinations occur when LLMs predict the next likely word without grounding
in factual or historical truth. The model produces content that is fluent and confident but
factually incorrect.
Question 3
Which prompt component is demonstrated when a user tells an AI, "You are an
independent teenager writing a play script"?
A) Output format
B) Persona
C) Instructions
D) Context
Correct Answer: B) Persona
Rationale: A persona assigns a specific role or character for the AI to adopt, which helps
tailor the tone and style of the output. Personas guide the model's voice and perspective.
Question 4
What is the primary risk of writing a "poor" or vague prompt for an AI-based search
tool?
A) Greater data usage
B) Opinion-based information
C) Imprecise results
D) Outdated results
Correct Answer: C) Imprecise results
,Rationale: Vague prompts lead to ambiguity, causing the AI to provide broad or irrelevant
results that do not meet the user's specific intent. Specificity and clarity are essential for
useful outputs.
Question 5
A company uses AI to analyze customer sentiment. One article cited by the AI model to
support a trend does not actually exist. This is an example of which ethical concern?
A) Privacy
B) Autonomy
C) Misinformation
D) Transparency
Correct Answer: C) Misinformation
Rationale: AI "hallucinations," where the model generates false but realistic-looking
information, fall under the ethical category of misinformation. Fabricated citations are a
common form of hallucination.
Question 6
What is the primary goal of prompt engineering in generative AI?
A) To write longer and more complex prompts
B) To maximize the likelihood of a desired model output
C) To reduce the number of model parameters
D) To train the model from scratch on new data
Correct Answer: B) To maximize the likelihood of a desired model output
Rationale: Prompt engineering focuses on designing inputs that guide a generative AI
model to produce accurate, relevant, and useful outputs without modifying the model's
weights. The goal is to elicit the best possible response through careful input design, not to
alter the underlying model.
, Question 7
What is prompt engineering?
A) The process of training a model on new data
B) The process of crafting and refining inputs to guide AI models toward desired
outputs
C) The process of reducing model size
D) The process of building neural networks
Correct Answer: B) The process of crafting and refining inputs to guide AI models
toward desired outputs
Rationale: Effective prompting improves accuracy, tone, and relevance in generative AI
responses. It is the practice of designing and iterating on prompts to achieve specific
outcomes.
Question 8
Which of the following is an example of a zero-shot prompt?
A) "Translate 'Hello' to Spanish." (without examples)
B) "Here is an example: 'Cat → Gato'. Now translate 'Dog'."
C) "Classify this sentiment: 'I love this' as positive or negative after reading 5 examples."
D) "Generate a story based on the following three examples of fairy tales."
Correct Answer: A) "Translate 'Hello' to Spanish." (without examples)
Rationale: Zero-shot means the model receives no examples; it must rely solely on its pre-
trained knowledge. The prompt provides no demonstrations of the desired input-output
pattern.
Question 9
Applications of Prompt Engineering – Objective Assessment
Complete Questions & Detailed Verified Answers
SECTION 1: FOUNDATIONS OF GENERATIVE AI AND
PROMPT ENGINEERING (Questions 1–60)
Question 1
What is an AI hallucination?
A) A language model generating plausible but false or misleading information
B) An AI system refusing to make predictions on unfamiliar input
C) An error in converting data types
D) A model failing to retrieve relevant knowledge from its database
Correct Answer: A) A language model generating plausible but false or misleading
information
Rationale: Hallucinations occur when Large Language Models generate factually incorrect
information that sounds grammatically correct and plausible. They are a significant
ethical concern because they can mislead users.
Question 2
When an AI generates a confident but completely false statement, such as inventing a
historical event, this is known as:
,A) Algorithmic bias
B) Data drift
C) Hallucination
D) Overfitting
Correct Answer: C) Hallucination
Rationale: Hallucinations occur when LLMs predict the next likely word without grounding
in factual or historical truth. The model produces content that is fluent and confident but
factually incorrect.
Question 3
Which prompt component is demonstrated when a user tells an AI, "You are an
independent teenager writing a play script"?
A) Output format
B) Persona
C) Instructions
D) Context
Correct Answer: B) Persona
Rationale: A persona assigns a specific role or character for the AI to adopt, which helps
tailor the tone and style of the output. Personas guide the model's voice and perspective.
Question 4
What is the primary risk of writing a "poor" or vague prompt for an AI-based search
tool?
A) Greater data usage
B) Opinion-based information
C) Imprecise results
D) Outdated results
Correct Answer: C) Imprecise results
,Rationale: Vague prompts lead to ambiguity, causing the AI to provide broad or irrelevant
results that do not meet the user's specific intent. Specificity and clarity are essential for
useful outputs.
Question 5
A company uses AI to analyze customer sentiment. One article cited by the AI model to
support a trend does not actually exist. This is an example of which ethical concern?
A) Privacy
B) Autonomy
C) Misinformation
D) Transparency
Correct Answer: C) Misinformation
Rationale: AI "hallucinations," where the model generates false but realistic-looking
information, fall under the ethical category of misinformation. Fabricated citations are a
common form of hallucination.
Question 6
What is the primary goal of prompt engineering in generative AI?
A) To write longer and more complex prompts
B) To maximize the likelihood of a desired model output
C) To reduce the number of model parameters
D) To train the model from scratch on new data
Correct Answer: B) To maximize the likelihood of a desired model output
Rationale: Prompt engineering focuses on designing inputs that guide a generative AI
model to produce accurate, relevant, and useful outputs without modifying the model's
weights. The goal is to elicit the best possible response through careful input design, not to
alter the underlying model.
, Question 7
What is prompt engineering?
A) The process of training a model on new data
B) The process of crafting and refining inputs to guide AI models toward desired
outputs
C) The process of reducing model size
D) The process of building neural networks
Correct Answer: B) The process of crafting and refining inputs to guide AI models
toward desired outputs
Rationale: Effective prompting improves accuracy, tone, and relevance in generative AI
responses. It is the practice of designing and iterating on prompts to achieve specific
outcomes.
Question 8
Which of the following is an example of a zero-shot prompt?
A) "Translate 'Hello' to Spanish." (without examples)
B) "Here is an example: 'Cat → Gato'. Now translate 'Dog'."
C) "Classify this sentiment: 'I love this' as positive or negative after reading 5 examples."
D) "Generate a story based on the following three examples of fairy tales."
Correct Answer: A) "Translate 'Hello' to Spanish." (without examples)
Rationale: Zero-shot means the model receives no examples; it must rely solely on its pre-
trained knowledge. The prompt provides no demonstrations of the desired input-output
pattern.
Question 9
