Chapter 1: PSYCHOLOGY AND SCIENTIFIC THINKING
Critical Thinking Questions
1) Illustrate how the confirmation bias has created a problem for a friend or family
member in the past.
Answer: Answers will vary but should include the following information for full
credit.
--Student should mention the basic idea of the confirmation bias (seek out supportive
evidence but fail to seek out, ignore, or distort contradictory information).
--Student should clearly and correctly identify a situation where they observed an
individual using the confirmation bias and how the person came to an erroneous
conclusion.
Question ID: Lil 2ce 1.5-1
Difficulty: 3
Page Ref: 10
Topic: Psychology as a Science
Skill: Application
2) Explain how the principles of critical thinking can assist a person in making more
informed, and hopefully more accurate decisions, in one's everyday life.
Answer: Answers will vary but should include at least four of the following ideas for
full credit.
--The principle of falsifiability helps to inform us of the kinds of questions that we can
ask and actually find a scientific answer.
, --The principle of parsimony reminds us to focus on the simplest explanation with the
fewest assumptions as being the best.
--The principles of replicability and extraordinary claims requiring extraordinary
evidence address the ability to verify other people's claims (we need concurrence from
independent sources) and that this is especially true when our claims contradict what is
“known.”
--Extraordinary claims also require stronger evidence because they are asking us to put
aside our current beliefs in favour of a new theory that explains both the known and
the new information we have gathered.
--We need to have gathered the evidence in such a way that our
explanation/understanding is the only possible rational reason for the data (Ruling out
rival hypotheses).
--We must remember that just because two things are related doesn't mean that one
caused the other (third variable explains each and the relationship we observe comes
from that).
Question ID: Lil 2ce 1.5-2
Difficulty: 3
Page Ref: 22-27
Topic: A Basic Framework for Scientific Thinking
Skill: Applied
3) Demonstrate a time that you fell victim to at least one of the following logical fallacies
(bandwagon fallacy emotional reasoning fallacy, or not me fallacy) and how it
negatively affected the quality of your decision on that occasion.
Answer: Answers will vary but should contain the following information for full
credit.
,--Student clearly and correctly identifies at least one of the fallacies listed above in
his/her answer, according to the definitions provided.
The emotional reasoning fallacy is the error of using our emotions as guides for
evaluating the validity of a claim (some psychologists also refer to this error as the affect
heuristic; Slovic & Peters, 2006).
The bandwagon fallacy is the error of assuming that a claim is correct just because many
people believe it.
The not me fallacy is the error of believing that we’re immune from errors in thinking
that afflict other people.
--Student provides supportive detail to show how the fallacy negatively affected them.
Question ID: Lil 2ce 1.5-3
Difficulty: 2
Page Ref: 18-20
Topic: What is Pseudoscience?
Skill: Applied
, Chapter 1: PSYCHOLOGY AND SCIENTIFIC THINKING
Essay Questions
1) Evaluate critically the kind of information that one gains from common sense.
Answer: Answers will vary but should contain information from the following
sections of Chapter 1 for full credit.
--Much of common sense is demonstrably incorrect.
--We often believe contradictory ideas with equal strength in their accuracy
(which leads to commonsense proverbs being unfalsifiable).
--Naive realism and logical fallacies mentioned in the text are used to buttress
claims of the accuracy of common sense (appeals to authority, argument from
antiquity fallacy, bandwagon fallacy).
--Confirmation bias and belief perseverance allow us to continue to hold
erroneous beliefs because we only look for supportive evidence (confirmation
bias) and we refuse to modify/correct our false beliefs (belief perseverance).
Question ID: Lil 2ce 1.4-1
Diff: 3
Type: ES
Page Ref: 6-7, 10-11, 19
Topic: Why We Can’t Always Trust Our Common Sense
Skill: Conceptual
Critical Thinking Questions
1) Illustrate how the confirmation bias has created a problem for a friend or family
member in the past.
Answer: Answers will vary but should include the following information for full
credit.
--Student should mention the basic idea of the confirmation bias (seek out supportive
evidence but fail to seek out, ignore, or distort contradictory information).
--Student should clearly and correctly identify a situation where they observed an
individual using the confirmation bias and how the person came to an erroneous
conclusion.
Question ID: Lil 2ce 1.5-1
Difficulty: 3
Page Ref: 10
Topic: Psychology as a Science
Skill: Application
2) Explain how the principles of critical thinking can assist a person in making more
informed, and hopefully more accurate decisions, in one's everyday life.
Answer: Answers will vary but should include at least four of the following ideas for
full credit.
--The principle of falsifiability helps to inform us of the kinds of questions that we can
ask and actually find a scientific answer.
, --The principle of parsimony reminds us to focus on the simplest explanation with the
fewest assumptions as being the best.
--The principles of replicability and extraordinary claims requiring extraordinary
evidence address the ability to verify other people's claims (we need concurrence from
independent sources) and that this is especially true when our claims contradict what is
“known.”
--Extraordinary claims also require stronger evidence because they are asking us to put
aside our current beliefs in favour of a new theory that explains both the known and
the new information we have gathered.
--We need to have gathered the evidence in such a way that our
explanation/understanding is the only possible rational reason for the data (Ruling out
rival hypotheses).
--We must remember that just because two things are related doesn't mean that one
caused the other (third variable explains each and the relationship we observe comes
from that).
Question ID: Lil 2ce 1.5-2
Difficulty: 3
Page Ref: 22-27
Topic: A Basic Framework for Scientific Thinking
Skill: Applied
3) Demonstrate a time that you fell victim to at least one of the following logical fallacies
(bandwagon fallacy emotional reasoning fallacy, or not me fallacy) and how it
negatively affected the quality of your decision on that occasion.
Answer: Answers will vary but should contain the following information for full
credit.
,--Student clearly and correctly identifies at least one of the fallacies listed above in
his/her answer, according to the definitions provided.
The emotional reasoning fallacy is the error of using our emotions as guides for
evaluating the validity of a claim (some psychologists also refer to this error as the affect
heuristic; Slovic & Peters, 2006).
The bandwagon fallacy is the error of assuming that a claim is correct just because many
people believe it.
The not me fallacy is the error of believing that we’re immune from errors in thinking
that afflict other people.
--Student provides supportive detail to show how the fallacy negatively affected them.
Question ID: Lil 2ce 1.5-3
Difficulty: 2
Page Ref: 18-20
Topic: What is Pseudoscience?
Skill: Applied
, Chapter 1: PSYCHOLOGY AND SCIENTIFIC THINKING
Essay Questions
1) Evaluate critically the kind of information that one gains from common sense.
Answer: Answers will vary but should contain information from the following
sections of Chapter 1 for full credit.
--Much of common sense is demonstrably incorrect.
--We often believe contradictory ideas with equal strength in their accuracy
(which leads to commonsense proverbs being unfalsifiable).
--Naive realism and logical fallacies mentioned in the text are used to buttress
claims of the accuracy of common sense (appeals to authority, argument from
antiquity fallacy, bandwagon fallacy).
--Confirmation bias and belief perseverance allow us to continue to hold
erroneous beliefs because we only look for supportive evidence (confirmation
bias) and we refuse to modify/correct our false beliefs (belief perseverance).
Question ID: Lil 2ce 1.4-1
Diff: 3
Type: ES
Page Ref: 6-7, 10-11, 19
Topic: Why We Can’t Always Trust Our Common Sense
Skill: Conceptual
