Psychology GRE Subject Test UPDATED
Questions and CORRECT Answers
psychopsychics - CORRECT ANSWER - the subfield of psychology devoted to the study
of physical stimuli and their interaction with sensory systems.
Ex. Psychical stimuli and the sensations produced from them.
signal detection theory - CORRECT ANSWER - Signal detection theory is a method of
differentiating a person's ability to discriminate the presence and absence of a stimulus (or
different stimulus intensities) from the criterion the person uses to make responses to those
stimuli.
Ex. hearing a siren while on busy street, snapping out of being zoned out when teacher calls your
name/says curse word
attention (4 types) - CORRECT ANSWER - 1. selective - attending to one stimulus when
others are present
2. divided - attending to multiple stimulus at the same time
3. sustained - attending to specific stimulus over a long period
4. alternating - regulating oneself to focus on one thing at a time but switching between them
perceptual organization (gestalt principles) - CORRECT ANSWER - The way our senses
interpret information and make it meaningful.
similarity - grouping of either auditory or visual stimuli such as dots separated with different
colors
continuation - when things are lined up we tend to assume they have correlation of randomly
placed things
closure - brains filling in empty information such as a halfway drawn circle being perceived as a
full one
proximity - grouping things we see that are spaced apart such as two columns of dots being a
little further apart than each dot in the column
, common region - grouping things together that are in the same enclosed space despite relativity
to any other thing outside the space.
symmetry & order (prägnanz) - brains will see the simplest form of the object such as the
olympic sign being a bunch of circles not curved lines.
Vision - CORRECT ANSWER - Occipital lobe of the cerebrum
Hemeralopia - inability to see clearly in bright light
Nyctalopia (night blindness) - the inability to see clearly in low light.
Macular degeneration - the blurring of the middle of eyesight
Glaucoma - damage of optic nerve
Cataract - cloudy areas in lens of eyes
audition - CORRECT ANSWER - the ability of an organism to sense sound and to process
and interpret the sensations to gain information about the source and nature of the sound.
Gustation - CORRECT ANSWER - the perception of sensations that are usually described
as having 1 or more basic taste qualities: sweet, salty, sour, bitter, or umami (savory/brothy)
Olfaction - CORRECT ANSWER - smells that bring of connected memories
Somatosenses - CORRECT ANSWER - a network of neurons that help humans recognize
objects, discriminate textures, generate sensory-motor feedback and exchange social cues.
vestibular sense - CORRECT ANSWER - including the sense of balance
kinesthetic sense - CORRECT ANSWER - the sense of body position and movement of
body parts relative to each other
Questions and CORRECT Answers
psychopsychics - CORRECT ANSWER - the subfield of psychology devoted to the study
of physical stimuli and their interaction with sensory systems.
Ex. Psychical stimuli and the sensations produced from them.
signal detection theory - CORRECT ANSWER - Signal detection theory is a method of
differentiating a person's ability to discriminate the presence and absence of a stimulus (or
different stimulus intensities) from the criterion the person uses to make responses to those
stimuli.
Ex. hearing a siren while on busy street, snapping out of being zoned out when teacher calls your
name/says curse word
attention (4 types) - CORRECT ANSWER - 1. selective - attending to one stimulus when
others are present
2. divided - attending to multiple stimulus at the same time
3. sustained - attending to specific stimulus over a long period
4. alternating - regulating oneself to focus on one thing at a time but switching between them
perceptual organization (gestalt principles) - CORRECT ANSWER - The way our senses
interpret information and make it meaningful.
similarity - grouping of either auditory or visual stimuli such as dots separated with different
colors
continuation - when things are lined up we tend to assume they have correlation of randomly
placed things
closure - brains filling in empty information such as a halfway drawn circle being perceived as a
full one
proximity - grouping things we see that are spaced apart such as two columns of dots being a
little further apart than each dot in the column
, common region - grouping things together that are in the same enclosed space despite relativity
to any other thing outside the space.
symmetry & order (prägnanz) - brains will see the simplest form of the object such as the
olympic sign being a bunch of circles not curved lines.
Vision - CORRECT ANSWER - Occipital lobe of the cerebrum
Hemeralopia - inability to see clearly in bright light
Nyctalopia (night blindness) - the inability to see clearly in low light.
Macular degeneration - the blurring of the middle of eyesight
Glaucoma - damage of optic nerve
Cataract - cloudy areas in lens of eyes
audition - CORRECT ANSWER - the ability of an organism to sense sound and to process
and interpret the sensations to gain information about the source and nature of the sound.
Gustation - CORRECT ANSWER - the perception of sensations that are usually described
as having 1 or more basic taste qualities: sweet, salty, sour, bitter, or umami (savory/brothy)
Olfaction - CORRECT ANSWER - smells that bring of connected memories
Somatosenses - CORRECT ANSWER - a network of neurons that help humans recognize
objects, discriminate textures, generate sensory-motor feedback and exchange social cues.
vestibular sense - CORRECT ANSWER - including the sense of balance
kinesthetic sense - CORRECT ANSWER - the sense of body position and movement of
body parts relative to each other
