Social Cognition – practice exam (self-made)
Lecture 1: History & Concepts
1. What does the “turning ballerina” illusion primarily illustrate?
A) Depth perception in relation to motion parallax
B) The influence of cultural bias on memory
C) Cognitive dissonance in ambiguous images
D) The construction of visual reality due to missing depth cues
2. What best defines social cognition?
A) The study of emotional reactions in group settings
B) The analysis of instinctive behaviors across species
C) The way people construct and interpret social reality based on internal processes
D) The measurement of observable responses to stimuli
3. In the Fukushima study, why did Alex and Corinna react so differently to the same news
event?
A) They were primed with different news sources
B) They had different cognitive traits and motivational styles
C) They lived in different countries
D) Alex had access to more accurate risk data
4. What characterizes phenomenological research in psychology?
A) It is based on hypothesis testing and experimental control
B) It systematically analyzes public policy effectiveness
C) It describes subjective experiences without assessing their accuracy
D) It focuses solely on biological correlates of thought
5. Why did the Pepsi commercial with Kendall Jenner backfire, according to this lecture?
A) It violated advertising ethics
B) It neglected insights from social cognition
C) It supported controversial political ideologies
D) It contained misinformation about product benefits
6. What is a core assumption of behaviorism?
A) Behavior results from reinforcement and not from conscious thought
B) Emotions are the foundation of all cognitive processing
C) Cognitions are reliable predictors of behavior
D) Social norms override individual preferences
7. Which methodological advancement was introduced during the cognitive revolution?
A) Inferring mental states through observable behavior and experimental control
B) Survey-based assessments of emotional reactions
C) Eliminating measurement of mental states entirely
D) Conditioning-based reinforcement schedules
,8. In Festinger’s dissonance study, why did the $1 group rate the task more positively than
the $20 group?
A) They were more motivated by external rewards
B) They experienced greater self-persuasion to resolve cognitive dissonance
C) They misunderstood the purpose of the study
D) They had prior positive attitudes toward repetitive tasks
9. Which of the following best illustrates normative social influence?
A) Adjusting behavior to gain accurate information
B) Accepting majority opinion to enhance memory recall
C) Changing beliefs based on expert advice
D) Following group behavior to avoid social rejection
10. What does the term homo oeconomicus refer to in the context of cognitive psychology?
A) A person driven entirely by unconscious impulses
B) An individual governed by norms rather than utility
C) A rational decision-maker who maximizes outcomes and avoids biases
D) A consumer who prefers fast decision-making over reflection
Lecture 2: Memory
11. What is shallow encoding, as studied by Ebbinghaus?
A) Memory formed without meaningful context
B) Encoding that occurs during traumatic experiences
C) The process of retrieving procedural memory
D) Encoding that enhances semantic storage
12. What was a key finding in the source monitoring study?
A) Presentation frequency had no effect on memory recall
B) Imagining an event had no impact on memory accuracy
C) Strength of encoding influences recall accuracy
D) Repetition decreases memory clarity
13. What is a phantom flashbulb memory?
A) A vivid and perfectly accurate memory of a traumatic event
B) A false memory based on suggestion and logical inference
C) A long-term memory stored in procedural systems
D) An episodic memory created through physical stimulus
14. In the studies on person description, incongruent information is better remembered
because:
A) It is easier to understand
B) It is processed at a shallow cognitive level
C) It matches prior schemas
D) It is unexpected and attracts attention
, 15. Which factor increases the impact of incongruent information in memory?
A) Schema saturation
B) Set size
C) Emotional valence
D) Degree of incongruency
16. According to schema theory, schema-inconsistent information is processed via:
A) Top-down processing and assimilation
B) Episodic memory channels
C) Shallow encoding and affective bias
D) Bottom-up processing and accommodation
17. What does the “framing effect” in memory studies demonstrate?
A) People forget emotionally neutral content
B) The wording of a question can influence memory
C) Participants always recall true details
D) Memory improves when expectations are met
18. What percentage of participants in a childhood memory study falsely recalled an event
suggested to them?
A) 70%
B) 90%
C) 25%
D) 40%
19. What best describes the persistence effect?
A) A tendency to forget corrected misinformation
B) Resistance of misinformation to correction
C) Temporary influence of neutral framing
D) Weakening of memory over time
20. Which of the following is true about pre-bunking strategies?
A) They involve warning and refutational pre-emption
B) They only work when misinformation is absent
C) They weaken memory encoding
D) They are less effective than debunking
Lecture 3: Heuristics & Biases
21. What is a heuristic, according to this lecture?
A) A psychological error that leads to faulty moral reasoning
B) A rational algorithm for maximizing utility
C) A cognitive shortcut or rule-of-thumb used in decision-making
D) A physiological reaction to stress under uncertainty
Lecture 1: History & Concepts
1. What does the “turning ballerina” illusion primarily illustrate?
A) Depth perception in relation to motion parallax
B) The influence of cultural bias on memory
C) Cognitive dissonance in ambiguous images
D) The construction of visual reality due to missing depth cues
2. What best defines social cognition?
A) The study of emotional reactions in group settings
B) The analysis of instinctive behaviors across species
C) The way people construct and interpret social reality based on internal processes
D) The measurement of observable responses to stimuli
3. In the Fukushima study, why did Alex and Corinna react so differently to the same news
event?
A) They were primed with different news sources
B) They had different cognitive traits and motivational styles
C) They lived in different countries
D) Alex had access to more accurate risk data
4. What characterizes phenomenological research in psychology?
A) It is based on hypothesis testing and experimental control
B) It systematically analyzes public policy effectiveness
C) It describes subjective experiences without assessing their accuracy
D) It focuses solely on biological correlates of thought
5. Why did the Pepsi commercial with Kendall Jenner backfire, according to this lecture?
A) It violated advertising ethics
B) It neglected insights from social cognition
C) It supported controversial political ideologies
D) It contained misinformation about product benefits
6. What is a core assumption of behaviorism?
A) Behavior results from reinforcement and not from conscious thought
B) Emotions are the foundation of all cognitive processing
C) Cognitions are reliable predictors of behavior
D) Social norms override individual preferences
7. Which methodological advancement was introduced during the cognitive revolution?
A) Inferring mental states through observable behavior and experimental control
B) Survey-based assessments of emotional reactions
C) Eliminating measurement of mental states entirely
D) Conditioning-based reinforcement schedules
,8. In Festinger’s dissonance study, why did the $1 group rate the task more positively than
the $20 group?
A) They were more motivated by external rewards
B) They experienced greater self-persuasion to resolve cognitive dissonance
C) They misunderstood the purpose of the study
D) They had prior positive attitudes toward repetitive tasks
9. Which of the following best illustrates normative social influence?
A) Adjusting behavior to gain accurate information
B) Accepting majority opinion to enhance memory recall
C) Changing beliefs based on expert advice
D) Following group behavior to avoid social rejection
10. What does the term homo oeconomicus refer to in the context of cognitive psychology?
A) A person driven entirely by unconscious impulses
B) An individual governed by norms rather than utility
C) A rational decision-maker who maximizes outcomes and avoids biases
D) A consumer who prefers fast decision-making over reflection
Lecture 2: Memory
11. What is shallow encoding, as studied by Ebbinghaus?
A) Memory formed without meaningful context
B) Encoding that occurs during traumatic experiences
C) The process of retrieving procedural memory
D) Encoding that enhances semantic storage
12. What was a key finding in the source monitoring study?
A) Presentation frequency had no effect on memory recall
B) Imagining an event had no impact on memory accuracy
C) Strength of encoding influences recall accuracy
D) Repetition decreases memory clarity
13. What is a phantom flashbulb memory?
A) A vivid and perfectly accurate memory of a traumatic event
B) A false memory based on suggestion and logical inference
C) A long-term memory stored in procedural systems
D) An episodic memory created through physical stimulus
14. In the studies on person description, incongruent information is better remembered
because:
A) It is easier to understand
B) It is processed at a shallow cognitive level
C) It matches prior schemas
D) It is unexpected and attracts attention
, 15. Which factor increases the impact of incongruent information in memory?
A) Schema saturation
B) Set size
C) Emotional valence
D) Degree of incongruency
16. According to schema theory, schema-inconsistent information is processed via:
A) Top-down processing and assimilation
B) Episodic memory channels
C) Shallow encoding and affective bias
D) Bottom-up processing and accommodation
17. What does the “framing effect” in memory studies demonstrate?
A) People forget emotionally neutral content
B) The wording of a question can influence memory
C) Participants always recall true details
D) Memory improves when expectations are met
18. What percentage of participants in a childhood memory study falsely recalled an event
suggested to them?
A) 70%
B) 90%
C) 25%
D) 40%
19. What best describes the persistence effect?
A) A tendency to forget corrected misinformation
B) Resistance of misinformation to correction
C) Temporary influence of neutral framing
D) Weakening of memory over time
20. Which of the following is true about pre-bunking strategies?
A) They involve warning and refutational pre-emption
B) They only work when misinformation is absent
C) They weaken memory encoding
D) They are less effective than debunking
Lecture 3: Heuristics & Biases
21. What is a heuristic, according to this lecture?
A) A psychological error that leads to faulty moral reasoning
B) A rational algorithm for maximizing utility
C) A cognitive shortcut or rule-of-thumb used in decision-making
D) A physiological reaction to stress under uncertainty
