Cognition Practice

Raj, a four-year-old child, learned to open the door to a classroom by pulling on the handle. Now whenever he approaches any door he pulls on the handle and is confused when that does not work. This is best explained by

• mental set

• divergent thinking

• algorithm

• functional fixedness

Achariya is lost. She quickly scans the crowd and decides to ask an elderly woman for directions because she believes the woman will be kind. Which method of problem solving did Achariya most likely use?

• divergent thinking

• availability heuristic

• representative heuristic

• algorithm

Bailey and Marcus packed everything they thought they would need for a weekend camping trip. When it rained and they realized they had not brought rain gear, Bailey said, “I knew we should have packed raincoats!” Bailey’s thinking illustrates which of the following concepts?

• prospective memory

• algorithm

• representative heuristic

• hindsight bias

When Cory is given a logic problem to solve, he systematically tries every possible solution until he finds the correct answer. Cory’s strategy is to use

• a heuristic

• a mnemonic

• an algorithm

• an insight

When confronted with the sequence “__N __” at the end of a word in a crossword puzzle, Tony inserts the letters “I” and “G” in the two blanks because that procedure has often led to the correct answer in previous puzzles. This example illustrates the use of

• a prototype

• a heuristic

• mental rotation

• grammar

Denny does not have wrapping paper to use to wrap a birthday present, and so he decides to use colorful newspaper comics instead. Denny’s solution demonstrates that he has overcome

• mental set

• cognitive dissonance

• functional fixedness

• anchoring bias

Creativity is most closely associated with which of the following?

• Convergent thinking

• Divergent thinking

• Interpersonal intelligence

• Intrapersonal intelligence

Piper reads about someone described as adventurous and extroverted. She then judges that this person is more likely to be a lawyer who enjoys hiking than a lawyer who does not. The best explanation for Piper’s error is that she is basing her judgment on

• the availability heuristic

• the anchoring-and-adjustment heuristic

• confirmation bias

• the representativeness heuristic

Jim has seen reports of a number of cases of Ebola on the news. He is more afraid of contracting Ebola than tuberculosis, even though the risk of infection of tuberculosis is greater than that of Ebola. Jim’s fear would most likely be attributed to

• the representative heuristic

• the availability heuristic

• functional fixedness

• an illusory correlation

Martine needs a hammer but cannot find one. As she looks around her apartment, her gaze passes over a metal paperweight and some other objects that could potentially serve as a makeshift hammer. However, she is so focused on these objects' typical uses that she does not think to use any of them as a hammer. Martine is experiencing which of the following?

• The Hawthorne effect

• Mental set

• Functional fixedness

• The fundamental attribution error