Developmental psychologists today generally view genes and environment as interacting rather than as separate, competing influences.
Correct Answer
True
True. Genes shape how people experience their environments, and experiences influence how genes are expressed, so nature and nurture work together.
Category: Issues in Development
Question 2
Piaget proposed that children's thinking differs from adults' only in the amount of information they know, not in the kind of thinking they use.
Correct Answer
False
False. Piaget argued that children think in qualitatively different ways from adults, which is why he described development as a series of distinct stages.
Category: Cognitive and Moral Theories
Question 3
In Piaget's theory, accommodation means changing an existing schema so it fits new information.
Correct Answer
True
True. When new information does not fit an existing mental framework, the child revises the framework or creates a new one, which Piaget called accommodation.
Category: Cognitive and Moral Theories
Question 4
Children in the preoperational stage typically understand that pouring water into a taller, thinner glass does not change its amount.
Correct Answer
False
False. Preoperational children usually lack conservation and say the taller glass holds more. Understanding that the amount stays the same develops in the concrete operational stage.
Category: Cognitive and Moral Theories
Question 5
Research by Renée Baillargeon suggested that young infants understand how objects behave earlier than Piaget believed.
Correct Answer
True
True. Baillargeon found that infants as young as 3 months looked surprised at physically impossible events, suggesting that some object knowledge appears earlier than Piaget proposed.
Category: Cognitive and Moral Theories
Question 6
Kohlberg found that most adults eventually reach the postconventional level of moral reasoning.
Correct Answer
False
False. Kohlberg held that postconventional reasoning, based on universal ethical principles, requires formal operational thought and that only a few people fully reach it.
Category: Cognitive and Moral Theories
Question 7
No amount of alcohol is considered safe to drink during pregnancy.
Correct Answer
True
True. Alcohol is a teratogen, and because no safe amount has been established, pregnant people are advised not to drink at all. Heavy prenatal drinking can cause fetal alcohol spectrum disorders.
Category: Prenatal Development
Question 8
The germinal stage of prenatal development lasts from about week 9 until birth.
Correct Answer
False
False. The germinal stage covers only the first two weeks after conception. The period from week 9 until birth is the fetal stage.
Category: Prenatal Development
Question 9
The Moro reflex is a newborn's response to a sensation of falling, in which the arms extend outward and then pull back in.
Correct Answer
True
True. The Moro reflex is one of several newborn reflexes, along with rooting, sucking and grasping, that usually fade within the first several months.
Category: Infancy and Childhood
Question 10
The rooting reflex causes a newborn to grip tightly any object placed in the palm of the hand.
Correct Answer
False
False. Gripping an object in the palm is the grasping reflex. The rooting reflex is turning the head toward a touch on the cheek, which helps the baby find the nipple.
Category: Infancy and Childhood
Question 11
By about 18 months, many toddlers recognize themselves in a mirror and will touch a spot of paint placed on their own nose.
Correct Answer
True
True. Passing this mirror test is taken as a sign that a child has begun to develop a self-concept, an awareness of being a separate individual.
Category: Infancy and Childhood
Question 12
In Ainsworth's research, avoidant attachment was the most common pattern among infants.
Correct Answer
False
False. Secure attachment was the most common pattern and is considered the healthiest. Avoidant infants showed little reaction to separation and reunion.
Category: Infancy and Childhood
Question 13
Theory of mind, the understanding that other people have their own beliefs and knowledge, typically develops between about ages 3 and 5.
Correct Answer
True
True. Around these ages children come to understand that someone else can believe something different from what they know to be true, a skill often shown with false-belief tasks.
Category: Infancy and Childhood
Question 14
Secondary sex characteristics are the reproductive organs themselves, such as the ovaries and testes.
Correct Answer
False
False. The reproductive organs are primary sex characteristics. Secondary sex characteristics are other physical changes of puberty, such as breast development, facial hair and a deeper voice.
Category: Adolescence and Adulthood
Question 15
The frontal lobes, which support judgment, planning and impulse control, are still developing into early adulthood.
Correct Answer
True
True. The frontal lobes mature later than many other brain areas, which may help explain why adolescents take more risks than adults.
Category: Adolescence and Adulthood
Question 16
Research shows that most adolescents have intense, constant conflict with their parents, as G. Stanley Hall's storm and stress view predicted.
Correct Answer
False
False. Most teenagers have only minor conflicts with their parents. Hall's idea of adolescence as a time of constant storm and stress is not supported for the majority of teens.
Category: Adolescence and Adulthood
Question 17
Jeffrey Arnett proposed emerging adulthood as a stage between adolescence and full adulthood that is marked by identity exploration in work and love.
Correct Answer
True
True. Arnett described emerging adulthood as a distinct period in which young people explore possibilities before settling into adult roles such as career, marriage and parenthood.
Category: Adolescence and Adulthood
Question 18
Fluid intelligence, which includes processing speed and reasoning about new problems, typically increases in late adulthood.
Correct Answer
False
False. Fluid intelligence declines in late adulthood, while crystallized intelligence, the store of accumulated knowledge, holds steady or improves.
Category: Adolescence and Adulthood
Question 19
Socioemotional selectivity theory proposes that older adults have smaller social networks but relationships that are as close as or closer than before.
Correct Answer
True
True. Laura Carstensen proposed that as people age they focus on fewer, more emotionally meaningful relationships, so networks shrink while closeness is maintained.
Category: Adolescence and Adulthood
Question 20
A health care proxy is a written document that lists which medical treatments a person does or does not want at the end of life.
Correct Answer
False
False. That document is a living will, one type of advance directive. A health care proxy is a person appointed to make medical decisions if the patient cannot speak for themselves.
Category: Death and Dying