Practice test - Emerging Adulthood: Cognitive Development

Note: These questions are part of a larger data base of questions on Chapter 18 & are selected 
to represent the type of question you should expect on unit exam six. You can, in fact, expect 
to see many of these very same questions on that exam. Exam questions, however, may deal 
with topics not covered in the self tests or in lectures but are discussed in your textbook. 
You are responsible for the content of your text book plus the content of lectures, interactive 
activities, & material on the web site.

Use these sample questions to test yourself & to practice for the test.

1. The cognitive growth of adults is

•  characterized by questioning of everything & everyone.
 • unrelated to childhood cognition.
  • fostered by life situations in many contexts.
   • straightforward & direct.

2.  Early on the psychometric approach to cognition emphasized

•  the components of intelligence. 
 •  encoding, memory, & output. 
  •  he effects of life events. 
   •  developmental stages of cognitive growth.

3. Ed takes into account his subjective feeling & personal experience when solving a real life problem, He is using

•  formal thought.
 •  postformal thought.
  •  an absolutist approach.
   •  hypothetical deductive thinking.

4. Objective, logical thinking is NOT

 valued in the scientific method.
 sufficient to understand complex human interactions.
 involved in categorizing experiences in a stable & reliable way.
 useful in overcoming culture-bound perspectives.

5. Adult adaptive thought is

 combining objective & subjective approaches to real life problems.
 the ability to ignore subjective feelings& personal experience.
 the tendency to reason strictly according to basic premises.
 recognizing the explicit logic of a situation.

6. Postformal thought is

- the ability to characterize experience in a stable, reliable way.
- understanding that one's own perspective is one of many
  potentially valid views.
- objective, logical thinking that devalues personal experience.
- understanding that knowledge is an absolute.

7. Dialectical thinking involves

 a rejection of logical principles.
 the view that everything is relative.
 the integration of an idea with its opposite.
 a closed system with an inevitable outcome.

8. A dialectical thinker is likely to recognize the

 changing nature of human relationships.
 true nature of most relationships.
 insincerity of most human relationships.
 need to explain human actions logically.

9. According to James Rest's research, the most useful type of 
college experience

 allows a person to work first in order to learn to serve others.
 includes study abroad in order to foster learning a second language.
 involves problem-solving strategies used to deal with ethical issues.
 involves social interaction at parties.

10. According to Kohlberg to be capable of "truly ethical" reasoning a person must have

 faith & religious insight.
 a low tolerance for hypocrisy.
 the experience of failure & disillusionment.
 sustained responsibility for the welfare of others.

11. A detailed six stage description of the development of faith has
been proposed by

 Carol Gilligan.
 Lawrence Kohlberg.
 Gisela Labouvie-Vief.
 James Fowler.

12. The stage of faith that acknowledges paradox & transcendence is

•  Stage 2: Mythic-Literal. 
 •  Stage 3: Synthetic-Conventional. 
  •  Stage 4: Individual-Reflective. 
   •  Stage 5: Conjunctive. 

13. The Defining Issues Test (DIT) was developed by

 James Fowler.
 James Rest.
 Carol Gilligan.
 Lawrence Kohlberg.

14. Which correlates with almost every measure of adult cognition?

 years of education
 age
 sex
 SES

15. Which approach to studying cognitive development would be most likely to include tests that ask individuals
 to define the word elementary or make a design with blocks as shown on a picture?

•  stage approach 
 •  psychometric approach 
  •  information-processing approach 
   •  physiological approach

16. To promote cognitive growth colleges should

•  keep faculty student contact to a minimum. 
 •  rely on lecture & recitation in most classes. 
  •  emphasize learning with personal involvement. 
   •  keep the students out of the cultural life of the area..

17. Gilligan feels that Kohlberg's moral theory has gender bias & does not consider 
the _______ only the _______.

•  male; female 
 •  father; mother 
  •  "morality of care"; "morality of justice" 
   •  "morality of fright"; "morality of fight" 

18.  Which has the most influence on cognitive growth during college?

•  the educational background of the faculty 
 •  the student's major 
  •  whether the college is a two-year or four-year institution 
   •  amount of contact between students & between students & faculty

19. According to Gilligan's view of moral development

- women are more concerned about justice than relationships.
- more experienced people construct principles that are relative
  & changeable.
- as they grow older men become more extreme on rights & justice.
- men tend to put human needs above legal principles.

20. Traditional models of formal operational thinking value _____ thought and devalue _____ thought.

•  subjective; hypothetical 
 •  hypothetical; psychometric 
  •  objective; subjective 
   •  objective; psychometric

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                            Topics in Psychology
                               Robert C. Gates