Chapter: Chapter 06: Memory Strategies and Metacognition
Multiple Choice
1. Which of the following research topics has implications concerning the use of memory improvement strategies?
a) divided attention
b) levels of processing
c) encoding specificity
d) All of the above are correct.
Ans: d
Feedback: See pages 172 - 174
2. According to the total time hypothesis, the amount of material a person learns depends on the total amount of time he or she:
a) devotes to learning the material.
b) devotes to learning new mnemonic strategies.
c) spends daydreaming about the task.
d) engages in dreaming the night before a test.
Ans: a
Feedback: See page 176
3. Which of the following is NOT a memory strategy suggest by your textbook for emphasizing practice?
a) The Beneficial Multitasking Effect
b) The Testing Effect
c) The Distributed-Practice Effect
d) The Total-Time Hypothesis
Ans: a
Feedback: See pages 176 - 177
4. The testing effect refers to the finding that:
a) taking a test is an excellent way to enhance a person’s long-term recall of academic material.
b) evidence for the total time hypothesis relies mainly on laboratory tests of long-term memory.
c) a person who takes a test is likely to misremember information later if he or she makes many mistakes on the test.
d) mnemonics are of little or no use when a person is taking a test on some academic material.
Ans: a
Feedback: See page 177
5. The general term referring to the use of mental strategies to improve a person’s memory is:
a) imagery.
b) total time.
c) self-reference.
d) mnemonics.
Ans: d
Feedback: See page 178
6. Mnemonics are devices to improve memory. Which of the following did your book suggest is a useful mnemonic technique?
a) imagery
b) organization
c) force
d) Both A and B.
Ans: d
Feedback: See pages 178 - 182
7. Which of the following aspects plays an important role in the success of memory-improvement techniques?
a) imagery
b) organization
c) chunking
d) All of the above are correct.
Ans: d
Feedback: See pages 179 - 182
8. In an early experiment (Bower & Winzenz, 1970), people were asked to learn pairs of words (e.g., soap-mermaid). Some people were told to repeat the pairs silently to themselves (repetition condition), whereas other people were told to construct an image of the two words in vivid interaction with each other (imagery condition). A major finding was that:
a) people in the repetition condition studied for relatively less total time because they found the task tedious and difficult.
b) people in the imagery condition studied for relatively less total time because they found the task tedious and difficult.
c) people in the repetition condition subsequently recalled more of the items than did people in the imagery condition.
d) people in the imagery condition subsequently recalled more of the items than did people in the repetition condition.
Ans: d
Feedback: See page 179
9. Examples of mnemonics that emphasize the important role of organization include using:
a) the keyword method, the method of loci, and distribution of practice.
b) chunking, hierarchies, the first-letter technique, and the narrative technique.
c) a shopping list, an alarm clock, a Post-it note, and a personal data assistant.
d) the "three Ms"--metacognition, metamemory, and mindfulness.
Ans: b
Feedback: See pages 180 - 182
10. The term prospective memory refers to:
a) remembering a past event, such as something you did last night.
b) remembering a fact that will be explicitly tested in the future.
c) remembering to do something in the future.
d) All of the above are correct.
Ans: c
Feedback: See page 183
11. What subtype of long-term memory is associated with remembering to do something in the future?
a) episodic memory
b) implicit memory
c) prospective memory
d) semantic memory
Ans: c
Feedback: See pages 183 - 185
12. The use of an external memory aid (such as a shopping list, an alarm clock, a Post-it note, or a personal data assistant) is especially helpful in a situation that involves:
a) retrospective memory.
b) prospective memory.
c) proactive interference.
d) retroactive interference.
Ans: b
Feedback: See page 185
13. The term metacognition is used to refer in a general way to a person's:
a) knowledge about different kinds of mnemonic techniques.
b) awareness of the limited-capacity nature of the components of working memory.
c) knowledge and control of his or her cognitive processes.
d) knowledge of facts, principles, and techniques in a particular domain of expertise.
Ans: c
Feedback: See page 188
14. A person’s knowledge of, monitoring of and control over their own memory is known as
a) metacognition
b) metacomprehension
c) metamemory
d) metacontrol
Ans: c
Feedback: See page 189
15. In one recent study (Dunning and his coauthors, 2003), students took a sophomore-level psychology test, and then they estimated the score that they thought they had obtained. The results showed that:
a) all students were underconfident in estimating how well they had done.
b) all students were overconfident in estimating how well they had done.
c) students with above-average scores estimated their scores fairly accurately, but students with below-average scores were overconfident in estimating how well they had done.
d) students with above-average scores were overconfident in estimating how well they had done, but students with below-average scores estimated their scores fairly accurately.
Ans: c
Feedback: See page 190
16. Metamemory, such as your knowledge of your knowledge of psychology while you are studying for a test is
a) better after a few minutes delay.
b) always accurate.
c) most accurate when assessed immediately after studying.
d) atrocious.
Ans: a
Feedback: See pages 191 - 192
17. Compared to people without Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), people with ADHD are:
a) no more likely to overestimate their total score on memory tests.
b) more poorly calibrated than people without ADHD when estimating their memory performance on an item-by-item basis.
c) spend much less time than necessary studying items they already know, and much more time studying items they have not yet mastered.
d) All of the above are correct.
Ans: a
Feedback: See pages 192 - 193
18. When students are allowed to study various items at their own pace, they tend to spend:
a) an equal amount of time studying items they already know and studying items they have not yet mastered.
b) more time studying items they already know and less time studying items they have not yet mastered.
c) more time than necessary studying items they already know, and not enough time studying items they have not yet mastered.
d) more time than necessary studying relatively difficult items, and not enough time studying relatively easy items.
Ans: c
Feedback: See pages 195 - 196
19. In one recent study, researchers found that when students are studying material under conditions of time pressure, they tend to study:
a) relatively easy material, which they are especially likely to master, instead of relatively difficult material.
b) moderately difficult material, apparently reasoning that they will remember the easiest material and not remember the most difficult material.
c) only the most difficult material, apparently reasoning that they will remember the least difficult material.
d) easy, moderately difficult, and very difficult material an approximately equal amount of time.
Ans: a
Feedback: See page 196
20. "The signs of it were unmistakable; he would appear to be in mild torment, something like the brink of a sneeze, and if he found the word his relief was considerable." This quotation is a good description of:
a) a mnemonic phenomenon.
b) an orthographic familiarity phenomenon.
c) a semantic-priming phenomenon.
d) a tip-of-the-tongue phenomenon.
Ans: d
Feedback: See page 197
21. The subjective experience of knowing the target word, but being unable to recall it at the moment is known as
a) the tip-of-the-tongue effect.
b) the adjacent phoneme effect.
c) the elephant-in-the-room phenomenon.
d) the missing-word conundrum.
Ans: a
Feedback: See page 197
22. One aspect of metacognition involves a person's ability to predict whether he or she will be able to correctly recognize the correct answer to a question (when the answer is not able to be recalled). This kind of judgment involves:
a) mnemonic strategies.
b) the feeling of knowing.
c) the self-reference effect.
d) metacomprehension.
Ans: b
Feedback: See page 199
23. The feeling-of-knowing effect is associated with activity in the
a) cingulate gyrus.
b) right prefrontal cortex.
c) left prefrontal cortex.
d) substantia innominata.
Ans: c
Feedback: See page 200
24. Studies of the accuracy of metacomprehension, such as involving college students as participants, reveal that:
a) college students are not very accurate in their metacomprehension skills.
b) students with high metacomprehension skills usually do not do well on tests of reading comprehension.
c) in most cases, students are highly underconfident in their answers to reading comprehension questions.
d) All of the above are correct.
Ans: a
Feedback: See page 200