SOLVED

161) Many claims of ESP have been refuted since, under controlled conditions, the claimants have been unable to reproduce the alleged abilities. This an example of the failure to a. accurately communicate. b. achieve falsifiability. c. achieve parsimony. d. replicate. 162) If a researcher’s initial findings that a particular relationship or effect exists are not reliably demonstrated by other independent researchers, how are these initial findings thought of in the discipline of psychology? a. As a deliberate, unethical attempt to falsify one’s data b. As a hoax or scam c. As an error or fluke in research d. As a real phenomenon that exists for some gifted people but not for everyone 163) Researchers who have questioned the effectiveness of eye movement desensitisation and reprocessing (EMDR) therapy argue that supporters have failed to consider that patients are being administered exposure therapy at the same time as EMDR. Further, the apparent effectiveness of EMDR is due to this exposure and not the eye movements. This example is most related to what principle of critical thinking? a. Ruling out rival hypotheses b. Falsifiability c. Correlation versus causation d. Occam’s razor 164) The principle of parsimony is to _________________ as the third-variable problem is to ________________. a. Oberg’s dictum; ruling out rival hypotheses b. falsifiability; replicability c. Occam’s razor; correlation versus causation d. extraordinary claims; scientific skepticism 165) Chandra was reading in bed, and dozing off while doing so, when she suddenly thought she saw something that looked like a ghost standing over the end of her bed. However, she remembered what she learned in her psychology class about hypnagogic imagery during the initial stages of sleep and concluded that she had not seen a ghost. In this example, Chandra is most STRONGLY relying on what principle of critical thinking? a. Falsifiability b. Ruling out rival hypotheses c. Replicability d. Occam’s razor 166) Principles of critical thinking are to _________________ as the warning signs of pseudoscience are to _______________. a. exaggerated claims; ruling out rival hypotheses b. falsifiability; ad hoc immunizing c. lack of self-correction; overreliance on anecdotes d. connectivity; psychobabble 167) The key take-home message from the author’s discussion of crop circles is that a. the cause of some real-world events are unexplainable and unknowable. b. hoaxers often impede scientific progress into the understanding of unexplainable events like the English crop circles. c. aliens or some form of extraterrestrial being has been trying to communicate with humans for hundreds of years. d. critical thinkers must select the simpler of two claims that fit with the available evidence. 168) In the natural world, there often are many different factors associated with the occurrence of a particular outcome. Therefore it is important that we as critical thinkers ________ whenever possible. a. create unfalsifiable theories b. propose complex statements of causation c. rule out competing explanations d. remember that correlation equals causation 169) Suppose a child watches an adult throw a doll at the wall, immediately followed by a harsh scolding by another adult. When left alone with the doll, the child does not play with it aggressively. Before you reach a conclusion that the child has learned that aggressive behaviour leads to a scolding, you think that perhaps the child simply did not learn the aggressive behaviour and thus couldn’t demonstrate it. By this, you have demonstrated the need to a. create unfalsifiable theories b. create parsimonious theories c. rule out competing explanations d. remember that correlation equals causation 170) A basic error that nearly all beginning psychology students make is to assume that a. simple theories are preferred to complex ones. b. research questions or theories must be falsifiable. c. good theories make safe, not risky, predictions. d. correlation is causation.