1. a BETTA Is a Kind of FISH, Which Is a Kind of ANIMAL. Which Category Level Is Exemplified

Chapter 8: Student Questions

1. A BETTA is a kind of FISH, which is a kind of ANIMAL. Which category level is exemplified by BETTA?

a. Superordinate

b. Basic level

c. Subordinate

d. Nominal

2. Concepts that are based on definitions set by humans, e.g., PRIME NUMBER, are known as ______concepts.

a. nominal

b. artifactual

c. natural-kind

d. fuzzy

3. Which of the following theories claims that concepts are structured around a prototype, with degree of membership determined by degree of overlapping features?

a. Classica View

b. Family Resemblance theory

c. Exemplar View

d. Psychological Essentialism

4. Bruner, Goodnow, and Austin (1956) presented people with stimuli that varied in shape, color, and number of figures on each card. People received feedback only on whether the training cards were IN or OUT of the category. They found it was easier for people to learn “feature A + feature B” (e.g., red + 3 figures) than “feature A or B” (e.g., green OR 1 figure). In other words, it was easier for people to learn ______than ______categories.

a. family resemblance; exemplar

b. classical; family resemblance

c. disjunctive; conjunctive

d. conjunctive; disjunctive

5. We sometimes use qualifying statements to indicate that an item is a peripheral member of a category. For example, we might say, “Technically, an olive is a fruit;” such statements are known as:

a. linguistic hedges.

b. characteristic features.

c. defining features.

d. context effects.

6. Historically, when a monarch (king or queen) has died, people have awardedthe kingdom to the son (or daughter), because people believed there was something “king-like” within that family that could be passed on through generations (even if people did not understand exactly what that “king-like” substance or trait was). Which theory best explains people’s reasoning in this case?

a. Family resemblance

b. Exemplar

c. Ad hoc categories

d. Psychological essentialism

7. Malt (1994) studied people’s judgments about instances of WATER versus non-WATER. What did she find?

a. All items judged to contain at least 51% H2O were deemed to be in the category, WATER.

b. All items judged to contain at least 75% H2O were deemed to be in the category WATER, whereas items 74% and below were non-WATERS.

c. Even though WATER was known to be H2O, people still judged instances of water on a graded structure

d. Because all things that count as “water” must contain H2O, subjects did not make any distinctions among whether some WATERS were better than others

8. In the Hierarchical Model of Semantic Memory proposed by Collins and Quillian (1969), which of the following should be FASTEST to verify?

a. A Salmon is a Fish.

b. A Salmon is an Animal.

c. A Salmon has skin.

d. A Shark is an Animal.

9. Many researchers have suggested that the ______level of categories is the most useful and informative one. For example, studies have found that this is the level used when adults label things for children (Brown, 1958), and that people list the largest number of attributes for category members within that level.

a. superordinate

b. basic level

c. subordinate

d. nominal

10. Patients with semantic amnesia often have trouble identifying, or retrieving information about, objects in one category but not another. For instance, they may be unable to recognize living things (e.g., animals), but perform well when recognizing nonliving things (e.g., furniture, tools). How do Caramazza and Shelton (1998) explain why there are different levels of impairment for living versus nonliving things in these patients?

a. Animals are often very similar to each other since many walk on four legs, have a tail, and so forth. This within-category similarity leads to more impairment with living things than nonliving things.

b. Information about living things is more dependent on sensory information, especially visual features, so that damage to parts of the brain that store visual information should lead to greater impairment of living things.

c. Information about living versus nonliving things has evolved to be represented in anatomicallydistinct parts of the brain.

d. Familiarity; we are exposed to nonliving things in our daily life (e.g., furniture) more than we are to living things (e.g., animals from all over the world).