Exam 3: Genes, Evolution, and Environment

Most psychologists would agree that the evolutionary history of our species accounts for our:

Match these definitions with the appropriate term. -The full set of genes in each cell of an organism (with the exception of sperm and egg cells).

Children not exposed to adult language may invent a language of their own.

________ is defined as an innate mental module that allows young children to develop language if they are exposed to an adequate sampling of conversation.

In order to study for her psychology exam, Nikiah is making index cards listing tendencies and characteristics that are either present at birth in all humans or develop rapidly during maturation. Which of the following will NOT be in her list?

A psychologist wants to investigate whether there are patterns in the ways that young children combine words, focusing on unique patterns that adults would never use. Use your knowledge of research methods to design a study to research this topic.

Research in the United States indicates that the concentration of lead in black children's blood is 10% to 15% higher than in white children's blood.

A sociobiologist is likely to contend that evolution has bred into each of us a tendency to act in ways that maximize our chances of passing on our genes.

The human genome is estimated to contain about ________ genes.

All of the following methods are used in assessing heritability EXCEPT the:

Raw scores on IQ tests have been falling steadily in developed countries for the past several generations.

In a massive cross-cultural study of 10 000 people in 37 cultures across the world, human sexual attitudes and behaviours did not correspond to the predictions of sociobiologists.

Sociobiologists state that males are choosy in their choice of sexual partners.

Behavioural-genetic studies have shown that as adopted children grow into adulthood, the correlation between their IQ scores and those of their biologically unrelated family members is about 0.45.

Which of the following is NOT an innate human characteristic?

Heritability is defined as a statistical estimate of the proportion of the total variance in some trait that is attributable to genetic differences among individuals within a group.

Sociobiology is an interdisciplinary field that emphasizes evolutionary explanations of social behaviour in animals, including human beings.

For children and adolescents, heritability estimates average around 0.50; that is, about half of the variance in IQ scores is explainable by genetic differences.

The scores of identical twins reared apart are more highly correlated than the scores of fraternal twins reared together.

________, the basic units of heredity, are located on ________, rod-shaped structures found in the nucleus of every cell of the body.