Deck 4: Social Perception: How We Come to Understand Other People

Question 1

All of the following are nonverbal behaviors except

A)spoken words.
B)tone of voice.
C)facial expressions.
D)touch.

Answer 1

spoken words.

Question 2

Eva and her roommate haven't been getting along lately.Every time Eva enters the room,her roommate looks away and turns her body so that her back is to Eva.This example best illustrates the use of nonverbal behavior to

A)communicate personality traits.
B)express rational cognitions.
C)convey attitudes.
D)facilitate verbal communication.

Answer 2

convey attitudes.

Question 3

Professor Axelrod is interested in the effects of physical attractiveness on how others interpret the appearance and behaviors of attractive versus unattractive people.Professor Axelrod is most likely to be interested in

A)attribution theory.
B)lie detection.
C)social perception.
D)social encoding.

Answer 3

social perception.

Question 4

Sarah sees that her friend is crying,and then herself feels sadness.What is the neurological structure involved?

A)empathic neurons
B)mirror neurons
C)serotonin
D)the amygdala

Question 5

The authors of your text report a story of a homeless man who spent his only quarter to find out why a couple (whose love letters he'd read)had broken up.This story demonstrates

A)that homeless people make irrational decisions.
B)that people tend to be very nosey.
C)the idea that people are fascinated with the human condition.
D)the need people have for belonging.

Question 6

Mirror neurons are activated ____ when we see someone express emotion.

A)using controlled processes
B)after conscious deliberation
C)automatically
D)effortfully

Question 7

Sheila fancies herself an outgoing extrovert.She smiles a lot and gestures dramatically as she talks.This example best illustrates the use of nonverbal behavior to

A)convey attitudes.
B)facilitate verbal communication.
C)communicate personality traits.
D)express emotions.

Question 8

The basic type of information people use about others to form impressions and understand them is

A)intuition.
B)nonverbal behavior.
C)rational judgment.
D)reading their blogs.

Question 9

Karen is on the phone when her roommate enters the room.Karen signals to her roommate to be quiet by pointing to the phone,shaking her head,and placing a raised index finger in front of her mouth.This example illustrates the use of nonverbal communication to ____ verbal communication.

A)augment
B)substitute for
C)contradict
D)duplicate

Question 10

Mirror neurons are brain cells that respond when we perform actions and when

A)we are recognizing ourselves in the mirror.
B)we feel anger towards others.
C)we see someone else perform the same action.
D)we create mirror images of complex drawings.

Question 11

According to the authors of your text,people use social perception in order to figure people out as part of social survival,and also because

A)it is a skill in high demand by employers.
B)it makes us more likely to win if we are ever on a reality TV show.
C)it helps us empathize with people in distant countries.
D)it is enjoyable,and a form of entertainment.

Question 12

According to your textbook authors,the popularity of "reality" television is largely due to the fact that we

A)have an obsession with deviant behavior because it seems so "unreal" to us.
B)promote our own self-esteem by viewing ourselves as superior to the "losers" on those programs.
C)now perceive sitcoms as childish in comparison.
D)are fascinated with trying to figure other people out so we can better understand our social world.

Question 13

On your birthday,you arrive home and are overjoyed to find a large bouquet of flowers from your best friend.Your eyes grow wide and a broad smile crosses your face.You laugh in delight.This example best illustrates the use of nonverbal behavior to

A)convey attitudes.
B)communicate one's personality traits.
C)facilitate verbal communication.
D)express emotions.

Question 14

The neurological basis for feeling what others feel,empathy,lies in

A)the cerebellum.
B)the brain stem.
C)neurotransmitters.
D)mirror neurons.

Question 15

Nonverbal behavior is used for all of the following except

A)communicating one's personality traits.
B)conveying attitudes.
C)writing letters.
D)facilitating verbal communication.

Question 16

All we can see is other people's appearance and behavior,but we are most interested in trying to infer from this

A)why people behave the way they do.
B)when people will change their behavior.
C)whether people are happy or unhappy.
D)what people will do when they are alone.

Question 17

If a scientist were to examine an fMRI and see that the mirror neurons were active,what would she be unable to distinguish in that person's mental processes?

A)whether the person was looking in a mirror or at a photo of him or herself
B)whether they were looking at a mirror image or true copy of a photograph
C)whether the person was using their left or right eye to view a face
D)whether the person was feeling sadness or seeing someone else experience sadness

Question 18

According to the authors of your text,humans are able to communicate nonverbally,as are

A)dogs.
B)turtles.
C)rabbits.
D)horses.

Question 19

____ is defined as how we form impressions of and make inferences about other people.

A)Attribution theory
B)Social perception
C)Social inference
D)Social encoding

Question 20

According to the authors,it's not easy to understand and explain other people's behaviors because

A)other people intentionally hide their motivations and intentions.
B)social behavior is often random.
C)we have access only to observable behaviors.
D)we are hopelessly biased by our own motivations.

Question 21

If a person has mirror neurons that are damaged or missing,he or she would most likely have trouble

A)recognizing his or her own face in the mirror.
B)recognizing other people in the mirror.
C)recognizing symmetry.
D)feeling empathy.

Question 22

According to research conducted by Susskind and his colleagues (2008)presented by the authors of your text,the expression of fear involves facial movements which

A)decrease visual input.
B)increase sensory input.
C)lower arousal.
D)enhance hearing.

Question 23

All of the following are among the six universally recognized facial expressions reported by Ekman except

A)sadness.
B)fear.
C)anger.
D)guilt.

Question 24

Jessica smiles to convey that she is happy.Jessica's smile is a way of ____ the emotion of happiness.

A)encoding
B)decoding
C)verbalizing
D)perceiving

Question 25

Research by Becker and his colleagues (2007)presented by the authors of your text,found that it was easier for people to decode the emotion of ____ in men.

A)surprise
B)anger
C)happiness
D)disgust

Question 26

The six major facial expressions discussed in the text are widely considered to be

A)universal.
B)culture specific.
C)developmentally determined.
D)primate specific.

Question 27

Larry sees a group of people weeping,with frowns on their faces and their eyes turned down.Larry ____ their expressions to understand that they are feeling sadness.

A)encodes
B)decodes
C)recodes
D)misinterprets

Question 28

According to the authors of your text,how good are people generally at noticing or interpreting "leaked" facial expressions?

A)It can be difficult.
B)It cannot possibly be done.
C)It is a skill anyone can learn.
D)Everyone already does this naturally.

Question 29

Based on research by Becker and his colleagues (2007)about decoding emotions presented by the authors of your text,which person's expression would be the easiest to decode?

A)Ann's expression of anger
B)Jake's expression of happiness
C)Robert's expression of disgust
D)Amanda's expression of happiness

Question 30

According to research conducted by Susskind and his colleagues (2008)presented by the authors of your text,when people make the facial expression of disgust,it involves

A)decreasing input from the senses.
B)increasing sensory input.
C)heightened arousal.
D)sensitized taste and smell.

Question 31

Express is to ____ as interpret is to ____.

A)encode; decode
B)decode; encode
C)encode; emit
D)emit; encode

Question 32

When people communicate using nonverbal behavior,they typically use

A)their eyes.
B)their hands.
C)their tone of voice.
D)multiple channels.

Question 33

Research presented by the authors of your text by Edman (2003,2006)suggests that when someone is trying to suppress an emotion,it is often leaked by

A)telling the emotion as a secret.
B)posting it on Facebook.
C)being coerced by an authority figure.
D)nonverbal behaviors.

Question 34

When people ask questions,the pitch of their voices typically goes up at the end of the sentence to signal others that a response is expected.This phenomenon best illustrates the use of nonverbal behavior to

A)communicate personality traits.
B)express emotion.
C)convey attitudes.
D)facilitate verbal communication.

Question 35

Darwin believed that emotional expressions began as ____ that came to have evolutionary value because they ____.

A)physiological reactions; convey emotional states to other members of the species
B)physiological reactions; increased the efficiency of bodily reactions
C)communication devices; increased the efficiency of bodily reactions
D)random mutations; convey expectations to other members of the species

Question 36

According to the authors of your text,how people communicate-intentionally or unintentionally-without words is the definition of

A)gestures.
B)automatic communication.
C)nonverbal communication.
D)social perception.

Question 37

According to research conducted by Susskind and his colleagues (2008)presented by the authors of your text,the emotions of ____ and ____ involve opposite facial muscle movements.

A)fear; disgust
B)happiness; sadness
C)anger; surprise
D)pride; shame

Question 38

Based on evidence presented by the authors of your text,the facial expression for disgust is adaptive because it

A)allows people to taste more sensitively.
B)decreases the intensity of disgusting sensations.
C)increases the chances people will detect poisons or pathogens in food.
D)actually decreases the likelihood someone will become ill from eating spoiled food.

Question 39

Based on the information in your text about research by Becker and his colleagues (2007)on decoding emotions,complete the analogy: men: ____:: ____: happiness.

A)sadness; children
B)disgust; elderly
C)anger; women
D)surprise; women

Question 40

Based on the idea that nonverbal behaviors may be more honest than words,the Transportation Agency implemented a program in which they deployed hundreds of security agents to

A)read concealed emotions on faces of passengers at airports.
B)use nonverbal behaviors to help with interrogation of prisoners.
C)decode facial expressions of videos produced by Al-Qaeda (a terrorist group).
D)train officers to have an unreadable "poker face."

Question 41

Nora has been blind since birth,and has never seen a smile,frown,or furrowed brow.At age three,how capable would she be of expressing emotions using the facial expressions of sighted people?

A)Incapable of properly using facial expressions,she would require special training.
B)She would be capable of expressing only negative emotions such as anger or sadness.
C)She would be able to express all six basic emotions just as well as sighted people.
D)It depends on what culture she is being reared in.

Question 42

Paul Ekman and Walter Friesen (1971)collected convincing evidence that facial expressions are universal.In their research,they studied

A)blind people who smile,even though they have never seen a smile.
B)a preliterate tribe in an isolated part of New Guinea.
C)infants before they learned to talk.
D)facial expressions on five different continents.

Question 43

Paul Ekman and his colleagues have identified ____ universal facial expressions in their research.

A)three
B)six
C)nine
D)twelve

Question 44

Chantelle's family is hosting a Japanese exchange student,Yukiko,at their home for a year.Chantelle notices that Yukiko hides her smile behind her hands.After reading Chapter 4 (Social Perception),Chantelle learns that Yukiko hides her smile because

A)Japanese norms discourage men and women from smiling.
B)she wants to conform to American display rules.
C)Japanese norms discourage Japanese women from showing broad smiles.
D)in Japan,smiles signal feelings of superiority.

Question 45

All of the following except the fact that ____ can interfere with people's ability to decode others' facial expressions.

A)some facial expressions are affect blends
B)people sometimes try to hide their emotions
C)there are cultural differences when emotions are displayed
D)nonverbal behavior is often multichannel

Question 46

Although certain facial expressions are easily encoded and decoded across members of the human species,display rules

A)signal that culture is important,too.
B)dictate whether to encode or decode a given expression.
C)dictate that we should hide our embarrassment.
D)signal whether we should pay attention to verbal or nonverbal behaviors.

Question 47

The authors of your text suggest that even infants express the six major emotions.However,some emotions such as pride or shame cannot be expressed until children have learned that

A)certain foods do not taste good and can make you physically ill.
B)they will not always get their way,no matter how much they plead.
C)their parents will not always comfort them when they encounter a problem.
D)there are consequences for matching or not matching the expectations of others.

Question 48

____ are culture-specific norms that dictate what kinds of emotional expression is allowed.

A)Nonverbal rules
B)Expressive norms
C)Display rules
D)Encoding rules

Question 49

Recent research suggests that the expression for the emotion of contempt may be

A)only found in Western cultures.
B)easily confused with anger.
C)only decoded by adults.
D)another universal emotion.

Question 50

Your sister comes in and announces that she has just gotten engaged to the man she has been dating for the past two months.You feel a mix of surprise,happiness,and concern,and this shows on your face.The expression your face displays is known as a(n)

A)affect blend.
B)emotional mix.
C)confusing facial display.
D)contradictory facial expression.

Question 51

Students in the United States seldom applaud after a lecture,whereas students in Europe often applaud or rap their knuckles on their desks.This cultural difference reflects the power of ____ to influence nonverbal communication.

A)display rules
B)emblems
C)encoding
D)politeness norms

Question 52

Harry is a child who recently learned that there are consequences when he fulfills the expectations set forth by his parents.Which emotion is Harry most likely to have recently begun experiencing?

A)happiness
B)pride
C)disgust
D)fear

Question 53

Recall that Paul Ekman and Walter Friesen (1971)have demonstrated that Fore tribespeople from a preliterate culture in New Guinea were able to decode facial expressions of Westerners and encode emotion easily interpretable by Westerners.Their findings suggest that Darwin was

A)right-facial expressions are species specific.
B)wrong-facial expressions are culture specific.
C)right-facial expressions are culture specific.
D)wrong-facial expressions are universal among humans.

Question 54

Based on information from the authors of your text,who would be more likely to express a feeling of shame publicly?

A)Ken,from an individualist culture
B)Tran,a man from a collectivist culture
C)Lisa,from an individualist culture
D)Nanami,a woman who grew up in both individualist and collectivist cultures

Question 55

If you use the internet,you are probably familiar with emoticons: facial expressions displayed using a combination of typographic figures,e.g.,:-)for a smile.Asian countries have their own set of emoticons; in these (which are viewed without having to turn one's head),there are different smiling facial figures for a man smiling (^_^)and a woman smiling (^ .^),since in Japan,women are not supposed to exhibit a wide,uninhibited smile.This difference between the men's and women's emoticons in Japan is due to a(n)

A)emblem.
B)display rule.
C)affect blend.
D)decoding difference.

Question 56

According to the authors of your text,individuals from a(n) ____ culture would be less likely to express feelings of shame in public.

A)collectivist
B)third-world
C)individualist
D)Eastern

Question 57

Sarah,a student at an American university,has just arrived in Bolivia for a study year abroad.When meeting her host parents,she notices that they stand very close to her as they speak.She feels uncomfortable until she realizes that

A)they have different cultural norms concerning the use of space.
B)she is just nervous about her trip.
C)their emblem use differs from her own.
D)social roles are different in Latin America.

Question 58

Ingrid has had a few interactions with Chinese students at her college and thinks that they are "hard to read" because they do not use facial expressions "clearly" relative to Americans she interacts with.Such experiences illustrate

A)women's inability to decode emotions.
B)women's inability to encode emotions.
C)differences in display rules.
D)the use of emblems.

Question 59

Contemporary researchers have collected evidence that naturalist Charles Darwin (1872)was correct when he asserted that facial expressions are

A)culture specific.
B)location specific.
C)species specific.
D)feeling specific.

Question 60

____ refers to a facial expression in which one part of the face registers one emotion and another part of the face registers a different emotion.

A)Ambivalence display
B)Dissembling
C)Deception
D)Affect blend

Question 61

Gestures that have a clear meaning within a culture-but which may not be universally understood-are called

A)display rules.
B)decoded displays.
C)encoded displays.
D)emblems.

Question 62

On a visit to Australia,then-President George H.W.Bush offended the Australians when he flashed the two- fingered "peace sign" to a crowd.This is an example of how the use of ____,which vary from culture to culture,may lead to confusion or conflict if used outside of the user's culture.

A)emblems
B)display rules
C)political gaffe
D)paralanguage

Question 63

When decoding the Social Interpretations Task (SIT),which clues are key for decoders pay attention to?

A)cues are diffused; there are several
B)facial expressions
C)gestures
D)tone of voice

Question 64

Judy forms a circle with her thumb and forefinger to communicate to her sister that everything is okay.Although in America this is a common gesture,it may be interpreted differently elsewhere in the world.What kind of gesture is this?

A)display rule
B)emblem
C)hand-purse
D)universal

Question 65

Implicit personality theories are strongly influenced by and tied to

A)idiosyncratic beliefs.
B)instincts.
C)cross-cultural universals.
D)culture.

Question 66

According to the authors of your text,why do they call email communication an "impoverished medium of communication"?

A)People are too liberal with their grammar.
B)It relies on words alone.
C)It has reduced the English language to acronyms such as LOL and BRB.
D)People receive too many emails to read any of them very carefully.

Question 67

"Computer nerds" are widely held to be socially awkward,introverted,unpopular,and obsessed with anything related to technology.This description represents a(n)

A)personality heuristic.
B)implicit personality theory.
C)subjective inference.
D)idiosyncratic schema.

Question 68

Watching a man and a woman at the park,using multi-channel nonverbal clues,how would you know whether or not they are a romantic couple?

A)amount of eye contact
B)how close they are to each other
C)smiling and facial expressions
D)all of these

Question 69

Based on research by Archer and Akert (1980)presented in your text,how well do people do at the Social Interpretations Task (SIT)? They get about ____ correct.

A)33 percent
B)50 percent
C)64 percent
D)95 percent

Question 70

Robin Akert and Dane Archer (1991,1998)have found that participants who view and decode interactions in the Social Interpretations Task (SIT)perform significantly better than chance when answering such questions as "Which woman is the mother of the baby?" According to these researchers,people do relatively well because

A)actors in the interactions are not good at deception.
B)multichannel nonverbal information is diffused throughout each scene.
C)participants pay close attention to facial expressions.
D)actors' nonverbal communication often contradicts their language.

Question 71

An implicit personality theory is a type of

A)schema.
B)norm.
C)self-construal.
D)role.

Question 72

Kruger and colleagues (2005)conducted a study examining how well people decoded messages transmitted face-to-face,by voice only,or via email.Based on the results of this study,who did better at decoding the emotional statements,regardless of how they were transmitted?

A)complete strangers
B)trained communications experts
C)close friends of the sender
D)everyone did about the same

Question 73

When communicating via email,people may add ____ as a substitute for nonverbal cues,in an attempt to clarify their words.

A)move verbs
B)more adjectives and adverbs
C)emoticons
D)punctuation

Question 74

Political commentator and humorist Molly Ivens made "Bubba" famous.Bubba is a loud,beer-drinking,swaggering man,simple in his tastes and thinking.This constellation of "Bubba traits" represents a(n)

A)personality type.
B)subjective inference.
C)implicit personality theory.
D)causal attribution.

Question 75

The authors of your text discuss a study by Kruger and colleagues (2005)examining how well people decoded messages conveyed face-to-face,by voice only,or via email.Which mode of communication was least accurate?

A)They were all decoded equally accurately.
B)email
C)voice only
D)face-to-face

Question 76

An implicit personality theory is

A)a belief about the relative importance of the conscious and unconscious in determining people's behavior.
B)an unconsciously held belief about what one's own traits are.
C)a framework for understanding others' unconscious motivations.
D)a schema about which traits tend to co-occur in people.

Question 77

The Social Interpretations Task (SIT)is a research tool used by Archer and Akert and discussed in your text.Which is the best description of the SIT?

A)a videotape of scenes of natural nonverbal behavior that subjects are asked questions about
B)a series of social tasks that subjects are asked to do,such as flirting,or lying
C)Subjects are asked to interact with several different types of people and rated on how well-liked they were.
D)Subjects are interviewed,and their nonverbal behaviors are coded (posture,gestures,eye movements).

Question 78

How are implicit personality theories developed?

A)They are instinctual.
B)They are universal and therefore "hardwired" in the brain.
C)over time and with experience
D)using information from authority figures

Question 79

When we make inferences about someone's personality based on what we already know about some characteristics,we are using a(n)

A)implicit personality theory.
B)blank filling procedure.
C)implicit heuristic.
D)inferential statistic.

Question 80

Based on information from your text about how accurately people decode messages transmitted different ways,if you have an emotionally laden message to convey accurately,which mode of communication is likely to lead to the worst decoding?

A)face-to-face
B)voice only
C)email
D)sign language