Question 1

Coincidences are extremely striking,and often lead people to believe in ________.The ease with which we think of coincidences makes them important players in the ______ heuristic.

Accepted Answer

Coincidences often lead people to perceive connections or correlations between events that are not actually related, which is known as illusory correlations. The availability heuristic is a mental shortcut that relies on immediate examples that come to a person's mind when evaluating a specific topic, concept, method, or decision, making coincidences stand out because they are memorable and thus easily thought of.

Question 2

Suppose you hear about a friend who graduated from college in dramatic arts.Suppose you also judge her to be more likely to be both selling insurance and active in community theater than she is to be only selling insurance.You have

Accepted Answer

The description of the friend's background suggests that she is involved in both selling insurance and community theater, which is more specific than just selling insurance. This is an example of the conjunction fallacy, which occurs when people judge the likelihood of a combined event to be higher than one of the individual events.

Question 3

In your book's example,you read a list of names and then tried to recall how many started with J;if you tended to overestimate the number of J names,it was probably due to the effects of _______ on the use of the _______ heuristic.

Accepted Answer

The tendency to overestimate the number of names starting with J is likely due to the familiarity effect on the availability heuristic, where familiar or easily recalled instances are perceived as more frequent.

Question 4

Credit card companies' practice of providing you with a minimum payment on your monthly bill likely influences payments to the companies' advantage.This influence occurs,at least in part,due to

Accepted Answer

The practice of providing a minimum payment on the monthly bill is an example of anchoring and adjustment heuristic. The minimum payment acts as an anchor or reference point for the customer, who is then likely to make a payment close to or above that amount, rather than paying off the entire balance. This benefits the credit card company as it results in the customer paying interest on the remaining balance, thereby increasing the company's profits.

Question 5

A pet phrase of sports announcers that refers to situations in which it seems a player can do no wrong (a quarterback completing all his pass attempts in a half or a basketball player making all his three point attempts in a quarter)is called

Accepted Answer

The phrase used by sports announcers described in the question is called a "hot hand." It refers to the belief that a player is on a streak of success and is likely to continue to perform well. This belief has been studied in the field of psychology, with some research suggesting that the hot hand may be a misconception and that success in the past does not necessarily guarantee success in the future.

Question 6

Reasoning from a stereotype is most closely related to this heuristic:

Accepted Answer

Reasoning from a stereotype is most closely related to the representativeness heuristic, which is the tendency to judge the likelihood of an event or person based on the extent to which it resembles a typical example or prototype. Stereotyping involves making assumptions based on characteristics that are typically associated with a particular group or category, which is similar to how the representativeness heuristic works.

Question 7

Our tendency to avoid situations in which many people may be killed while simultaneously being relatively impervious to risky situations in which deaths are more spread out is called

Accepted Answer

The described tendency is known as "dread risk," the fear of catastrophic events that could result in many deaths, which people tend to avoid. However, people tend to be less sensitive to risky situations with a lower probability of a catastrophic outcome, even if those situations may lead to many deaths in aggregate (i.e., spread out over time and space). Therefore, dread risk is the most appropriate term to describe this phenomenon. The other options, anchoring, fatality fear, and fatal risk assessment, are not related to this concept.

Question 8

Suppose you had somebody guess how a sequence of 10 coin flips would play itself out (e.g. ,THTHHHTHHT).If people did this task,they would tend to ____ the number of alternations,due to their reliance on the ______ heuristic.

Accepted Answer

The representativeness heuristic is the tendency to judge the probability or likelihood of an event by how similar it is to a typical example or prototype. In the context of coin flips, people may assume that a sequence with a lot of alternations (e.g. HTHTHTHTHT) is more representative of random chance than a sequence with fewer alternations (e.g. TTTTHHHHHH). Therefore, they would tend to overestimate the number of alternations in a sequence of coin flips.

Question 9

The "Madden jinx" is the purported tendency for a person to perform poorly after being touted on the yearly version of the popular video game.Our perception of this outcome as a "jinx" is due to

Accepted Answer

The "Madden jinx" is often attributed to regression toward the mean, where an athlete's performance naturally fluctuates and may return to average levels after an exceptional season, rather than being caused by appearing on the game's cover.

Question 10

The belief that after a run of bad luck a change is due to occur is called

Accepted Answer

The belief that after a run of bad luck, a change is due to occur is called gambler's fallacy, which is the mistaken belief that if something happens more frequently than usual during a given period, then it will happen less frequently in the future, or vice versa. This belief is irrational and has no basis in statistical or probabilistic principles.

Question 11

Intuitively,it seems that spacing out instances of a given concept or rule would make it ______ to learn the concept/rule.Research conducted by Kornell and Bjork (2008)_______ this intuition,revealing that ______ repetitions led to better learning.

Accepted Answer

The answer of Intuitively,it seems that spacing out instances of...

Question 12

Which of these everyday sayings defines the hindsight effect?

Accepted Answer

The saying "I could have told you that was going to happen" relates to the hindsight effect, which is the tendency to believe, after an event has occurred, that one would have predicted or expected that event beforehand.

Question 13

When you ask people what caused more deaths - accidents and homicides or strokes and diabetes - people will guess accidents and homicides,even though it is strokes and diabetes (and it's not even really close).This is most likely due to

Accepted Answer

The availability heuristic is the cognitive bias where people tend to estimate the likelihood of an event based on how easily examples of it come to mind. In this case, people may have heard more news stories or have personal experiences with accidents and homicides, making them believe it is more common than strokes and diabetes which are not as readily available in their memory.

Question 14

Hastie,Schkade,and Payne (1999)looked at the hindsight bias in the context of mock civil litigation.In a foresight condition,participants were told that a dangerous situation was developing along a railroad line,and given an extensive set of facts,were then asked to estimate the foreseeability of an accident.In the hindsight condition,participants were given the same set of facts,but were told the accident had already occurred.They were also asked to predict the foreseeability of the accident.Participants in the hindsight condition were more likely than those in the foresight condition to judge the defendant as

Accepted Answer

Participants in the hindsight condition were more likely to judge the defendant as liable, reckless, and disregarding grave risk. Therefore, the best choice is D, all of these.

Question 15

The more recently something has happened,the _____ likely it is to affect our judgment,due to

Accepted Answer

The availability heuristic refers to our tendency to rely on easily available information when making decisions or judgments. More recent events are more easily available in our memory, so they are more likely to influence our judgment.

Question 16

When your best friend divorces,her mother tells her,"I'm sorry for you,but I knew this would eventually happen.You were never really right for each other." This is an example of the

Accepted Answer

This statement from the friend's mother is an example of hindsight bias because she is claiming to have predicted the divorce all along, despite not necessarily having evidence to support that claim. It is easy to believe that one could have predicted an outcome after the fact, but this bias can lead to an overconfidence in one's own predictive abilities.

Question 17

When people estimate confidence intervals,they tend to provide intervals that are too ____,thus showing

Accepted Answer

When people estimate confidence intervals, they often do so with too much certainty, meaning the intervals they provide are too narrow. This reflects overconfidence in their knowledge or estimates.

Question 18

Vivid news reports that highlight the danger of serial killers,terrorist threats,and toxic substances in food may heighten public concern beyond a level that's reasonable due to

Accepted Answer

The availability heuristic refers to the tendency for people to base their judgments and decisions on the easily and readily available examples or information in their memory. Vivid news reports about danger can create a perception of the issue being more common or prevalent than it actually is, leading to heightened public concern beyond what is reasonable.

Question 19

People tend to ignore the base rate of some occurrence in the population in making their judgments.For example,they assume anyone over 6 feet,6 inches tall must have played a lot of basketball,even though the majority of individuals have not played much basketball.This is a prime example of

Accepted Answer

This scenario describes the use of the representativeness heuristic, where individuals make judgments based on how well a particular observation or event matches their mental prototype or stereotype of that category. In this case, the stereotype is that tall people tend to be good at basketball, even though the actual base rate of basketball players in the population is much lower.

Question 20

When we make judgments,we often have to do so in the absence of information or computational skill.Because of this,we must often rely on

Accepted Answer

When we don't have enough information or computational skills to make an accurate judgment, we often rely on heuristics, or mental shortcuts, to guide our decision-making. Heuristics are useful in speeding up the decision-making process, but they can also lead to errors and biases. Premises are assumptions or propositions that serve as the basis for an argument or inference. Problem space refers to the set of possible solutions or approaches to a problem, while algorithms are step-by-step procedures for solving a problem. While these concepts may be useful in decision-making, they do not specifically relate to the act of making judgments in the absence of information or skill.

Quiz 11: Judgments and Decisions

Coincidences are extremely striking,and often lead people to believe in __.The ease with which we think of coincidences makes them important players in the heuristic.

Suppose you hear about a friend who graduated from college in dramatic arts.Suppose you also judge her to be more likely to be both selling insurance and active in community theater than she is to be only selling insurance.You have

In your book's example,you read a list of names and then tried to recall how many started with J;if you tended to overestimate the number of J names,it was probably due to the effects of _ on the use of the _ heuristic.

Credit card companies' practice of providing you with a minimum payment on your monthly bill likely influences payments to the companies' advantage.This influence occurs,at least in part,due to

A pet phrase of sports announcers that refers to situations in which it seems a player can do no wrong (a quarterback completing all his pass attempts in a half or a basketball player making all his three point attempts in a quarter) is called

Reasoning from a stereotype is most closely related to this heuristic:

Our tendency to avoid situations in which many people may be killed while simultaneously being relatively impervious to risky situations in which deaths are more spread out is called

Suppose you had somebody guess how a sequence of 10 coin flips would play itself out (e.g. ,THTHHHTHHT) .If people did this task,they would tend to the number of alternations,due to their reliance on the __ heuristic.

The "Madden jinx" is the purported tendency for a person to perform poorly after being touted on the yearly version of the popular video game.Our perception of this outcome as a "jinx" is due to

The belief that after a run of bad luck a change is due to occur is called

Intuitively,it seems that spacing out instances of a given concept or rule would make it __ to learn the concept/rule.Research conducted by Kornell and Bjork (2008) _ this intuition,revealing that ____ repetitions led to better learning.

Which of these everyday sayings defines the hindsight effect?

When you ask people what caused more deaths - accidents and homicides or strokes and diabetes - people will guess accidents and homicides,even though it is strokes and diabetes (and it's not even really close) .This is most likely due to

The more recently something has happened,the _____ likely it is to affect our judgment,due to

When your best friend divorces,her mother tells her,"I'm sorry for you,but I knew this would eventually happen.You were never really right for each other." This is an example of the

When people estimate confidence intervals,they tend to provide intervals that are too ____,thus showing

Vivid news reports that highlight the danger of serial killers,terrorist threats,and toxic substances in food may heighten public concern beyond a level that's reasonable due to

People tend to ignore the base rate of some occurrence in the population in making their judgments.For example,they assume anyone over 6 feet,6 inches tall must have played a lot of basketball,even though the majority of individuals have not played much basketball.This is a prime example of

When we make judgments,we often have to do so in the absence of information or computational skill.Because of this,we must often rely on

Quiz 11: Judgments and Decisions

Coincidences are extremely striking,and often lead people to believe in ________.The ease with which we think of coincidences makes them important players in the ______ heuristic.

Suppose you hear about a friend who graduated from college in dramatic arts.Suppose you also judge her to be more likely to be both selling insurance and active in community theater than she is to be only selling insurance.You have

In your book's example,you read a list of names and then tried to recall how many started with J;if you tended to overestimate the number of J names,it was probably due to the effects of _______ on the use of the _______ heuristic.

Credit card companies' practice of providing you with a minimum payment on your monthly bill likely influences payments to the companies' advantage.This influence occurs,at least in part,due to

A pet phrase of sports announcers that refers to situations in which it seems a player can do no wrong (a quarterback completing all his pass attempts in a half or a basketball player making all his three point attempts in a quarter) is called

Reasoning from a stereotype is most closely related to this heuristic:

Our tendency to avoid situations in which many people may be killed while simultaneously being relatively impervious to risky situations in which deaths are more spread out is called

Suppose you had somebody guess how a sequence of 10 coin flips would play itself out (e.g. ,THTHHHTHHT) .If people did this task,they would tend to ____ the number of alternations,due to their reliance on the ______ heuristic.

The "Madden jinx" is the purported tendency for a person to perform poorly after being touted on the yearly version of the popular video game.Our perception of this outcome as a "jinx" is due to

The belief that after a run of bad luck a change is due to occur is called

Intuitively,it seems that spacing out instances of a given concept or rule would make it ______ to learn the concept/rule.Research conducted by Kornell and Bjork (2008) _______ this intuition,revealing that ______ repetitions led to better learning.

Which of these everyday sayings defines the hindsight effect?

When you ask people what caused more deaths - accidents and homicides or strokes and diabetes - people will guess accidents and homicides,even though it is strokes and diabetes (and it's not even really close) .This is most likely due to

The more recently something has happened,the _____ likely it is to affect our judgment,due to

When your best friend divorces,her mother tells her,"I'm sorry for you,but I knew this would eventually happen.You were never really right for each other." This is an example of the

When people estimate confidence intervals,they tend to provide intervals that are too ____,thus showing

Vivid news reports that highlight the danger of serial killers,terrorist threats,and toxic substances in food may heighten public concern beyond a level that's reasonable due to

People tend to ignore the base rate of some occurrence in the population in making their judgments.For example,they assume anyone over 6 feet,6 inches tall must have played a lot of basketball,even though the majority of individuals have not played much basketball.This is a prime example of

When we make judgments,we often have to do so in the absence of information or computational skill.Because of this,we must often rely on

Coincidences are extremely striking,and often lead people to believe in __.The ease with which we think of coincidences makes them important players in the heuristic.

In your book's example,you read a list of names and then tried to recall how many started with J;if you tended to overestimate the number of J names,it was probably due to the effects of _ on the use of the _ heuristic.

Suppose you had somebody guess how a sequence of 10 coin flips would play itself out (e.g. ,THTHHHTHHT) .If people did this task,they would tend to the number of alternations,due to their reliance on the __ heuristic.

Intuitively,it seems that spacing out instances of a given concept or rule would make it __ to learn the concept/rule.Research conducted by Kornell and Bjork (2008) _ this intuition,revealing that ____ repetitions led to better learning.