AP Psychology Practice Worksheets & Answer Key

Answer: Less systematic pre-existing variation between enrolled groups.

1. First distinguish entry into the study from placement in a condition. Entry was voluntary and school-specific; only placement was random.
2. Random assignment makes systematic pre-existing group differences less likely, strengthening the comparison of reminders under otherwise controlled conditions. It cannot by itself make a convenience sample nationally representative, and chance imbalances remain possible.

Answer: The first relationship is stronger and negative; the second is weaker and positive.

1. Compare absolute magnitudes: 0.78 is farther from zero than 0.32, so the first coefficient describes the stronger linear association.
2. Then interpret the signs: negative means the variables tend to vary in opposite directions, while positive means they tend to vary together. Neither sign nor strength supplies causal identification or tells us that the two samples used equivalent measures.

Answer: Individual spikes follow an all-or-none principle while firing rate can vary.

1. Separate the size of an individual action potential from the frequency of action potentials. The recording keeps amplitude approximately constant while frequency changes.
2. This is consistent with the all-or-none principle for individual spikes and variation in firing rate under the stated recording conditions. The simplified example does not provide a complete account of neural coding or justify conclusions about every neuron and stimulus range.

Answer: Give each close pair a shared color that differs from the other pairs.

1. Proximity groups nearby elements; similarity groups elements with shared features. Giving each close pair its own shared color makes the two cues favor the same grouping.
2. That adds a competing explanation for pair perception, so spacing alone is no longer isolated as the cue. A uniform color change or an altered gap with otherwise identical dots would not introduce the same pair-specific similarity contrast.

Answer: Add an extra piece of clay to the cylinder while changing its shape.

1. A conservation task distinguishes judgments driven by appearance from an understanding that the same amount remains after reshaping. The intended comparison therefore keeps the amount fixed.
2. Adding clay changes actual quantity along with appearance. A “more” judgment could then be accurate, so it would no longer uniquely indicate a failure to conserve. The design critique does not diagnose a developmental stage from one response.

Answer: The observer emphasizes disposition while discounting a relevant situational constraint.

1. The observer explains behavior using a personal trait while discounting a documented external constraint. That contrast is central to the attribution issue.
2. It illustrates a dispositional emphasis consistent with the fundamental attribution error in this setting. The example does not claim that dispositions never matter or that the same attribution tendency appears identically in every cultural or interpersonal context.

Answer: The judgment of available coping resources relative to the demand.

1. The student continues to regard the task as demanding, but evaluates available support and preparation differently.
2. That focuses on coping resources, a central part of secondary appraisal. The example describes an appraisal change rather than proving that the objective task disappeared or that stress will be eliminated for every person in the same situation.

Answer: Record the number of target symbols correctly marked during a three-minute task.

1. An operational definition specifies how a variable is measured or manipulated in a study. A count over a stated task and interval supplies an observable recording procedure.
2. That procedure is one possible operationalization of concentration, not the whole construct. Its reliability and validity still require evaluation; making a measure precise does not prove that every interpretation of it is justified.