Ten questions on how minds work, each stated with the caution the evidence actually supports.
Psychology suffers from being interesting, which means its findings get simplified and overstated on the way to general knowledge. This quiz covers the foundational figures and experiments, how memory is structured, and the biases that show up reliably across studies. Where a famous result has been questioned or has replicated poorly, the explanation says so. The intention is accuracy about what the evidence supports rather than a set of tidy rules.
Every question in this quiz is listed below with its correct answer and the reasoning behind it. Play first if you would rather not see the answers — or read through as a study sheet.
Play it insteadAnswer: D. Classical conditioning
Why: Pavlov showed that a neutral signal paired repeatedly with food would eventually trigger salivation alone. Operant conditioning, concerning consequences of behaviour, is associated with Skinner.
Answer: C. Psychoanalysis
Why: Freud developed psychoanalysis around unconscious conflict and early experience. Much of his specific theory is not supported by later evidence, though his cultural influence was enormous.
Answer: A. Improvement arising from expectation rather than active treatment
Why: Belief that treatment is being received can produce measurable change, particularly in subjective symptoms. The reverse, where expectation produces harm, is the nocebo effect.
Answer: B. Favouring information that supports what one already believes
Why: People seek and weight evidence that fits existing beliefs and discount what conflicts. It operates without any intention to be unfair.
Answer: D. Human needs
Why: It arranges needs from basic physical requirements up to self-actualisation. It remains widely taught despite limited empirical support for the strict ordering.
Answer: A. Holding a limited amount of information briefly
Why: It holds a small number of items for a short period unless rehearsed. The classic estimate of about seven items is now generally regarded as too high.
Answer: D. Patterns of thought and behaviour
Why: CBT works on identifying and changing unhelpful thinking and behaviour patterns. It is among the most extensively trialled talking therapies.
Answer: D. Obedience to authority
Why: Participants were instructed to administer what they believed were escalating shocks. The studies are historically important and would not meet current ethical standards.
Answer: C. The relative influence of genes and environment
Why: Current understanding treats the two as interacting rather than opposed. Most traits reflect both genetic predisposition and environmental influence.
Answer: C. Performance on a particular set of cognitive tasks
Why: Scores reflect performance on specific tasks under specific conditions, and are influenced by education and familiarity with testing. Treating a score as a fixed measure of a person's worth misreads what it captures.
Memory, Bias & Behaviour has 10 questions and takes about 7 minutes to finish. It is rated Medium and sits in our Psychology category.
Each of the 10 correct answers adds 10 XP, up to 100 XP for a clean run. Wrong answers cost you nothing, and your full question-by-question review is shown at the end.
Yes. All 10 questions carry a written explanation of why the correct answer is right, so the quiz works as a study sheet as well as a test.
Yes, as often as you like. The questions and the answer options are reshuffled on each run, and you can use Practice Mistakes afterwards to retry only the ones you missed. No account is needed to play.
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The misinformation effect describes what?
Replication, pre-registration and the famous psychology results that stopped standing up.
In research, replication means what?
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What is the chemical symbol for gold?
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