33 Psychology Trivia Questions for Kids
The easiest psychology questions in the game, picked for younger players. Every one comes with the answer and a short explanation of why it is right.
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Easy Psychology Questions and Answers
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Which brain structure is strongly associated with processing fear?
Amygdala
The amygdala is involved in emotional processing, including responses to threat and fear.
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A person is less likely to help during an emergency when a crowd is watching. What is this?
Bystander effect
Psychologists Bibb Latane and John Darley proposed the effect after press reports on the 1964 murder of Kitty Genovese in New York claimed many neighbors failed to intervene, an account later research showed was exaggerated. The mechanism is diffusion of responsibility: each witness assumes someone else will step in.
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Someone searches only for articles agreeing with a belief. Which bias is this?
Confirmation bias
Confirmation bias is the tendency to seek or interpret information in ways that support existing beliefs.
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What is the feeling that a new situation has happened before?
Déjà vu
Déjà vu is the feeling of having previously experienced a situation that is actually new.
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In a drug trial, neither volunteers nor interacting researchers know who got which pill. What design is this?
Double-blind procedure
A double-blind procedure keeps both participants and researchers who interact with them unaware of condition assignment.
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Claustrophobia is the fear of what?
Enclosed spaces
From the Latin claustrum, meaning an enclosed place. It is why some people cannot tolerate an MRI scanner.
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Who proposed eight stages of psychosocial development?
Erik Erikson
Erik Erikson proposed a lifespan theory of eight psychosocial stages.
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Planning, switching tasks, and resisting an impulse rely on which mental processes?
Executive functions
Executive functions are higher-order cognitive processes that support planning, monitoring, shifting, and inhibition.
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Volunteers shown a doctored photo of themselves in a hot-air balloon later recalled the ride in detail. What is that recollection called?
False memory
A false memory is a recollection that differs from what actually happened or includes an event that did not occur.
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A committee ignores warnings because everyone wants agreement. What is this called?
Groupthink
Irving Janis used groupthink for defective decision-making under pressure to maintain group unanimity.
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One favorable trait colors judgments of a person's other traits. What bias is this?
Halo effect
The halo effect occurs when one favorable trait shapes how we judge a person’s other traits, often making us view them more positively overall. The term was introduced by psychologist Edward Thorndike in 1920 after he observed this pattern in military evaluations.
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Someone with acrophobia is afraid of what?
Heights
From the Greek akron, meaning peak or summit. It is distinct from a fear of flying, which is aerophobia.
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After a surprise result, friends say they knew it all along. Which bias is this?
Hindsight bias
Hindsight bias is the tendency to see an event as having been predictable after learning its outcome.
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What tendency makes people favor those they identify with?
In-group bias
In-group bias is the tendency to trust and reward people seen as part of your own group, whether that is a nation, a team or a workplace, while judging outsiders more harshly. It appears even when the groups are assigned at random minutes earlier.
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What does IQ stand for?
Intelligence quotient
The term is a quotient because the original score divided mental age by chronological age and multiplied by 100.
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Who proposed the hierarchy of needs?
Abraham Maslow
He introduced the idea in a 1943 paper, arguing that needs like food and safety generally have to be met before people pursue belonging, esteem, and self-actualization. The now-famous pyramid diagram does not appear in his original work. It was added later by other writers summarizing his theory.
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What sits at the top of Maslow's hierarchy of needs?
Self-actualization
Maslow's hierarchy runs from physiological needs at the base up through safety, belonging and esteem, with self-actualization at the summit: becoming everything a person is capable of becoming. He argued that the lower needs generally have to be satisfied before the higher ones start to press.
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Who conducted the famous obedience experiments using a simulated shock generator?
Stanley Milgram
Stanley Milgram conducted influential experiments on obedience to an authority figure.
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What does OCD stand for?
Obsessive-compulsive disorder
The name pairs obsessions, which are intrusive thoughts, with compulsions, which are the repeated acts done to relieve them.
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A dog gets a treat after sitting and sits more often. What learning process is this?
Reinforcement
In operant conditioning, reinforcement increases the future likelihood of a behavior.
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Which psychologist is associated with classical conditioning?
Ivan Pavlov
The APA identifies classical conditioning as Pavlovian conditioning and credits its discovery to Ivan Pavlov.
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A person feels better after taking an inactive pill they believe is medicine. What is this?
Placebo effect
The placebo effect is a change attributed to expectations surrounding an intervention rather than its active ingredient.
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What does PTSD stand for?
Post-traumatic stress disorder
Post-traumatic stress disorder entered formal diagnosis in 1980, replacing earlier terms such as shell shock and combat fatigue.
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A study uses chance to place each volunteer in a treatment or control group. What process is this?
Random assignment
Random assignment places participants into conditions by chance, helping balance preexisting differences.
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Which memory system briefly holds a small amount of information for immediate use?
Short-term memory
Short-term memory temporarily holds information available for immediate processing and use.
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Which psychologist is associated with operant conditioning?
B. F. Skinner
Skinner studied the process using a soundproof chamber that let him control what a rat or pigeon received after pressing a lever, building on Edward Thorndike's earlier law of effect. His key finding was that behavior followed by a reward becomes more frequent, while behavior followed by punishment becomes less so.
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What influence leads people to follow others when deciding how to act?
Social proof
Social proof is the tendency to view other people's behavior as evidence of what is appropriate in an uncertain situation.
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Reviewing vocabulary on several days works better than one long cram session. Which effect is this?
Spacing effect
The spacing effect is improved long-term retention when learning episodes are spread out over time.
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Arachnophobia is the fear of what?
Spiders
The name comes from arachne, the Greek word for spider, and one of the most common specific phobias worldwide.
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You finish a bad movie because you already watched an hour. Which effect fits?
Sunk-cost effect
The sunk-cost effect is the tendency to continue an endeavor because of previously invested resources.
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Why can't you tickle yourself?
The brain predicts the touch from your own movement and turns the sensation down
As you move, the brain sends a copy of the command forward and predicts the touch that will result. Predicted touch is damped down, which is how the body ignores its own clothing and movement. Brain scans show sensory areas respond less to self-produced touch than to identical touch from someone else.
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Graphology claims to reveal a person's character from what?
Their handwriting
Graphology reads slant, pressure, spacing and letter shapes as clues to personality, and has been used by some employers to screen job applicants. Controlled studies have repeatedly found that it does not predict personality or job performance, and it is classed as a pseudoscience.
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What is the feeling of knowing a word but being unable to recall it?
Tip-of-the-tongue state
A tip-of-the-tongue state is the temporary feeling that a known word is just out of reach for recall.
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