Practice Quiz

CLEP Intro Edu Psych

Category - Cognitive Perspective

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Kristen is teaching a high school health class. After a lecture about the dangers of smoking cigarettes, a student raises his hand. “I don’t think smoking is that bad,” says the student, adding “My grandfather smoked three packs a day and lived until he was 92.” What heuristic is this student using?
  1. Representativeness
  2. Availability
  3. Anchoring
  4. Denial
Explanation
Answer: B - Availability is a heuristic in which an individual estimates the probability of an event using examples from their own experience or awareness. Typically, the more examples a person thinks of, the more the person is convinced of their position. In this example, the student can think of somebody who lived a long life as a smoker and cannot think of anyone he knows whose death was directly caused by cigarettes. Because of this, he finds it likely that smoking is not harmful.
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