Psychology · Unit 1 · Paper 3

Biological Bases of Behavior unit test

A test on this unit alone, marked as a percentage and a letter grade — for the test your class is actually sitting, rather than for May. Answer everything, then submit once: seeing the answer to question 3 before attempting question 4 makes the final percentage meaningless.

Paper 1 Paper 2 Paper 3

Each paper is built from this unit’s 28 terms and is the same for everyone, so a teacher can assign “Unit 1, Paper 3” and every student sits the identical test. Multiple choice is marked objectively; the written sections you mark yourself against the model answer and rubric.

Suggested time 34 min 31 points0/17 attempted

Myelin sheath

Neuroplasticity

GABA and glutamate

Absolute vs difference threshold

Refractory period

Dopamine

Cerebellum

Neuron structure

Endorphins

Hippocampus

Broca's vs Wernicke's area

Hypothalamus

Short answer 1. Define or explain: Excitatory vs inhibitory signals

3 pts

Short answer 2. Define or explain: Action potential

3 pts

Short answer 3. Define or explain: Frontal lobe

3 pts

Short answer 4. Define or explain: Adrenal glands

3 pts

Free response

7 pts

This course has no free-response prompt tagged to this unit, so one from elsewhere in the course is used. It is still worth writing — the skill transfers.

EVIDENCE-BASED QUESTION (EBQ). Using the three sources below, develop and defend an argument about whether high schools should delay their morning start times to 8:30 a.m. or later. SOURCE 1: A controlled laboratory study of 90 adolescents aged 14 to 17 measured melatonin onset across two weeks. Melatonin release began on average 1.9 hours later in participants aged 16 to 17 than in participants aged 10 to 12 tested previously, indicating a biologically driven delay in circadian phase during puberty. Participants required a mean of 8.9 hours of sleep to reach baseline alertness on a psychomotor vigilance task. SOURCE 2: A quasi-experimental study followed five school districts that shifted high school start times from 7:25 a.m. to 8:35 a.m. Across the two years after the change, average self-reported school-night sleep duration increased by 34 minutes, tardiness declined 24 percent, and the crash rate for teenage drivers in those districts fell 13 percent relative to neighboring districts that did not change start times. Grade point averages rose by a small but statistically significant margin. SOURCE 3: A survey of 1,100 families in districts considering a start-time change found that 46 percent of parents opposed the shift. Reported concerns included conflicts with parents’ work schedules, reduced time for after-school employment and athletics, longer bus routes requiring new vehicles at an estimated cost of 1.2 million dollars per district, and a worry that adolescents would simply stay up later. A follow-up in two districts that had made the change found that bedtimes shifted about 9 minutes later, offsetting a small portion of the sleep gain. (A) Propose a specific and defensible claim about whether high schools should delay start times. (B) (i) Support your claim with specific evidence from one of the sources. (ii) Explain how that evidence supports your claim. (C) (i) Support your claim with specific evidence from a second source. (ii) Explain how that evidence supports your claim, using at least one psychological concept or research principle. (D) Address a limitation of the evidence or a competing consideration raised by the sources.