One of the categories of biological explanations for cognitive gender differences focuses on genetic gender differences. A typical genetic explanation proposes that
a. for males, a greater percentage of each chromosome is devoted to spatial ability.
b. males inherit math abilities from both parents, whereas females inherit math abilities from just the mother.
c. some abilities may be associated with recessive traits, carried on the X chromosome.
d. the chromosomes are more likely to undergo mutation in males than in females.
Question 2Chapter 5 discusses some biological explanations that have been proposed to account for gender differences in cognitive ability. Which of the following statements is correct about these explanations?
a. Research has not supported a genetic explanation for gender differences.
b. The term lateralization refers to the fact that the X chromosome is larger than the Y chromosome.
c. In normal individuals, the left hemisphere is completely responsible for spatial tasks.
d. People who have more complete lateralization show the best performance on cognitive tasks.
Question 3Which of the following students provides the most accurate summary of the research on spatial abilities?
a. Osmane: Gender differences are relatively large on some spatial tasks, but these gender differences can be reduced when the instructions are modified..
b. Anna: Not one of the gender differences is statistically significant, despite the media coverage of this topic..
c. Oswalda: Gender differences are large on tests of spatial visualization and spatial perception, but they are small on tests of mental rotation..
d. Fred: Individual differences are smaller on spatial tasks than they are on verbal or mathematical tasks..
Question 4According to the research on spatial abilities,
a. females may receive higher scores if the instructions are related to traditionally female interests, rather than traditionally male interests..
b. a major portion of the gender differences in spatial ability is traced to biologically based gender differences.
c. although some gender differences in spatial abilities are not consistent, the gender differences in mental rotation have been consistently found throughout the current research.
d. the scores for mental rotation are distributed in a bell-shaped curve for both males and females.
Question 5Your text describes Favreau's re-analysis of data on gender differences in mental rotation. When Favreau examined the distributions of scores for males and females, she noticed that
a. the distributions were virtually identical.
b. some of the females actually had faster rotation times than the fastest males.
c. most of the males had faster rotation times than most of the females.
d. the gender difference could be accounted for by a small number of females with very slow rotation times.
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