"Cognition & Emotions" — Practice

Question 1

Which of the following is NOT one of Goleman's five components of emotional intelligence?
(a) Self-regulation  (b) Empathy  (c) Intelligence quotient (IQ)  (d) Social skills

Accepted Answer

Goleman's five components are self-awareness, self-regulation, motivation, empathy, and social skills. IQ is a separate, general-cognitive-ability construct that Goleman's own book title explicitly contrasts EI against, not a component within it.

Answer: (c) Intelligence quotient (IQ). Traps (a), (b) and (d) are all genuine components of Goleman's model and are correct answers to the reverse question 'which IS a component' — the trap here is simply not noticing the question asks for the exception.

Question 2

A student shows only mild interest in a lesson and little urgency to engage with it. According to the Yerkes-Dodson law, this student's arousal level is most likely:
(a) Optimal for peak performance  (b) Too low, leading to disengagement  (c) Too high, leading to panic  (d) Irrelevant to performance

Accepted Answer

Very low arousal produces boredom and disengagement on the Yerkes-Dodson inverted-U curve — attention drifts and little gets encoded. Optimal performance (a) occurs at moderate, not minimal, arousal.

Answer: (b) Too low, leading to disengagement. Trap (a) wrongly assumes any level of arousal below panic is optimal. Trap (c) describes the opposite extreme of the curve. Trap (d) ignores the entire premise of the Yerkes-Dodson law, which is that arousal and performance are directly related.

Question 3

A study guide claims Daniel Goleman 'invented' the concept of emotional intelligence in his 1995 book. This claim is:
(a) Correct, since his book is the first published use of the term  (b) Incorrect, since Peter Salovey and John Mayer defined the academic construct in 1990, and Goleman popularised and extended it  (c) Correct, since Goleman conducted the original research on EI in the 1970s  (d) Incorrect, since the term originates from Piaget's writings

Accepted Answer

Salovey and Mayer academically defined emotional intelligence in 1990, five years before Goleman's bestselling book. Goleman's real contribution was popularising the concept for a general and educational audience and proposing the practical five-component competency model.

Answer: (b). Trap (a) is the exact misconception this question is designed to catch. Trap (c) invents an unrelated decade and research claim. Trap (d) wrongly borrows Piaget's name, who worked on cognitive development, not emotional intelligence.

Question 4

A teacher realises a quiet student's silence in class reflects anxiety rather than lack of interest, but has not yet taken any action about it. This best illustrates:
(a) Empathy  (b) Social skills  (c) Self-regulation  (d) Motivation

Accepted Answer

Accurately sensing another person's emotional state, without yet acting on it, is the definition of empathy. Taking an action to actually help the student would move into social skills; self-regulation concerns managing one's own emotions, not reading another's.

Answer: (a) Empathy. Trap (b) confuses recognising a feeling with acting on it. Trap (c) applies a component about the teacher's own impulses to a situation about someone else's emotions. Trap (d) misapplies the EI trait of persistence and optimism to an unrelated situation.

Question 5

According to Vygotsky, a child's higher mental functions first appear:
(a) Purely within the individual, unaffected by social context  (b) Between people, in social interaction, before being internalised  (c) Simultaneously within the individual and socially, with no meaningful sequence  (d) Only after formal schooling begins

Accepted Answer

Vygotsky's account moves from the interpsychological (developing between people, through social interaction) to the intrapsychological (internalised within the individual) — this sequence, not the reverse, is central to his socio-cultural theory.

Answer: (b). Trap (a) describes a purely individualist, non-Vygotskian view. Trap (c) denies the sequence Vygotsky explicitly proposed. Trap (d) wrongly restricts the theory to formal schooling, when Vygotsky's framework applies to social interaction broadly, including well before school age.

Question 6

Two students receive the same public correction from a teacher in front of the class. One is mildly embarrassed and moves on within minutes; the other is deeply distressed for days afterward. Vygotsky's concept most directly relevant to explaining this difference is:
(a) The Zone of Proximal Development  (b) Scaffolding  (c) Perezhivanie — the child's own lived emotional experience of the event  (d) The More Knowledgeable Other

Accepted Answer

Perezhivanie names precisely this: the same external event is not experienced identically by every child, and it is the child's own lived, subjective emotional processing of the event — not the event itself — that shapes its developmental impact.

Answer: (c). Traps (a), (b) and (d) are genuine Vygotskian concepts, but they describe mechanisms of cognitive scaffolding through social interaction, not why an identical event produces different emotional outcomes in different children.

Question 7

A Class VIII student refuses to raise her hand, convinced that any small mistake will be noticed and mocked by 'everyone' in the room, even though her classmates are largely focused on their own work. This is best explained by:
(a) Personal fable  (b) Imaginary audience  (c) Self-regulation failure  (d) Extrinsic motivation

Accepted Answer

The belief that one is constantly the focus of others' attention and judgement, even when this isn't actually true, is Elkind's imaginary audience. Personal fable concerns feeling uniquely misunderstood or invulnerable, not feeling watched.

Answer: (b). Trap (a) picks the other half of Elkind's egocentrism pair, describing a different belief. Trap (c) misapplies an emotional-intelligence competency about managing one's own impulses. Trap (d) misapplies a motivation-theory term to a situation with no reward or punishment involved.

Question 8

A Class VIII student takes part in a risky prank, insisting 'nothing bad will happen to me, I'm different,' despite knowing the general danger involved. This reflects:
(a) Imaginary audience  (b) Personal fable  (c) Self-awareness  (d) The Yerkes-Dodson law

Accepted Answer

The belief that one's own experience and fate are unique and exempt from the risks that apply to others is the risk-taking form of Elkind's personal fable, distinct from imaginary audience, which concerns feeling watched rather than feeling invulnerable.

Answer: (b). Trap (a) confuses the two egocentrism concepts. Trap (c) borrows an EI term unrelated to adolescent risk perception. Trap (d) applies an arousal-performance framework to a situation about risk belief, not task performance.

Question 9

A well-prepared student consistently underperforms on tests relative to what her classroom work suggests she knows, and reports 'blanking out' during the exam. The most likely explanation, connected to the Yerkes-Dodson law, is:
(a) Insufficient preparation despite appearances  (b) Arousal has risen past the optimal point, narrowing working memory during the test  (c) A genuine lack of aptitude for the subject  (d) Low intrinsic motivation for the subject

Accepted Answer

This is the classic classroom signature of excessive test anxiety: arousal has crossed from helpful alertness into the performance-impairing region of the Yerkes-Dodson curve, narrowing the working memory needed to recall material the student genuinely knows.

Answer: (b). Trap (a) contradicts the question's own premise that the student is well-prepared. Trap (c) and trap (d) both misdiagnose an arousal/anxiety problem as an ability or motivation problem.

Question 10

Which classroom practice is most consistent with reducing exam-related anxiety, per CTET's pedagogical approach?
(a) Publicly ranking students by test score to motivate effort  (b) Providing feedback that compares each student only to their own previous performance  (c) Announcing surprise tests to keep students alert  (d) Withholding feedback until the final exam to avoid distraction

Accepted Answer

Non-comparative, growth-oriented feedback measured against a learner's own prior performance reduces the social-comparison stress that public ranking generates, consistent with a non-threatening classroom climate.

Answer: (b). Trap (a) increases anxiety through public comparison. Trap (c) increases unpredictability, a known stress source, rather than reducing it. Trap (d) removes the ongoing feedback that helps a learner track and manage their own progress.

Question 11

A teacher, aware that she tends to react sharply when a lesson plan goes off track, consciously takes a breath and calmly redirects a chaotic group activity instead of reacting sharply. This sequence demonstrates, in order:
(a) Empathy, then social skills  (b) Self-awareness, then self-regulation  (c) Motivation, then empathy  (d) Social skills, then self-awareness

Accepted Answer

Recognising her own tendency to react sharply is self-awareness; the deliberate act of taking a breath and calmly redirecting instead is self-regulation applied immediately afterward — the two components operating in their natural sequence.

Answer: (b). Trap (a) names two components neither of which describes managing one's own emotional reaction. Trap (c) and trap (d) both misorder or misname the pair, missing that this scenario is specifically about the teacher's own emotional awareness and control, not about reading or influencing others.

Practice — "Cognition & Emotions"

Sign in to save attempts to your dashboard and track your accuracy over time

Find a verified tutor

Join a live course

Browse coaching centres

About

Categories

Support

Documentation

Get Study Tips & Updates

Download Our App

Download for iOS

Download for Android

Popular Cities