AP Psychology Practice Test

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Prepare for the AP Psychology Exam with a comprehensive practice test featuring detailed questions and explanations. Enhance your learning experience as you dive deep into psychological concepts, theories, and important figures in psychology. Get ready for your exam!

Each practice test/flash card set has 50 randomly selected questions from a bank of over 500. You'll get a new set of questions each time!

Practice this question and more.

What does the rate of nerve impulses traveling up the auditory nerve match according to the frequency theory?

The volume of a tone
The pitch of a tone
The duration of a tone
The intensity of a tone

The correct answer is: The pitch of a tone

Frequency theory of hearing proposes that the rate at which nerve impulses travel up the auditory nerve corresponds to the frequency of a tone, which translates directly into our perception of pitch. When a sound wave vibrates at a particular frequency, it causes hair cells in the cochlea to fire at a rate that matches that frequency. For instance, a high-pitched sound would result in a faster firing rate of nerve impulses, while a low-pitched sound would have a slower firing rate. This matching mechanism allows our auditory system to interpret the frequency of sound waves as different pitches, making the understanding of tone perception closely linked to the concept of pitch in frequency theory.