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DEA 1500 Exam 1 Sample Essay Questions For each DEA 1500 exam, several essay questions will be distributed ahead of time. A portion of those questions are included here. Others will follow. Typically a total of 8-10 questions will be distributed. For the actual exam, you will be asked to write the answers to four of the exact same questions. No notes, outlines, or other materials can be used during the exam. You will not be able to choose which four questions to answer. The exam will be two hours in length. You will be required to answer the questions on your own during the exam. Study groups. You are encouraged to prepare your answers to these questions with others in small groups. If you need help finding a study group, you can log onto the website and sign up. Any exceptions to group preparation are noted in bold. The same example from two persons for the BOLD component of question will be considered a violation of Academic Integrity. It’s fine to discuss your example with someone else and give each other feedback. But on the exam, your answer needs to be unique for any bolded parts. Professor/TA assistance. Please remember that your discussion section TAs have been instructed not to spend time on the exam questions. That is not the purpose of the sections. It is fine to ask me or one of the graduate TAs about the exam questions. You do not need an appointment to see Professor Evans. In addition to office hours, I tend to be in my office in late afternoons/early evenings and you are welcome to drop by. My office is 3415 East MVR. Note: Quick queries via e mail or questions right before or after class are ok but not ones that are going to require a lengthy response. Please note if you wait until the last minute and then bombard me with e-mails, I won’t be able to help you because of time. Same goes for graduate student TAs. Exam writing. It is fine to use drawings, bullet points, lists. We are not evaluating writing: what is critical is you demonstrating knowledge. Poor handwriting: please use a pen and if you have poor handwriting, please print. Throughout you will see questions asking you to generate or respond to hypothetical experiments and/or data to support or contradict certain theories or to illustrate certain patterns of results. Precise values are not the critical issue: it is the pattern of values and your explanations that are important. A ‘correct’ answer with a poor explanation will get fewer exam points awarded than a ‘wrong’ answer with a good explanation. For some questions, you are asked to generate a design guideline. The criteria for a good design guideline are described in the first project assignment in the Discussion section 3 & 4 tab on the course website. There are also examples of design guidelines in this same section. Plus we have put a marvelous example of design guidelines, Cooper, C. Housing as if people mattered on Mann Library Reserve. Finally, we discuss Design guidelines in class. At a minimum the design guideline for the exam needs to include: Succinct and clear behavioral or performance guideline Define the primary HER process your guideline reflectsDescribe in terms of that HER processes, the rationale for the guidelineComment about a social identity (e.g., gender, age, culture/ethnicity, disability, etc.) that might be important to consider in terms of your guideline. (note: this is an example of person X environment interaction) or explain why you think the guideline is likely to apply similarly to most people. Another way to think about this, is are your guidelines universal (“one size fits all”).Draw how to implement the guideline (drawing needs to make sense, it does not need to be beautiful).Note: the requirements for Design Guidelines for the exams are a subset of what is required for Assignment 1 on the Dormitory Guidelines.1. a. Define environmental determinism. b. Give two examples of research from lecture/reading demonstrating environmental determinism and explain why/how they show environmental determinism. You cannot use the fictitious example below. c. This table depicts the percentage of adult birds that can see the color red as a function of the color of the environment they were raised in at different ages (e.g. 10% of adult birds can see the color red if between the ages of 3-10 weeks they had been reared in an environment of blue light)Percentage of adult birds who can see the color red. Rearing Environment Age of Exposure Red Light Blue Light birth-3 weeks 100 100 3-10 weeks 100 10Describe the relationship between these data and the following:i. environmental determinismii. plasticityiii. critical period. Be very specific, which combinations of data show each of these concepts and explain why. Caution: usually in order to show some effect, you have to have a control or a comparison condition. In the present example if red light has some specific or unique effect, you are going to need evidence that blue light has an effect that is different than red light’s effect. The data on red light alone are unlikely to be sufficient. d. Change the percentages in a new table to show environmental determinism but no critical period. Explain why these changes indicate environmental determinism but not a critical period. Be specific about which combinations show environmental determinism but no critical period in the new table. e. Make a new table or graph showing evidence with adult humans that cognitive appraisal is an important factor in adult ability to see certain colors. Explain how your data show evidence color vision in adult humans is affected by cognitive appraisal. Remember to label your table or graph with appropriate headings.N.B. BOLD means has to be original. Fine to get help and discuss with your study group but your answer needs to be unique to you.2. a. Define cognitive appraisal. b. Explain the relationship of cognitive appraisal to each of the following: i. human evolution ii. manifest and latent function iii. user designer gap c. Think about some examples of a person X environment interaction that involves culture/ethnicity and housing design. Then generate some hypothetical data (graph or table) to illustrate this interaction between people of different cultures/ethnicity and some aspect of residential design on human responses such as preference, well being, or performance. Then using these hypothetical data describe a user-designer gap that might emerge from the data. Remember to label your table or graph with appropriate headings. Note: hypothetical data means you cannot use an example from class or readings. d. Use your hypothetical data to write a design guideline for a designer of a house. Explain to the designer what your hypothetical data suggest for home design for the different cultural groups in your example. Remember to follow instructions about design guidelines from the introduction to the practice exam questions. Generate some hypothetical data in a new table or graph for a different aspect of housing and human reaction not covered above. For this different housing component illustrate environmental determinism. Describe why your data are deterministic.3. Many college students experience dormitories as institutional or low in homeyness. Take four, different, specific physical elements of the dorm where you currently or previously lived and do the following:With respect to Mc Cracken’s theory of homeyness, explain four different design elements that relate to why each of these features is not home like.For one of these specific physical elements, describe one social identity (e.g., gender, culture/ethnicity, age, disability) that you think would modify occupant’s reactions to this element and explain how these reactions might vary because of different social identities. Relate the personal characteristic to research in readings or lecture that would suggest your hypothetical idea is likely to be correct. Describe precisely how that research relates to your example. Using the residence where you lived when you were 16 years old, describe one element of the residence that worked well for you and/or your family and one element that did not work so well. Analyze the good and poor examples in terms of two different HER processes: environmental stimulation, homeyness, personal space, territoriality, privacy, or defensible space. In your description define the HER process; state whether you think your example is illustrating determinism or cognitive appraisal and explain why.For the design problem, write a design guideline about how to improve residential design for your family. Remember to follow instructions about design guidelines from the introduction to the practice exam questions.4.a) Evaluate Appel dining commons in terms of the HER processes of environmental stimulation, homeyness, personal space, territoriality, and privacy. Define each HER process and describe how a particular aspect of Appel dining commons relates to the process and why you think it is supporting or detracting from that process as currently designed. Choose a different aspect for each process.b) Write one design guideline in order to improve the design and function of Appel. Incorporate one of the above HER processes. Be explicit about how the HER process is encapsulated in your design guideline.Reminder: see the introduction to the Sample Essay Questions above re: what needs to be incorporated into a design guideline for purposes of the exam. c) Explain whether your design guideline illustrates the principle of environmental determinism or cognitive appraisal. If you think it might do both, that is acceptable, just explain why/how. Make sure you define each of these principles as part of your answer.d) Describe two different types of human responses an international student might have to the design of the Appel dining commons. Preference or satisfaction would be one type of response but not two. High blood pressure and more stress hormones would be one type of response but not two. Thus your answer would need to cover one example of preference or satisfaction and one example of high blood pressure or more stress hormones. Explain with an HER process other than used in part b) above, one of these international student’s responses to the design of Appel dining commons. Generate some hypothetical data in a graph or table illustrating incongruence or poor environmental fit for the international student’s response compared to an American student’s response. Explain your answer in terms of: a. how it illustrates incongruence; b. is consistent from material in readings or lecture about cultural differences in human responses to the built environment.5.a.Describe one physical and one mental health consequence of poor housing quality. b.Self-selection is a potentially confounding variable for many environmental impacts on human health and well-being. Describe the self-selection challenge and explain using an example from lecture or readings how it might relate to research on housing and human health or well-being.c.Take one physical health outcome of poor quality housing and show some hypothetical data in a table or a graph illustrating a person x environment interaction. Remember to label your table or graph with appropriate headings. Explain how your hypothetical data show this. Hint: to show a person x environment interaction you need to have variability in both a personal characteristic and in an environmental characteristic. d. Explain the role of privacy in potential problems with high rise housing design.Take one of these problems with privacy and high rise housing and explain how you would change the design of theHigh rise buildingIndividual apartment in that same buildingto enhance the residential experience of privacy? Incorporating lecture or readings, why do you think each of your two re-designs (overall building, individual apartment) might help? e. Define and then apply any of the HER processes other than privacy to housing design to foster better child development or successful aging later in life.? Describe why you think your ideas might work in terms of research on this HER process. ................
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