3.2.2.3.2 Von Frisch's bee study Quiz: AQA Psychology, Unit 6

The 20 questions

1. What did Von Frisch study in his research on honeybees?

   • How queen bees control the sex of their offspring by changing larval diet
   • How honeybees defend the hive against wasps by forming a ball around the intruder
   • How honeybees build hexagonal wax cells with the least material possible
   • How worker bees tell other bees where food sources are, using a movement pattern

2. What is the 'waggle dance' in Von Frisch's work?

   • A figure-of-eight movement in which a returning bee waggles its body, passing on information
   • A loud buzz a bee makes when threatened by a predator near the hive entrance
   • A shared cleaning routine in which bees brush wax from each other after returning
   • A sudden jump a bee makes on a flower to mark it as already visited that day

3. What information does the waggle dance convey about a food source?

   • Its size and how many bees will be needed to carry the nectar back
   • Its direction relative to the sun and its distance from the hive
   • Its colour and taste, so bees can recognise the flower on sight
   • Its age and the number of days since the flower first opened to pollinators

4. How does the duration of the waggle run relate to distance?

   • The length of the waggle run has no link to distance, only the speed of the dance
   • Longer waggle runs indicate a food source farther from the hive
   • Longer waggle runs indicate a food source closer to the hive and easier to reach
   • Shorter waggle runs indicate a food source farther away that has more nectar

5. A bee dances with the waggle run pointing straight up. What does this mean about the food?

   • The food is in the direction of the sun, as seen from the hive
   • The food is underground, so bees need to dig through the soil to collect it
   • The food is directly opposite the sun, so bees must fly away from the light to reach it
   • The food is inside the hive itself, so bees should stay in and wait for nectar

6. Von Frisch's work is used as evidence that bees communicate. Which feature best supports this?

   • Bees dance only at night, when no other bees are awake to observe it
   • Bees dance at random times, so the dance cannot carry reliable information about food
   • Other bees fly to the location indicated, showing the message was understood and acted on
   • Bees dance only when alone in the hive, so no other bees are present to hear it in daily life

7. Which scientist is associated with the study of the honeybee's dance language?

   • Jean Piaget, a Swiss psychologist who studied the stages of cognitive development
   • Karl von Frisch, an Austrian zoologist who studied the communication of honeybees
   • Wilder Penfield, a Canadian neurosurgeon who mapped the surface of the brain
   • Noam Chomsky, an American linguist who argued that grammar is innate in all humans

8. Why is the waggle dance considered limited compared with human communication?

   • It conveys detailed information about past events, more than most human conversations share
   • It conveys information only to the queen bee, so other bees cannot understand it
   • It conveys information about every topic the bees need, as rich as human speech
   • It conveys only food location, not abstract ideas or events that are absent or in the past

9. Von Frisch found bees could use the dance to report a food source not visible from the hive. What does this suggest?

   • The dance shows bees never leave the hive and rely on others to find all food sources
   • The dance shows bees can only report food they can see directly from the hive entrance
   • The dance shows food must always be placed inside the hive for bees to communicate about it
   • The dance can carry information about a location the receivers cannot directly see

10. What does 'figure-of-eight' describe in the dance?

    • The pattern of stripes on the bee's body that help other bees recognise it on the comb
    • The shape of the honeycomb cells the bee builds after feeding on nectar
    • The number of flowers a bee visits before returning with pollen to the hive
    • The dancer's path: a straight waggling run followed by a return loop back to the start

11. A researcher moves a food source farther from the hive. What change would Von Frisch predict in the dance?

    • The waggle run would become longer, signalling a greater distance to the food
    • The dance would stop, because bees can no longer find food beyond the hive entrance
    • The waggle run would become shorter, signalling the food is now closer to the hive
    • The dance would turn to the opposite direction, showing the food is behind the hive

12. Which property of the waggle dance did Von Frisch describe?

    • It encodes the queen's health, so workers know when a new queen is needed
    • It encodes both direction and distance in a single movement pattern
    • It encodes the species and colour of the flower, but not its location in the field
    • It encodes only danger, so bees use it to warn the hive of approaching predators

13. Two dances show a different angle to vertical. What does a change in angle indicate?

    • The bee has become tired, so it needs to rest before flying out again
    • The food source has grown larger, so more bees are needed to carry the nectar back
    • The food's direction relative to the sun has changed, so bees must fly at a different angle
    • The food has been used up, so bees should stop visiting that area and look elsewhere

14. Which feature of the waggle dance is most like a 'code'?

    • Particular movements and their duration stand for particular information, such as direction and distance
    • Particular smells of the bee's body stand for different queens, so workers recognise their hive
    • Particular colours of the bee's body stand for particular types of flower visited recently
    • Particular sounds of the bee's wings stand for different species of predator nearby

15. Why was it important that bees in the experiment were not told where the food was in advance?

    • So the bees would not become bored, which would otherwise ruin the results
    • So the experimenter could save money on sugar, since food was placed only once per trial
    • So the experimenter could show the information came from the dance, not another source
    • So the bees would have to fly faster, which made distance easier to record accurately

16. Which statement about the dance's accuracy is best supported by Von Frisch's work?

    • Bees could not follow the dance unless the queen was present in the hive at the time
    • Bees ignored the dance completely and relied only on their own sight to find food
    • Bees that followed the dance were able to find the indicated food source
    • Bees that followed the dance always flew in the wrong direction, so the dance is useless

17. Which scenario best illustrates Von Frisch's finding about bee communication?

    • A forager sings a loud tune, and recruits stay inside and wait for the food to be brought
    • A forager sleeps on the comb, and recruits search randomly across the local area in daily life
    • A forager dances on the comb, and recruits fly out in the indicated direction to find food
    • A forager builds a wax wall, and recruits stay inside to protect the stored honey

18. Why might Von Frisch's dance findings count against the idea that animals cannot communicate about things not present?

    • The dance refers only to the queen's movements, which is all bees can describe to each other
    • The dance refers only to past events, which bees cannot share with others in the hive
    • The dance refers to a food source the receivers cannot see at the time, so it conveys absent information
    • The dance refers only to bees present in the hive, so it cannot convey anything about the outside

19. What is a 'forager' in Von Frisch's research?

    • A young bee that never leaves the hive and spends its days cleaning and feeding larvae
    • A male bee whose only role is to mate with the queen during her flights
    • A worker bee that has found food and returns to the hive to share its location
    • A worker bee that guards the entrance and attacks any insect that tries to enter

20. Which finding would suggest the dance carries information beyond simple attraction?

    • Bees are attracted back to the hive by the dance, so they return to the same spot each time
    • Bees are guided to a specific direction and distance, not merely drawn to the general area
    • Bees are attracted to the dancer by the smell of nectar, which wafts through the hive
    • Bees are attracted to the dancer by its loud buzzing noise, which draws them toward its body

Related quizzes

• Piaget's theory: language depends on thought Quiz · 3.2.2.1.1 · 20 questions
• Sapir-Whorf hypothesis: thinking depends on language Quiz · 3.2.2.1.2 · 20 questions
• Variation in recall of events and recognition of colours across cultures Quiz · 3.2.2.2.1 · 20 questions
• Limited functions of animal communication Quiz · 3.2.2.3.1 · 20 questions
• Properties of human communication absent in animals Quiz · 3.2.2.3.3 · 20 questions
• Verbal and non-verbal communication; functions of eye contact Quiz · 3.2.2.4.1 · 20 questions
• Body language: open and closed posture, postural echo, touch Quiz · 3.2.2.4.2 · 20 questions
• Personal space: cultural, status and gender differences Quiz · 3.2.2.4.3 · 20 questions
• Darwin's evolutionary theory of non-verbal communication Quiz · 3.2.2.5.1 · 20 questions
• Evidence that non-verbal behaviour is innate Quiz · 3.2.2.5.2 · 20 questions