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Behavioural science medical question bank

Practise every behavioural science topic with explained SBAs.

Recall Engine has 850+ behavioural science questions across 40+ topics in 6 body systems. Every question explains each option.

questions
850+
topics
40+
topic notes
40+
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Behavioural science by body system

Behavioural science has 40+ topics in 6 body systems. Each section shows how many questions it has and every topic it covers.

Nervous system

70+ questions across 2 topics. It also has 2 topic notes.

  • Memory and amnesia
  • Neuropsychology: history and methods

Mental health and behaviour

350+ questions across 20+ topics. It also has 20+ topic notes.

  • Burnout and resilience
  • Cognitive ageing and memory assessment
  • Cultural psychiatry
  • Developmental psychopathology
  • Drug misuse
  • Family, culture, and mental health
  • Heart disease: psychological factors
  • Illness beliefs, coping, and cancer
  • Medical psychology
  • Mental health continuum
  • Mental illness: stigma and team care
  • National mental health survey
  • Neuropsychological assessment
  • Personality development: attachment and defences
  • Pregnancy and childbirth: psychological care
  • Psychiatric disorders: brain circuits and neurochemistry
  • Psychological care in cancer
  • Psychotherapy: types and uses
  • Stress and psychoneuroimmunology
  • Youth mental health

Growth, development, and ageing

50+ questions across 3 topics. It also has 3 topic notes.

  • Adolescent development
  • Later life in Egypt
  • Old age: health and services

Multisystem and acute care

30+ questions across 2 topics. It also has 2 topic notes.

  • Complementary medicine
  • Pain psychology

Population health and evidence

250+ questions across 10+ topics. It also has 10+ topic notes.

  • Chronic illness and disability
  • Complementary and alternative medicine
  • Ethnicity and health
  • Gender, sexuality, and sexual health
  • Health behaviour change
  • HIV stigma: community visitors
  • Illness behaviour and help-seeking
  • Limits of medical knowledge
  • Medicalisation
  • Sexuality and health
  • Social class and health
  • Social determinants and health care
  • The body and the cultures of health

Ethics, law, and communication

40+ questions across 3 topics. It also has 3 topic notes.

  • Doctor-patient relationship
  • Meeting community visitors
  • Patient narrative

Behavioural science sample questions

These 5 are published behavioural science questions shown exactly as students see them. Open an answer to see why it is right and why every other option is wrong.

Question 1 · Behavioural science, Preclinical

In elderly men followed for 15 years, which psychological factor was associated with lower cardiovascular mortality after controlling for cardiovascular risk factors and depressive symptoms?

  1. A. Anger and hostility
  2. B. Chronic work stress
  3. C. Type A personality
  4. D. Optimism
  5. E. Psychological distress
Show the answer and explanation

Answer: D. Optimism

Optimism was associated with a lower risk of cardiovascular mortality in elderly men during 15 years of follow-up. The association remained after controlling for cardiovascular risk factors and depressive symptoms.

Why the other options are wrong

  • A. Anger and hostility: Anger and hostility were associated with increased CHD events in healthy populations and poor prognosis in CHD populations.
  • B. Chronic work stress: Work stress (high demand, low control) is a chronic stressor.
  • C. Type A personality: Type A personality is hostile, pressured behaviour contributing to CVD.
  • E. Psychological distress: Psychological distress shows a dose-response association with cardiovascular disease death across the full range of distress.

Key point: Optimism was associated with lower cardiovascular mortality independent of risk factors and depressive symptoms.

Question 2 · Behavioural science, Preclinical

What does compassion, as part of the spirit of motivational interviewing, involve?

  1. A. Actively promoting the individual's welfare
  2. B. Accepting what the person brings through inherent worth, empathy, autonomy, and affirmation
  3. C. Working for and with the person in an active collaboration
  4. D. Establishing a helpful connection and working relationship
  5. E. Enhancing what is already present, not instilling what is missing
Show the answer and explanation

Answer: A. Actively promoting the individual's welfare

The spirit of MI is partnership, acceptance, compassion, and evocation. Compassion is to actively promote the individual's welfare.

Why the other options are wrong

  • B. Accepting what the person brings through inherent worth, empathy, autonomy, and affirmation: This is acceptance, another element of the spirit of MI.
  • C. Working for and with the person in an active collaboration: This is partnership, another element of the spirit of MI.
  • D. Establishing a helpful connection and working relationship: This is engaging, one of the four key processes of MI.
  • E. Enhancing what is already present, not instilling what is missing: This is evocation, another element of the spirit of MI.

Key point: The spirit of motivational interviewing is partnership, acceptance, compassion, and evocation, and compassion is actively promoting the individual's welfare.

References

Question 3 · Behavioural science, Preclinical

Which scientist embraced the idea that mind and body are distinct but closely joined, with the mind controlling the behaviours of the body and the body able to influence the mind?

  1. A. Gall
  2. B. William James
  3. C. Tolman
  4. D. Skinner
  5. E. Descartes
Show the answer and explanation

Answer: E. Descartes

Descartes' dualism holds that body and mind are distinct from one another and always divisible, yet closely joined. The mind has control over the behaviours of the body, and the body could also have influence over the mind.

Why the other options are wrong

  • A. Gall: Phrenology focused on measurements of the human skull, based on the concept that the brain is the organ of the mind.
  • B. William James: Connectionism, which he began to lay down, holds that mental phenomena can be described by interconnected networks of units.
  • C. Tolman: Purposive behaviourism combines the objective study of behaviour with consideration of its purpose or goal.
  • D. Skinner: He believed that one should focus on the external, observable causes of behaviour.

Key point: Descartes' dualism treats mind and body as distinct but closely joined, with influence running in both directions.

References

Question 4 · Behavioural science, Preclinical

Which strategy can increase the capacity of short-term memory?

  1. A. Repetition
  2. B. Elaboration
  3. C. Visual imagery encoding
  4. D. Chunking
  5. E. Auditory encoding
Show the answer and explanation

Answer: D. Chunking

Short-term memory holds 7 units, plus or minus 2, and chunking can increase that capacity. The other strategies keep information in short-term memory for longer or move it into long-term memory rather than raising capacity.

Why the other options are wrong

  • A. Repetition: Repetition recirculates information in short-term memory and resets the clock, giving another few seconds before the information decays.
  • B. Elaboration: Elaboration combines related information retrieved from long-term memory with information held in short-term memory.
  • C. Visual imagery encoding: Creating visual images improves memory.
  • E. Auditory encoding: Auditory encoding is the conversion of visual patterns to sounds.

Key point: Chunking can increase the capacity of short-term memory, which is 7 units plus or minus 2.

Question 5 · Behavioural science, Preclinical

At an antenatal class, a 30-year-old woman in her first pregnancy says, "I just know the pain will be unbearable and I will lose control; nothing I do will help." Later she mentions that she got through two painful dental procedures by listening to music and slowing her breathing. Which approach is most likely to help her cope in labour?

  1. A. Build on her own past strategies and rehearse them in class
  2. B. Teach her the class's standard breathing script only
  3. C. Advise a planned caesarean to avoid labour pain
  4. D. Tell her that labour is usually less painful than women expect
  5. E. Avoid talking about pain so she does not get anxious
Show the answer and explanation

Answer: A. Build on her own past strategies and rehearse them in class

Psychological preparation for labour pain widens women's coping strategies, identifies unhelpful patterns such as catastrophising, builds on strategies they already use, strengthens self-efficacy by practice and reinforcement, and plans for changing labour conditions with the birth partner. Coping strategy enhancement led women to use their strategies for more of labour.

Why the other options are wrong

  • B. Teach her the class's standard breathing script only: A single standard technique ignores the strategies she already trusts; effects of taught techniques vary widely between women.
  • C. Advise a planned caesarean to avoid labour pain: Fear of pain is a reason to support her, not by itself a reason for major surgery she has not asked for.
  • D. Tell her that labour is usually less painful than women expect: Women more often underestimate labour pain, so false reassurance sets up a gap between expectation and experience.
  • E. Avoid talking about pain so she does not get anxious: Avoiding the topic leaves her catastrophising unchallenged and her coping skills undeveloped.

Key point: Prepare women for labour pain by building on their own coping strategies, challenging catastrophising, rehearsing to strengthen self-efficacy, and setting realistic expectations.

References

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