PSY 201 Ch2 Set A (Scientific Research)

scientific research requires critical thinking; curiosity, skepticism, questioning

assessing claims, making judgements, based well-supported evidence

1. to DESCRIBE behavior and mental processes; 2. to make accurate PREDICTIONS about them; 3. to demonstrate some CONTROL over them; 4. to EXPLAIN how and why behavior and mental processes occur

1. Define the problem; 2. formulate the hypothesis; 3. Select a research method and design the study; 4. Select your subjects/conduct study; 5. Analyze the data; 6. Write up the results

step 1; what are you trying to find out? MUST BE IN THE FORM OF A QUESTION; ex: Does heart rate increase with watching violent movies?

observations, curiosity, past research (readings), skepticism, theories, and other studies of folklore

step 2; educated guess; a specific prediction about some phenomenon; a testable prediction; "statement of the expected relationship between the variables of interest"; what we think will happen; Ex: If someone watches a violent movie, then they will have a higher heart rate than those who dont.

exact operations or methods used; variables in terms that they can be observed and measured; amount of something used, way something's measured

test your hypothesis; five basic methods: experimental method, correlational method, survey method, ___, ___

a controlled means of studying the relationship between the variables of interest; two variables: independent and dependent

the variable the experimenter changes or manipulates

the response or results variable; subject's response; what was measured

"The effects of ______(independent) on ______(dependent)."

things that could impact the findings (or dependent variable) other than the independent variable; want to hold these variables constant

random assignment (or randomizing); each subject has an equal chance of being in either an experimental or control group; distribute confounding (extraneous) variables across groups (equally); minimizing chance of distorted/biased results; RANDOM ASSIGNMENT

one means of control; establishes cause and effect; randomly assign groups to independent variable

receives the independent variable/treatment; How does the independent variable affect them?; participant group

receives everything the experimental group receives except the independent variable/no treatment; may receive a placebo; comparison group

control; cause and effect

can't manipulate everything; ethical concerns;

means of studying the magnitude and direction of the relationship between the variables of interest; measure the variables and plot them to determine the relationship; use a statistic to determine the strength (magnitude) and direction of the relationship

between +1.00 and -1.00; closest to either = strong correlation; closest to 0 = weak or no correlation

no real independent and dependent variable; usually called grouping, categorical or classification variables; may still be referred to as independent and dependent variables

positive, negative and no correlation

as one variable of interest increases, the other variable of interest increases; change in same direction

as one variable of interest increases, the other variable of interest decreases

there is no relationship between the variables of interest; correlation coefficient closer to .00

testing predictions; evaluating theories

two-way causality (bi-directionality problem), third variable problem

can't establish causality

may be an artificial relationship; changes in two variables may be due to another variable

information is obtained by asking many people a standard set of questions; ask about attitudes, opinions and behaviors; self-report measures; polling/questionnaire (written survey); interview (oral survey)

gathers large amounts of data; quick; inexpensive

poorly phrased questions; response biases (social desirability)