Psy 1101 Final Exam Notes PDF

1 Chapter 2: Methodes 2.2 Psychology as a Science: The Scientific Method The scientific method: 1. Identify the problem: Identify the problem of interest. 2. Gather information: Review the scientific literature and examine existing theories of behavior. Try...

1 Chapter 2: Methodes 2.2 Psychology as a Science: The Scientific Method The scientific method: 1. Identify the problem: Identify the problem of interest. 2. Gather information: Review the scientific literature and examine existing theories of behavior. Try to find all the information available about your problem of interest. 3. Develop a hypothesis: Develop a hypothesis/educated prediction about what you think the outcome of the experiment will be. Tentative statement about the relationship between one or more variables. - Must be falsifiable --> Must be able to test and falsify the hypothesis. 4. Design and conduct experiments: Develop an experiment to test the hypothesis and collect data. 5. Analyze data and formulate conclusions: Analyze your findings and come up with a conclusion. The conclusion you come up with is not necessarily correct. 6. Restart the process: Replicate/redo the experiment and see what happens. Replication: We must replicate our studies with diMerent sets of subjects. Our confidence grows if we repeat and get similar results. Evolution: Science is constantly evolving, Science is self-correcting.  2 2.3.1 Naturalistic Observation Definition: The researchers leave their labs and go do their research in the real world. It is ecologically valid because the observations are a product of behavior. A fundamental rule: The researcher must not interfere in any way. They are just to observe. Operational definition: How a researcher decides to measure a variable. Reactivity (Hawthorne EEect): When people feel like they are being observed or know they are being studied their performance improves. Advantages: - Real: It does not get more real than this. We move away from artificiality of the lab. - Sometimes this is the only way: Sometimes this is the only way to get the information we need. - Discovery: By going into the real world to do research, we may discover things that we may never discover in the lab  3 2.3.1.1 Disadvantages of Naturalistic Observations Disadvantages: - Lack control: Researchers lack control over the environment and the many diMerent factors that can aMect behavior. So, we may not be sure of what is influencing behavior. - Researchers bias: No matter how hard researchers try to be objective they still may be influenced by their own theories, beliefs, and expectations. They may end up hearing what they want to hear and seeing what they want to see. matter how hard researchers try to be objective they still may be influenced by their own theories, beliefs, and expectations. They may end up hearing what they want to hear and seeing what they want to see. - The presence: Even though researchers do not interfere, still the mere presence of the researcher can influence an eMect and change the observed behaviors. Solution is that researchers must blend in.  4 2.3.4 Surveys Definition: Researchers ask a large sample of people questions that they would like the answer to. It is impossible to survey every single person in a population. The solution is to extract a sample from the population. Representative sample: We need to make sure the characteristics of our sample closely reflect the characteristics of our population. Why: We must have it because we use that sample to generalize to the population. How: Researchers use random sampling in order to obtain a random sample. Random Sampling: Every single person in the population of interest has an equal chance to be in the survey. Chance, only chance and nothing but chance determines who ends up in the sample. Simple random sample: Go into the population of interest and extract a sample using random sampling Stratified random sample: We take the population we are interested in, and we break it down into the diMerent groups we are interested in. Then we go into every one of those groups and extract a sample from them. Advantages: - Cheap: Very cheap - Easy to: Very easy to administer - Includes: We can include people that aren’t usually included in research. Ex. Illiterate people, homebound people, etc. - Sometimes it is the only way: Sometimes it is the only way to know something.  5 Disadvantages: - Truth: Just because you ask something, it doesn’t mean you’ll get the truth. - Easily: The answers we get can be easily influenced by how we word a question (Word influence). The results we get can be easily aMected by the characteristics of the person asking the question. Response bias: The tendency for people to answer the question the way they feel they are expected to answer or in a systematic way that are otherwise inaccurate. Acquiescent response bias: The tendency for participants to agree or respond “yes” to all questions regardless of their actual opinions. Socially desirable bias: Participants respond to questions in way that would be seen as acceptable by others. Illusory superiority: The tendency to describe our own behavior as better than average. Key survey-related bias: Who was willing to participate in this survey, and were those who did representative of the rest of the population? Volunteer bias: A bias whereby only a motivated fraction pf a population respond to a survey or participate in research.  6 2.4.1 The Tuskegee Syphilis Study What: A study done on over 600 African American men (half with and half without the disease). Why: Learn more about syphilis. How: Observing the participants and then conducting autopsies on the dead. Goal: Follow the time course syphilis. (not to actually treat them) Result: The preventative death of hundreds of participants and needless contribution to the spread of syphilis.  7 2.4.2.1 Principle A: Beneficence and Non-maleficence Definition: Research should strive to do good (beneficence) and avoid creating experiments that can intentionally harm (maleficence) participants. Psychologists must: Carefully weigh the benefits of the research against the costs that participants may experience and put in place safeguards to protect the mental and physical well-being of research participants. 2.4.2.3 Principle C: Integrity Definition: Psychologists should engage in accurate, honest, and non-biased practices in the science, teaching, and practice of psychology.  8 2.4.3 The Practice of Ethical Research Institutional Review Board: Committee of independent people who review and assess if the research project will be carried out in a way that is consistent with the general ethical principles. Ethical principles: - The proposed study will use sound research design. - Risks associated with participation in the study are minimized and reasonable. - The benefits of the research outweigh any potential risks. - All participants can make an informed decision to participate in the study, and that decision may be withdrawn at any time without consequence to the participant. - Safeguards are in place too protect the well-being of participants. - All data collected will be kept private and confidential. Informed consent: The process whereby researchers work with participants to describe essential details of the study.  9 2.5 Correlational Research Looking to: Identify relationships that exist between two or more variables. Correlation: A measure (r) that capture the direction and strength of a relationship between variables. Scatterplot: Type of graph that has one variable on the x-axis and one on the y-axis and provides a visual representation between variables. - Strong = points cluster tightly together in a line  10 2.5.2 Strength of Correlation Positive and negative: Values convey the direction of a correlation. Do not: Indicate how closely the two variables are related. Closer: Closer the data points are to the line, the stronger the correlation is. Correlation coeEicient: Numerical representation of the strength of the relationships between variables(r). Ranges from -1 to +1. Absolute value: The magnitude of strength of the correlation. Direction: The +/- sign is just the direction that the line goes in. It is unrelated to the strength. Strong: Gets stronger the closer the value is to 1.0. (1.4 is not stronger than 1.0)  11 2.6.2 Experimental Variables Allows us: Experimental research allows us to observe, describe, predict and explain. It is the only: Type of research that allows us to talk about cause-and-eMect relationships. Why: 1. Researcher manipulates independent variable of interest. 2. Researcher controls all other independent variables that could interfere with his results. Independent variable (IV): Variable that causes change in another variable. Either manipulated or controlled. Always comes first. What we think will cause a change in our experiment. Cause. Dependent variable (DV): Variable that is being changed, influenced, aMected by the independent variable. Researcher measures this. EMect. Extraneous variable (EV): Also known as confounding variables. Variables that are note the focus of the study, but that may influence the outcome of research is not controlled. Can be done: In the lab and in the real world. Field experiment: Done in the real world. Here researcher. Can manipulate and control variables  12 2.6.4 Experimental and Control Groups Two groups: Creating two groups as a bias for our comparison. Experimental group: Group that receives the treatment of interest. Control group: Treated nearly identical to the experimental group but it does not receive Placebo eEect: The brain will trick patients into thinking the drug they are taking is working even if it’s fake.  13 2.7.1 Describing Data: Central Tendency Descriptive statistics: Collection of ways to describe the data in the simplest way possible. Central tendency: Three types Mean: The average score Median: The middle score in an ordered set of data. Mode: The most frequently occurring number in a data set.