Ch 2 The Research Enterprise in Psychology

Question 0

what are the 3 goals of the scientific enterprise?

Answer 0

1) measure and describe behaviour
2) understand and predict behaviour
3) apply knowledge to control behaviour

Question 1

What are the 5 steps in a scientific investigation?

Answer 1

1) formulate a testable hypothesis
2) select the research method
3) collect the data
4) analyze the data and draw conclusions
5) report findings

Question 2

What is an operational definition used for?

Answer 2

describes the actions or operations that will be used to measure or control a variable

Question 3

what are the 2 main benefits of using the scientific method?

Answer 3

clarity and intolerance of error

Question 4

what is the difference between an independent and dependent variable?

Answer 4

indie- condition or event that an experimenter varies in order to see its impact on another variable

dependent- variable that is thought to be affected by manipulation of the indie variable

Question 5

What is an extraneous variable?

Answer 5

any variables other than the independent variable that seem likely to influence the depended variable in a specific study

Question 6

What is a cofounding of variables, and when does it occur?

Answer 6

when you cant tell which variable is having the effect on your dependent variable.

occurs when two variables are linked together in a way that makes it difficult to sort out their specific effects

Question 7

true or false, many experiments tend to be artificial

Answer 7

true

Question 8

what is a control group?

Answer 8

similar subjects who do not receive the special treatment given too the experimental groups

Question 9

What is reactivity?

Answer 9

when a subjects behaviour is altered by the presence of an observer

Question 10

How can case studies be used to look for general principles of behaviour?

Answer 10

if you examine a series of studies involving similar problems, you can look for threads of consistency that may yield general conclusions

Question 11

what are the strengths and weaknesses of descriptive/correlational research? (hint: experiments, naturalistic observ, case studies, and surveys)

Answer 11

Experiments: + control over variables, cause and effect relationships. - ethics, often artificial
Naturalistic: + not artificial - not able to create cause and effect relationships
Case studies: + compelling support to theory - often unrepresentative
Surveys: + can give data of hard to observe info - can be unreliable due to self report

Question 12

True or false, clinical research depends heavily on case studies

Answer 12

true

Question 13

what are the three measures of central tendency?

Answer 13

mean, median, and mode

Question 14

what is a frequency polygon?

Answer 14

a line figure used to present data from a frequency distribution.

Question 15

What is a frequency distribution?

Answer 15

an orderly arrangement of scores indicating the frequency of each score or a group of scores

Question 16

In a negatively skewed distribution, do most scores pile up at the high end of the scale or the low end of the scale?

Answer 16

high end

Question 17

what is variability?

Answer 17

refers to how much the scores in a data set vary from each other and the mean

Question 18

What is a standard deviation?

Answer 18

an index of the amount of variability in a set of data

Question 19

What does a percentile score indicate?

Answer 19

the percentage of people who score at or below a particular score

Question 20

When does a correlation exist?

Answer 20

when variables are related to eachother

Question 21

What is a correlation coefficient?

Answer 21

a numerical index of the degree of relationship between 2 variables

Question 22

what is the difference between a positive and a negative correlation?

Answer 22

a positive correlation is when 2 variables co-vary in the same direction.

a negative correlation is when 2 variable s co-vary in the opposite direction

Question 23

what is the highest amount of correlation you can have on either end of the scale, and what is the smallest

Answer 23

0 is the smallest amount of correlation

and -1.00 or +1.00 are the highest amounts

Question 24

What are inferential statistics used for?

Answer 24

used to interpret data and draw conclusions

Question 25

when is statistical significance said to exist?

Answer 25

When the probability of the observed finsinds are due to chance is really low

Question 26

what is replication?

Answer 26

the repetition of a study to see wheter the earlier results are duplicated

Question 27

what is a sampling bias?

Answer 27

when a sample is not representative of the population from which it was drawn

Question 28

what is meta-analysis?

Answer 28

the combination of many studies of the same question yielding an estimate of the size and consistency of a variables effects

Question 29

What is the social desirability bias?

Answer 29

when people have a tendency to give socially approved answers to questions about oneself

Question 30

what is a response set?

Answer 30

the tendency to respond questions in a particular way that is unrelated to the content of the questions

Question 31

what is a double blind procedure?

Answer 31

when neither subjects of nor experimenters know which subjects are in the experimental or the control group

Question 32

What are the 4 key principles of the Canadian code of ethics?

Answer 32

1) respect for the dignity of people
2) responsible caring
3) integrity in relationships
4) responsibility to society

Question 33

What is defined as “a tentative prediction about the relationship between two variables”?

Answer 33

hypothesis

Question 34

When a researcher decides if a study will be correlational or experimental, what are they deciding?

Answer 34

how much control they will have over the study

Question 35

a group of clients are randomly assigned to same sex or co-ed groups for therapy. What is the independent variable of this study?

Answer 35

wether or not the group was co-ed

Question 36

A researcher wants to see whether a protein diet will enhance the maze running of rats. For the duration of the study, the researcher feeds one group of rats the protein diet and the other gets its regular food. In this experiment, what is the term used to describe the maze-running performance of the rats?

Answer 36

the control variable

Question 37

a research study examines the effect of a new teaching technique on students achievement test scores. What would be an extraneous variable? (hair colour, athletic skills, IQ, or sociability?)

Answer 37

IQ

Question 38

When you have a cold, you rest in bed, take medication, and drink plenty of fluids. If you wanted to know which of those three actions led to the improvement of your symptoms, which method would prevent you from knowing for sure? (cofounding, self-report, sampling bias, or experimenter bias?)

Answer 38

Cofounding of variables

Question 39

A psychologist monitors a group of nursery school children, recording each instance of altrustic behaviour when it occurs. What type of research method is the psychologist using?

Answer 39

naturalistic