Ch. 3: Identifying & Operationalizing Research Topics Flashcards
research questions
key elements in developing a topic area, and in
essence are questions that explore the relations among or between constructs
research hypothesis
states the expected relationship between
constructs
descriptive questions
ask what some phenomena or events are like
difference questions
ask if there are differences between groups of people, or even within individual participants (the key component being comparison)
relationship questions
explore the degree to which two or more con-
structs are related or vary together (typically uses correlation stats or regression analyses)
operational definition
define the constructs involved in a particular study, provides a working definition of the phenomenon, allows the researcher to move from general ideas and constructs to more specific and measurable events
uniformity myth
the assumption that treatments are a standard set of techniques, applied in a consistent
manner, by a standard therapist, to a homogeneous group of clients
MAXMINCON principle (Kerlinger)
an attempt to maximize the variance of the variable or variables pertaining to the research questions, minimize the error variance of random variables, and control the variance of extraneous or unwanted variables that might affect or bias the variables in question
internal validity
an experimental control allows researchers to make more inferences about causal relationships between variables
external validity
generalizability of the results to applied settings
experimental field studies
studies characterized by investigations that manipulate independent variables and are conducted in a real-life setting; attempts to examine causality through random assignment of treatments and control of independent variables
experimental laboratory studies
studies are characterized by manipulation of independent variables and are conducted in a laboratory setting
descriptive field studies
studies characterized by investigations that do not exercise experimental controls
(randomization, manipulation of variables) and are conducted in a real-life
setting
descriptive laboratory studies
studies characterized by investigations that do not exercise experimental controls (such as randomization or manipulation of independent variables) and that are conducted in a laboratory setting of some kind
experimental controls
a key component of internal validity; examples include manipulations of variables and randomization