Chapter 1: Psychology is a way of thinking

Question 1

Psychology is an empirical science (T/F)

Answer 1

True

Question 2

What are the five different sources of knowledge we went over in class?

Answer 2

Authority, common sense, intuition, rationalism, empiricism

Question 3

Sources of knowledge

Describe “Authority”

Answer 3

When someone influential says something, including scientists

Question 4

What are problems with getting knowledge from authority?

Answer 4

• can encourage dissent
• info is only as good as the expert
• authority can be biased

such as prior to the renaissance, when questions about how the world works were answered by the works of experts

Question 5

Types of knowledge

Describe “common sense”

Answer 5

folk wisdom, what everyone knows, corroborated by personal experience

Question 6

What are the problems with common sense type of knowledge?

Answer 6

• people accept things they think are true and ignore counter-examples, everyone coulda gree upon something incorrect
• selectively attend to what fits

Question 7

Types of knowledge

Rationalism

Answer 7

• a priori (from what is earlier) method; knowledge dervied from reasoning, deduction, or logic
• If given certain bits of information, you can induce/infer something else from those bits of information
• deduction/inference

Question 8

What is the problem with rationalism?

Answer 8

Women driving example

Question 9

Types of knowledge

Describe empiricism

Answer 9

• knowledge from experience/observation
• depends on using evidence as the basis for conclusions
• Personal experience is de-emphasized

Question 10

What is the problem with empiricism?

Answer 10

Humans are biased

Question 11

When a field is empirical, it relies on data from…

Answer 11

observers

Question 12

What type of knowledge is best for science and technology?

Answer 12

Systematic/empirical observation

Question 13

What type of logic is best for computer languages, math, and philosophy?

Answer 13

Logic/reason (rationalism)

Question 14

What type of knowledge is best for family/relationships, art, and creativity?

Answer 14

Intuition

Question 15

Theory-data cycle

Answer 15

• scientists collect data to test, change, or update their theories
• people do this everyday (show up to class with nobody there example)…notice we went through a specific procedure ad you asked specific kinds of questions because you were operating under a specific theory

Question 16

What is a theory?

Answer 16

A set of statements that describe how variables relate to other as simply as possible (parsimony)

Question 17

What do good theories generate?

Answer 17

Hypotheses

Question 18

How many hypotheses do researchers have

Answer 18

Most researchers test theories with a number of different hypotheses

Question 19

What is a hypothesis

Answer 19

• a prediction stated in terms of study design
• specific outcome the researcher will observe in a study
• reflects the theory its based on

Question 20

Data vs datium

Answer 20

data plural datium singular

Question 21

What are data

Answer 21

set of observations

Question 22

What does data support

Answer 22

either the null or alternative hypothesis

data that support the hypotheses strengthen our confidence in a theory

Question 23

Do studies prove theories

Answer 23

NO

Question 24

What should you say instead of “prove” a theory

Answer 24

support or are consistent with the theory

Question 25

Why not say prove

Answer 25

• impossible to observe all instances of an event/occurence
  there may be another explanation for the data

Question 26

What could be making data inconsistent/refute

Answer 26

• the theory
• the experimental design
• the assumptions of the experimenter

Question 27

Good theories are…

Answer 27

• falsifiable
• you should ne able to develop a hypothesis that can fail t support a theory (invisible gnome example)

Question 28

Merton’s Scientific Norms

Universality

Answer 28

• everyone evaluated on the same criteria
• the same criteria apply to all scientists and research

Question 29

Merton’s Scientific Norms

Communality

Answer 29

scientific knowledge is created by the community and its findings belong to the community

Question 30

Merton’s Scientific Norms

Disinterestedness

Answer 30

• scientists strive to discover the truth
• not influenced by conviction, idealism, politics, or profit

Question 31

Merton’s Scientific Norms

Organized Skepticism

Answer 31

• scientists question everything including their own theories, widely accepted ideas, and “ancient wisdom”

Question 32

What happens during the peer-review process?

Answer 32

1. You test your hypothesis and collect data, then write up results in a peer-reviewed journal
2. Other scientists review what you did. If you did something wrong or if other scientists do not agree with the results, you do not get published.
   3.If you do get published, other researchers will design other experiments to test the hypothesis, and use your results to advance other questions
3. If similar researchers all get similar results, we might be onto something

Question 33

Describe an original source

Answer 33

• aka primary source
• the article/chapter was written by the researchers
• Includes peer-reviewed journal articles and edited books

Question 34

Describe a secondary source

Answer 34

• The media was produced by someone else who read and summarized the work
• Textbooks, blogs, newspaper articles/stories
• These can be a good way to get a lot of info easily but can often be sensationalized (more likely to be read, but makes it easy to spread misinformation)

Question 35

Cycle of misinformation- Mozart Effect example

Answer 35

1. Rausher (1993) found when students heard Mozart for 10 minutes they performed better on spatial tasts then listening to a speaker
2. This was translated into “scientists say listening to Mozart makes babies smarter”
   -Problems: listening to any music can help with performance on some tasks, effects are weak, will not actually change your overall IQ