Chapter 2

Question 1

Cycle of the Scientific method in psychology

Answer 1

Research Literature><Research>Empirical study>Data Analysis>Conclusions>Publish Paper>Research Questions</Research>

Question 2

Informal ideas

Answer 2

Are direct or indirect observations on behavior. It can be a real life observation while going on your day or something a newspaper says that you question. Note: Milgram’s famous study was prompted by Nazi’s saying they committed atrocities because they were only obeying orders

Question 3

Practical Problems

Answer 3

That either impair human functionality in the environment or something you want to see improved .

Question 4

Why read Previous Research other than learning

Answer 4

can help build studies based on already established work from people of expertise in the area. It can also help narrow down your topic to a specific degree to be researchable. Most common research ideas

Question 5

Methods of finding previous research

Answer 5

1. Professional Journals which have two types: Empirical research reports which is empirical studies and review articles which look at previously reviewed articles and present new ways to look at the results
2. Theoretical articles which present a new theory
3. Meta-analysis which is statistically studying what came before
4. Double-blind peer review

Question 6

Double-blind peer review

Answer 6

process of when an article is sent to a Journal to be published, it is sent to two or three experts who write a critical review of it but the reason its double-blind is because the reviewers do not know who the researcher is and vise versa

Question 7

meta Analysis

Answer 7

Statistically studying what came before

Question 8

Theoretical Articles

Answer 8

Articles that present a new theory

Question 9

Two types of Professional Journals

Answer 9

1. Empirical research reports which is empirical studies
2. review articles which look at previously reviewed articles and present new ways to look at the results

Question 10

Scholarly Books and their two types

Answer 10

are books written for other researchers,

a monograph is written by a single author or a small group of authors;

edited volumes is a single or small group of editors who recruit many authors to write a book with sometimes a different author per chapter

Question 11

How many sources does a typical report have?

Answer 11

50

Question 12

techniques for turning research ideas into empirical research questions

Answer 12

Asking about the causes and effects of behavior

What types of people or situations promote the behavior

Research abstracts and discussion sections of previous articles

refine what has already been researched

Question 13

What makes a research question interesting?

Answer 13

When a question is in doubt

may answer a question

will advance the literature

answer a practical problem

Question 14

Theory

Answer 14

A theory is a coherent explanation of one or more phenomena that has a lot of proof

Question 15

Hypothesis

Answer 15

A hypothesis is a specific prediction about a new phenomena that you assume will be accurate.

Question 16

techniques to generate a hypothesis

Answer 16

Analyze competing theories

thinking of if-then relationships

looking at previous research

Question 17

Hypothetico-deductive model

Answer 17

Starting out with data and attempting to explain it based on what you know. Then make a prediction, then run an experiment and then revise the hypothesis based on the results.

Question 18

Operational definition

Answer 18

A definition of a variable or precisely how it is to be measured. Such as taking depression and turning it into something that can be observed such as Becks depression inventory

Question 19

Distinguish between lab studies, field studies, and field experiments.

Answer 19

Laboratory studies are done in the lab and field studies are done outside the lab. Lab studies have high internal validity (confidence in the causal relationship) because we can manipulate variables.

Field studies have high external validity (the degree we can generalize findings or circumstances) because we observe them in real-world settings

Filed experiments are experiments (variables manipulated) in the field

Question 20

Standard deviation

Answer 20

average distance of scores from the mean

Question 21

variance

Answer 21

Standard deviation squared

Question 22

difference between descriptive and inferential statistics

Answer 22

Descriptive is about gaining data on phenomena

inferential is about drawing conclusions based on a sample

Question 23

Type 1 error

Answer 23

false positive. When something is due to random chance even with the results concluded as statistically significant

Question 24

Type II error

Answer 24

a missed opportunity. It is when a researcher concludes that their results are not statistically significant when in reality there is a real effect in the population and they just missed detecting it. Once again, these Type II errors are more likely to occur when the threshold is set too low (e.g., set at 1% instead of 5%) and/or when the sample was too small

Question 25

Why do scientists avoid the term scientific proof?

Answer 25

Because of Type 1 errors, there could always be a random chance part or a third part variable. There could be other plausible theories to summarize the hypothesis. Also its always possible a disconfirming case can come along. There is only evidence, never proof