Chapter 2: Methods Flashcards
hindsight bias
it’s relatively easy to explain the occurrence of an event after it occurs
applied research
research that has clear, practical applications
basic research
explores questions of interest that do not have clear, practical applications
hypothesis
expresses a relationship between two variables
dependent variable
variable that changes as a result of the independent variable
independent variable
a variable that is independent
theory
aims to explain a relationship between variables
operational definitions
explains how to measure a variable
valid
if it produces an accurate result
reliable
if it continues to produce similar results over time
participants
people that participate in the study
population
anybody that could potentially become a participant, or part of the sample
sample
the group of participants
sampling
process of selecting a sample
random selection
each member of the population has an equal chance of being selected; is done best via a double blind procedure
representative
must represent the larger population
stratified sampling
random sampling from subgroups; if you wanted an experiment to be racially representative, you could divide the population into smaller subgroups and then sample from each subgroup individually in proportion to their representation in the population
laboratory experiments
conducted in a controlled laboratory environment
field experiments
conducted in the ‘real world’
confounding variables
any difference between experimental and control conditions except for the independent variable
assignment
process by which participants are put into a group
participant-relevant confounding variables
confounding variable introduced by allowing the participant some control of the experiment; e.g. allowing them to choose a violent movie rather than randomly placing them in a group
group matching
making control and experimental groups equal for some criteria; assigning equal numbers of the female population to the two groups
situation-relevant confounding variables
any difference in the setting of the control v the experimental (except for the independent variable) that could affect the outcome
experimenter bias
unconscious difference in the way they treat groups
double-blind procedure
neither participants or researcher are able to affect the outcome of the experiment
demand characteristics
when participants form a preconceived notion about the way the experiment is supposed to go and behave accordingly
Hawthorne effect
participants alter their behavior because they know they are being studied
naturalistic observation
observing in natural habitat/in the field
case study
intensively studying one case or individual to get an idea of how things work on a larger scale
descriptive statistics
describe a set of data via statistics
frequency distributions
histograms, etc, graphical representations of frequencies
measures of central tendency
mean, median, mode; attempt to mark the center of a distribution
mean
average 90, 60, 20, 53 is the mean
median
central score, middle one in the number of scores. 90 60 20, 60 is the median
outliers
values that are extreme scores
positively skewed
skew caused by a particularly high score, more scores on the low end
negatively skewed
skew caused by a particularly low score, more scores on the high end
measures of variability
depict diversity of a distribution; range, variance, standard deviation
z scores
distance of score from mean in units of standard deviation
within one standard dev
approx 68 percent of scores
within 2 standard devs
approx 95 percent of scores
within 3 standard devs
approx 99 percent of scores
