Contemporary Methods And Issues Flashcards
What is basic science research?
- Research that increases understanding and theory
- Tries to understand a given phenomenon
- ex. Universities, Research institutes
What is applied science research?
- Research that applies theory into applied interventions
- Used to make the world better in some tangible way
- ex. Healthcare, Workplace, Communities
Explain quantitative vs qualitative research
Quantitative:
- Measures “how much”
- Traditional methods and designs are quantitative, which emphasise reliable measures in controlled experiments or surveys
Qualitative:
- Understanding “why, what, when and how”
- Use interviews, focus groups, narratives, or case studies
- Experience-focused
Explain the cross-sectional quantitative method
- Measures taken at one point in time
- Issues with causality unless you conduct an experiment
Explain the longitudinal quantitative method
- Measures taken at two or more time points
- Better case for cause and effect
- Confounding or “third” variables
Explain the SEM quantitative method
- Structural Equation Modelling
- Maps out complex relations between many factors/variables
- Aim to create a model that “fits” data
- Non-exploratory
- Models informed by theory
- Best method to test theories
Experimental vs Quasi-Experimental Designs
Experimental:
Researchers randomly assign participants to one condition, treatment or group
Quasi-experimental:
- Group of interest cannot be manipulated (occurs naturally/pre-existing or unethical to manipulate)
- ex. gender, race, alcohol intake, drug use
What are the issues with quasi-experimental designs?
- Lack of control or comparison group, which makes it potentially unreliable
- Certain predispositions or individual differences may have influenced categorisation in a group
- Recruitment of certain populations can be difficult
What are the advantages of quasi-experimental design?
- Social psychologists are usually very interested in pre-existing groups
- A factor that is commonly focused on in studies of social psychology
- ex. age, race/ethnicity, sex/gender, SES
What are the disadvantages of quasi-experimental designs?
- Selection differences: Any differences between pre-existing groups not controlled or accounted for by the researcher
- Cannot demonstrate cause and effect
What are the issues with social experiments?
- Ecological validity: Modelling social phenomena in a controlled lab environment can’t always depict an accurate representation of normal contexts
- Use of confederates: Actors who play the role of someone in a study is not always convincing (use of online, virtual confederates might be more reliable)
Explain the meta-analysis quantitative method
Use of statistics to combine results of several individual studies addressing similar questions into a single pooled measure of an effect size
What is the difference between ‘between-subjects’ and ‘within-subjects’ designs?
Between-subject design:
- Different participants test each condition, so a single person is exposed to a single user interface
- Usually involves a control group that doesn’t undergo treatment
Within-subject design:
- The same person tests all the conditions (all user interfaces)
- No control group
Explain double blind control and single-blind control
Double-blind control:
- Randomised study which prevents bias
- Researcher and participant oblivious of the condition they are in
Single-blind control: When only the participant is unaware of their condition
What does ‘effect size’ refer to?
Strength of an association between variables
What are the ethical concerns of social psychology studies?
- Social psychologists measure sensitive information, which is an issue because…
- Some individuals may not honestly report sensitive information
- Reporting information could elicit stress or other concerns
- Concern for anonymity, particularly for illegal behaviours - Studying social behaviours may harm participants, because…
- Stressful manipulations can cause anxiety or harm
- Among stigmatised groups, attempt to study their experiences can make them relieve the traumatic events
- Just deception of social psych in general
How are the ethical concerns of social psychology studies addressed?
- In response to sensitive information:
- Anonymity in responses
- Provide resources for those potentially stressed by the study
- Avoid asking for additional sensitive information when possible
- Avoid the use of any identifiable information (ex. anon ID numbers) - In response to harmful social studies
- Pre-screen to exclude “at-risk” participants (ex. high stress individuals; mental health issues)
- Model phenomenon by minimising use of stigmatised groups (minimal group paradigms; vignettes instead of face2face)
What is the definition of construct?
- Attempt to capture patterns of behaviour
- Hard to capture directly due to vagueness
What are operational definitions?
- We try to define constructs through operational definitions, which is how we can measure it
- Can be quantitative or qualitative
- Vary in reliability, but there are usually endless options
Examples:
- Quantitative: Self-report scales, Physiological measures, Reaction times,
- Qualitative: Natural observation
- Mixed: Implicit Association Test, Flanker Task, Reading Span Task
Differentiate between explicit and implicit operationalisations
Explicit Operationalisation:
- Conscious and deliberate
- Self-reported by participant (e.g. interview, survey, questionnaire)
- Vulnerable to social desirability because it gives you a chance to think about your response
Implicit Operationalisation:
- Unconscious and automatic
- Gut reactions or impulsive decisions made by participant
- Ex. Behavioural tasks, natural observation, facial expression, etc.
Explain the Implicit Association Test (IAT)
(what it does, how it works, how its measured)
- Measures the strength of automatic associations between concepts
- Interpreted as implicit preferences or attitudes
- How it works: When two concepts are associated in your mind, it is easy to respond more quickly and correctly when categorising -> Stronger associations will give faster responses
- Bias is measured by D-Score (positive values = congruent bias; negative is opposite; zero = no bias)
What are the issues with IAT?
- Makes assumptions about groups and forces categorisation
- May prime participants with stereotypes, rather than assess them
- Some targets may not have appropriate comparisons (ex. is the opposite of alcohol water? soda?); Oversimplifies some things by restriction of two categories
- For the previous point, we could just do a single target comparison when appropriate
What are the possible issues (7) in the cycle process of conducting research?
- Novelty Bias
- The preference for novel studies instead of a replication
- This lack of replication as a norm means that only 1 in 1000 papers are replicated - Low statistical power of design studies
- Poor chance to detect effects even if they exist - Lack of pre-registration after determining design study
- “Cherry-picking” data that supports hypothesis, during data collection and/or data analysis
- Mining data for statistically significant associations (data analysis/interpretation)
- HARKing to fit the data or analyses (data interpretation/hypothesis-generation)
- HARKing = presenting a post-hoc hypothesis (one based on or informed by the study’s results) - During publishing process
- Publication Bias = publishing of positive results instead of truthful and critical results
- Data. materials, method not shared
- Peer review is secret
