Doing psychology Flashcards
What is psychophysics?
Psychophysics is the relationship between psychological and physical
What is the just noticeable difference?
The just noticeable difference is the smallest detectable difference between two stimuli
What is the absolute threshold?
Absolute threshold is the smallest detectable sensation that can be detected.
What did absolute threshold become a unit of measure for? and what did this lead to?
Absolute threshold became the unit of measure for sensation making it possible to measure relationship between physical and mental. It also meant it was possible to vary stimuli
What is nominal data?
Nominal data is numeric values indicate groups but nothing about the numbers mean anything apart from splitting people into groups
What is ordinal data?
Ordinal data is numeric values that order responses
What is interval data?
Interval data is numeric values with no meaningful zero point
What is ratio data?
Ratio data is numeric values with meaningful zero point
What is reliability?
Reliability is the accuracy of our measurement (i.e. consistency)
What is accuracy of measurement across items referred as?
Accuracy of our measurement across items is referred to as internal consistency
What is internal consistency?
Internal consistency is a set of items or stimuli that closely assess or measure the same things
What is accuracy of measurement across persons referred as?
Accuracy of our measurement across persons is referred to as inter-rater agreement
What is inter-rater agreement?
Inter-rater agreement is the extent to which a number of different raters of a particular target agree with each other
What is accuracy of measurement across time referred as?
Accuracy of measurement across time is referred to as test-retest
What is test-retest?
Test-retest is when a test is taken one day, and repeated the day after, and then again in two weeks, and refers to how closely the test scores resemble each other
What is validity?
Validity concerns the degree to which our measurement tool measures what it was designed to measure
What is content validity?
Content validity is when the test/measure contains content relevant to the intended construct
What is face validity?
Face validity does appear to measure the intended construct
What is convergent validity?
Convergent validity is high correlations with measures of the same construct
What is discriminant validity?
Discriminant validity is low correlations with measures of different constructs
What is concurrent validity?
Concurrent validity is when the correlations are being derived from contemporaneous measures
What is predictive validity?
Predicative validity is when the construct predicts an expected outcome at some time in the future
What is measurement error?
Measurement error is the difference between measured value and the true value
What is measured value?
Measured value is the value I am given in a study
What is the true value?
True value is the actual level of some constraint
What is random error?
Random error is inevitable and uncontrollable
What is systematic error?
Systematic error can be reduced with good study design and measure selection
What is experimental psychology?
It studies cause and effect by manipulating independent variables in the controlled environment of the laboratory
What is correlational psychology?
It studies natural variance in the real world which had obvious practical advantages
What is a dependant variable?
A dependant variable is the thing we want to predict/ understand (also known as outcome)
What is an independent variable?
An independent variable is the thing we hypothesize influences the dependant variable (also known as predictor)
What is the covariate?
The covariate is the thing that will influence the outcome but we may not hypothesize about
What is observational research?
Observational research is observed in the native environment in the real world, there’s no control over setting
What is experimental research?
Experimental research is observed in an controlled environment of the lab
What is exploratory research?
Exploratory research is exploring a topic with no fixed hypotheses about what influences might be involved
What is confirmatory research?
Confirmatory research is when a specific claim is being tested
What are pilot studies?
Pilot studies are often used as exploratory research in which the main goal is to test materials and procedures
What is primary data?
Primary data is new data collection
What is secondary data?
Secondary data is using available data for a different purpose
What is a key feature of experimental design?
In experimental design we manipulate our independent variable
What is a key feature of observational design?
In observational design there is no manipulation of the independent variable
What are the four things that reliable and valid experiments should be?
Reliable and valid experiments will be replicable, reproducible, robust and generalizable
