Exam 1 Flashcards
Intuition
we are relying on our guts, our emotions, and/or our instincts to guide us
Authority
This method involves accepting new ideas because some authority figure states that they are true
Rationalism
involves using logic and reasoning to acquire new knowledge
Empiricism
involves acquiring knowledge through observation and experience
Scientific Method
is a process of systematically collecting and evaluating evidence to test ideas and answer questions
Systematic Empiricism
refers to learning based on observation, and scientists learn about the natural world systematically, by carefully planning, making, recording, and analyzing observations of it
Empirical Question
These are questions about the way the world actually is and, therefore, can be answered by systematically observing it
Public Knowledge
This usually means writing an article for publication in a professional journal, in which they put their research question in the context of previous research, describe in detail the methods they used to answer their question, and clearly present their results and conclusions
Pseudoscience
refers to activities and beliefs that are claimed to be scientific by their proponents—and may appear to be scientific at first glance—but are not
falsifiable
A scientific claim that must be expressed in such a way that there are observations that would—if they were made—count as evidence against the claim
to describe
is achieved by making careful observations
To predict
Once we have observed with some regularity that two behaviors or events are systematically related to one another we can use that information to predict whether an event or behavior will occur in a certain situation
To explain
goal involves determining the causes of behavior
Basic research
Research conducted primarily for the sake of achieving a more detailed and accurate understanding of human behavior, without necessarily trying to address any particular practical problem.
Applied Research
Research conducted primarily to address some practical problem
Folk psychology
Intuitive beliefs about people’s behavior, thoughts, and feelings
heuristics
Mental shortcuts in forming and maintaining our beliefs
confirmation bias
Tendency to focus on cases that confirm our intuitive beliefs and to disregard cases that disconfirm our beliefs.
skepticism
Pausing to consider alternatives and to search for evidence—especially systematically collected empirical evidence—when there is enough at stake to justify doing so
tolerance for uncertainty
Accepting that there are many things that we simply do not know
empirically supported treatments.
A treatment that that has been shown through systematic observation to lead to better outcomes when compared to no-treatment or placebo control groups.
Three of the most common sources of inspiration
informal observations, practical problems, and previous research
Informal observations
include direct observations of our own and others’ behavior as well as secondhand observations from non-scientific sources such as newspapers, books, blogs, and so on
Practical problems
can also inspire research ideas, leading directly to applied research in such domains as law, health, education, and sports
previous research
Recall that science is a kind of large-scale collaboration in which many different researchers read and evaluate each other’s work and conduct new studies to build on it
research literature
All the published research in that field
Professional journals
Are periodicals that publish original research articles.
Empirical research reports
Research reports that describe one or more new empirical studies conducted by the authors
Review articles
Articles that summarize previously published research on a topic and usually present new ways to organize or explain the results
meta-analysis
A review article that provides a statistical summary of all of the previous results
theoretical article
A review article that is devoted primarily to presenting a new theory.
double-blind peer review
A process in which the reviewers of a research article do not know the identity of the researcher(s) and vice versa.
Scholarly books
Books written by researchers and practitioners mainly for use by other researchers and practitioners
monograph
A coherent written presentation of a topic much like an extended review article written by a single author or a small group of authors
Edited volumes
Books that are collections of chapters written by different authors on different aspects of the same topic, and overseen by one or more editors
PsycINFO
A comprehensive electronic database covering thousands of professional journals and scholarly books going back more than 100 years—that for most purposes its content is synonymous with the research literature in psychology.
empirically testable research questions
questions expressed in terms of a single variable or relationship between variables.
Evaluating Research Questions
This means they must have some way of evaluating the research questions they generate so that they can choose which ones to pursue.
interestingness
How interesting the question is to people generally or the scientific community. Three things need to be considered: Is the answer in doubt, fills a gap in research literature, and has important practical implications.
feasibility
How likely is the research question going to be successfully answered depending on the amount of time, money, equipment and materials, technical knowledge and skill, and access to research participants there will be
theory
A coherent explanation or interpretation of one or more phenomena
hypothesis
A specific prediction about a new phenomenon that should be observed if a particular theory is accurate.
hypothetico-deductive method
A cyclical process of theory development, starting with an observed phenomenon, then developing or using a theory to make a specific prediction of what should happen if that theory is correct, testing that prediction, refining the theory in light of the findings, and using that refined theory to develop new hypotheses, and so on.
testable and falsifiable
The ability to test the hypothesis using the methods of science and the possibility to gather evidence that will disconfirm the hypothesis if it is indeed false.
logical
Hypotheses should be informed by previous theories or observations and logical reasoning.
deductive reasoning
to generate a more specific hypothesis to test based on that theory
inductive reasoning
involves using specific observations or research findings to form a more general hypothesis
positive
the hypothesis should make a positive statement about the existence of a relationship or effect, rather than a statement that a relationship or effect does not exist
variable
A quantity or quality that varies across people or situations
quantitative variable
A quantity, such as height, that is typically measured by assigning a number to each individual.
categorical variable
A variable that represents a characteristic of an individual, such as chosen major, and is typically measured by assigning each individual’s response to one of several categories
operational definition
A definition of the variable in terms of precisely how it is to be measured.
population
A large group of people about whom researchers in psychology are usually interested in drawing conclusions, and from whom the sample is drawn.
Sample
A smaller portion of the population the researcher would like to study
Simple Random Sampling
which every member of the population has an equal chance of being selected for the sample
convenience sampling
A common method of non-probability sampling in which the sample consists of individuals who happen to be easily available and willing to participate
Experimental Research
Researchers who want to test hypotheses about causal relationships between variables need to use an experimental method.
independent variable
The variable the experimenter manipulates
dependent variable
The variable the experimenter measures (it is the presumed effect)
Extraneous variables
Any variable other than the dependent and independent variable.
Confounds
A specific type of extraneous variable that systematically varies along with the variables under investigation and therefore provides an alternative explanation for the results
Non-Experimental Research
Researchers who are simply interested in describing characteristics of people, describing relationships between variables, and using those relationships to make predictions simply measures variables as they naturally occur, but they do not manipulate them
laboratory study
A study that is conducted in the laboratory environment.
field study
A study that is conducted in a “real world” environment outside the laboratory.
internal validity
Refers to the degree to which we can confidently infer a causal relationship between variables
External validity
Refers to the degree to which we can generalize the findings to other circumstances or settings, like the real-world environment
field experiments
A type of field study where an independent variable is manipulated in a natural setting and extraneous variables are controlled as much as possible
Descriptive Statistics
used to organize or summarize a set of data.
mode
The most frequently occurring score in a distribution.
median
The midpoint of a distribution of scores in the sense that half the scores in the distribution are less than it and half are greater than it.
mean
The average of a distribution of scores (symbolized M) where the sum of the scores are divided by the number of scores
