experimental Methods Flashcards
What are the disadvantages of a lab experiment ?
Lacks eco logical validity
it is an artificial set up and one of which participants are unlikely to encounter in everyday life . This means we can’t generalise the findings to other situations outside of the lab
demand characteristics;
partcipants may try to work out what the aim of the study is and act accordingly l. This can affect the validity of a study. Participants may change their behaviour to plesse the researcher or to go against them . “Please you and screw you effect “
What are the advantages of a lab experiment ?
There is a high control over variables.
So more extraneous variables can be controlled this means that the IV is causing the change in the DV
replicability - because of the high control In experiments , this means that the study should be easily repeated to see if other researchers then achieve the same results too
What is a lab experiment ?
Environment - lab
Independent variable - manipulated
What are the disadvantages of a quasi experiment ?
Lacks ecological validity as its a lab experiment
may have a bias sample as participants can’t be randomly allocated to different groups
What are the advantages of a quasi experiment ?
High control
What is a quasi experiment ?
IV can’t be determined by anyone it is already pre determined eg gender and age
Lab environment
What are the 4 experimental methods ?
Natural
Field
Lab
Quasi
What are the disadvantages of a natural experiment
Loss of control
Ethical issues
What are the advantages of a natural experiment
Reduces demand characteristics as it is not a lab experiment so participants are unlikely to know that they’re being studied .
High ecological validity- natural environment so can be applied to real life settings
What is a natural experiment ?
Environment : natural
Independent variable : not manipulated
What are disadvantages of field experiments ?
Loss of control as it is a natural environment .
Confounding and extraneous variables can easily influence results.
ethical issues - deception lack of fully informed consent etc
What are advantages of a field experiment ?
Higher ecological validity : It is a natural environment so It is less artificial and so validity will be higher and we should be able to generalise the findings to real life situations .
reduces demand characteristics - participants are unaware they are taking part as its a natural environment so they shouldn’t work out what is going on to influence the validity of the experiment
What is a field experiment ?
Environment : natural
Independent variable manipulated
What are the advantages of a lab experiment ?
There is a high control over variables. So more extraneous variables can be controlled this means that the IV is causing the change in the DV
replicability - because of the high control In experiments , this means that the study should be easily repeated to see if other researchers then achieve the same results too
What are the advantages of a field experiment ?
Higher ecological validity : It is a natural environment so It is less artificial and so validity will be higher and we should be able to generalise the findings to real life situations .
reduces demand characteristics - participants are unaware they are taking part as its a natural environment so they shouldn’t work out what is going on to influence the validity of the experiment
What are the 4 types of experimental methods?
Natural
field
laboratory
quasi
What are the advantages of a natural experiment ?
Reduces demand characteristics as it is not a lab experiment so participants are unlikely to know that they’re being studied .
High ecological validity
What are the disadvantages of a quasi experiment ?
Lacks ecological validity as its a lab experiment
may have a bias sample as participants can’t be randomly allocated to different groups
What are demand characteristics ?
Participant may try to work out what is going on in an experiment and what the aim is
they may look for clues to tell them how to act
they may act unaturally and try to behave how the researcher wants them to or go against it
screw you or please you effect
