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Experiments Flashcards

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1
Q

What is a laboratory experiment?

A

When the IV is manipulated by the experimenter and the experiment is carried out in a laboratory or away from a participants natural environment

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2
Q

What is a field experiment?

A

The IV is manipulated by the experimenter but the experiment takes place in the participants’ normal surroundings

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3
Q

What is a Quasi experiment?

A

The IV is naturally occurring

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4
Q

What is the advantage of a laboratory experiment?

A

The high level of control will produce scientific research, which ensures that the IV is actually the thing affecting the DV

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5
Q

What is the disadvantage to a lab experiment?

A

They have less ecological validity as they are in an artificial setting which doesn’t reflect real life, so therefore the behaviour could be considered artificial too.

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6
Q

What is the advantage to a field experiment?

A

They have a more realistic setting for the study so have higher ecological validity

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7
Q

What is a disadvantage of a field experiment?

A

The lack of control can mean it is difficult to assume that the DV was actually being influenced by the IV and not something else.

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8
Q

What is an advantage of a quasi experiment?

A

It allows us to study the effect a variable that the researchers cannot manipulate on behaviour.

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9
Q

What is a weakness of a quasi experiment?

A

There is no control over the participants, which might be a confounding variable which could influence behaviour.

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10
Q

What is a repeated measures design?

A

The same people are used in each condition

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11
Q

What is an independent measures design?

A

Different people are used in each condition

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12
Q

What is a matched participants design?

A

Individuals are tested on key characteristics and then matched on similar scores. one member of this pair is sent to one condition and the other to the other.

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13
Q

What is a participant variable?

A

The characteristics of an individual participant that could influence the results.

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14
Q

What is a situational variable?

A

Any feature of the research situation which may influence a participant’s behaviour

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15
Q

What are two advantages of a repeated measures design?

A

Fewer participants can be used, making it more time and cost effective.
By comparing each individual with themselves, the participant variables are almost negligible.

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16
Q

What are two disadvantages of a repeated measures design?

A

t can be affected by order effects so counterbalancing is requited to control for this.
If subjects are tested more than once, they may guess the aim and behave accordingly (demand characteristics)

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17
Q

What are three advantages of an independent measures design?

A

Not affected by order effects as each participant only tested once.
less time consuming than a matched participants design
less likely to be affected by demand characteristics as each person only sees one condition of the experiment

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18
Q

What are two disadvantages of an independent measures design?

A

Large samples are often needed

It does not control extraneous participant variables

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19
Q

What are two advantages of a matched participants design?

A

It controls participant variables better than an independent measures design.
Avoids some issues present in repeated measures such as order effects and demand characteristics.

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20
Q

What are two disadvantages of a matched participants design?

A

It is very time consuming to match participants

It is impossible to match participants on enough variables to be sure that there are no possible extraneous variables

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21
Q

How can participant variables be controlled?

A

Use a repeated measures or matched participants design

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22
Q

How can situational variables be controlled? (order effects)

A

By using an individual measures or a matched participants design

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23
Q

How can demand characteristics be controlled?

A

Don’t tell participants the aim of the study

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24
Q

What are demand characteristics?

A

cues in an experiment that communicate to participants what is expected of them which may unconsciously affect the behaviour of participants

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25
Q

What does double blind mean?

A

when neither the participants nor the people carrying out the research know the aim of it

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26
Q

What does single blind mean?

A

when the participants don’t know the aim of the study

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27
Q

What is an alternative hypothesis?

A

Predicts how the IV will effect the DV

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28
Q

What is a null hypothesis?

A

predicts that the IV will not have an effect on the DV - that any change is due to external factors

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29
Q

What is a hypothesis?

A

a precise testable statement of the relationship between two variables

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30
Q

What is a two-tailed hypothesis?

A

AKA a non-directional hypothesis, it predicts that the IV will have an effect on the DV, but not the direction this will go in

31
Q

What is a One-tailed hypothesis?

A

This predicts that not only will the IV have a significant effect on the DV but also the direction this effect will go in.

32
Q

What does operationalising mean?

A

Making variables physically measurable or testable

33
Q

What is the target population?

A

The group of people the researcher is interested in studying

34
Q

What is the sample?

A

the actual group of participants used in the research

35
Q

What is a self-selecting sampling method?

A

When people volunteer to take part in the study

36
Q

What is an opportunity sampling method?

A

A sample of participants selected by selected those who are most readily available at a given time and place selected by the researcher

37
Q

What is a random sampling method?

A

A technique in which each member of the target population has an equal chance of being selected

38
Q

What is a snowball sampling method?

A

When participants are asked to contact their friends and family to ask them to also take part in the research; they in turn will ask other people

39
Q

What are two strengths of a self selecting sampling method?

A

Ethical as volunteered

Relatively easy and participants are likely to turn up

40
Q

What are two weaknesses of a self selecting sampling method?

A

biased based on volunteers

possible time and cost of time advertising process

41
Q

What are two strengths of opportunity sampling?

A

Quick to gather participants

Easy as no advertising or selection is required

42
Q

What is a strength of a random sampling method?

A

Is normal very representative of the target population

43
Q

What are two weaknesses of opportunity sampling?

A

biased based on where you go and therefore who is available at the time
less ethical as participants may feel more obliged to take part

44
Q

What are two weaknesses of random sampling?

A

Can be difficult to ensure all names from the target population are included
can still be biased based on who (from those selected) are willing to take part

45
Q

What are two strengths of snowball sampling?

A

Easy s only required finding a few participants before they recruit the rest.
relatively cheap as not requiring advertising

46
Q

What are two weaknesses of snowball sampling?

A

may not get enough participants

biased as all participants likely to know each other

47
Q

What is primary data?

A

data collected by the researcher

48
Q

What is secondary data?

A

data collected by someone else used by the researcher

49
Q

What is quantitative data?

A

numerical data

50
Q

What are two strength of qualitative data?

A

It is often richer and more detailed

unexpected behaviours can be captured

51
Q

What are three strengths of quantitative data?

A

Objective data analysis
easier to summarise and present
easier to analyse

52
Q

What are two weaknesses of quantitative data?

A

less in depth - don’t know why

unexpected behaviours may not be counted

53
Q

What are two weaknesses of Qualitative data?

A

Difficult to analyse
Difficult to present in summarised form
Subjective bias interpretation of data possible

54
Q

What are the three measures of central tendency?

A

Mean
Median
Mode

55
Q

How do you work out the mean?

A

add up all the values and divide it by the number of values

56
Q

What is an advantage of the mean?

A

Most powerful measure of central tendency as it includes all data

57
Q

What is a disadvantage of the mean?

A

It can be distorted my extreme outlier scores

58
Q

How do you work out the median?

A

Place all the scores in rank order and see which is the middle value

59
Q

What is an advantage of the median?

A

Not distorted by extreme outlier scores

60
Q

What is a disadvantage of the median?

A

May not represent full set of scores

61
Q

How do you work out the mode?

A

See what result occurs most often

62
Q

What is an advantage of the mode?

A

Not influenced by extreme scores, can be used for non-numerical data

63
Q

What is a disadvantage of the mode?

A

Not useful if there are many models or none at all

64
Q

What are the three measures of dispersion?

A

the range
variance
standard deviation

65
Q

How do you calculate variance?

A

calculate the mean score per condition in the experiment
for each participant then subtract the mean score from their score
then square each result
add all of the squared scores together and calculate the mean of all of these scores (divide by n-1 not just n)

66
Q

How do you calculate the standard deviation?

A

find the square root of the variance

67
Q

How do you work out the range?

A

subtract the lowest score from the highest score

68
Q

What is an advantage of the range

A

very quick and easy

69
Q

What is a disadvantage of the range?

A

Doesn’t give any indication of the spread of scores

70
Q

What is a disadvantage of the variance?

A

Very complicated to work out

71
Q

What is the advantage of the variance?

A

Improvement over the range takes into account all values, not just top and bottom

72
Q

What is the advantage of standard deviation?

A

It provides the extent to which scores are spread out around the mean

73
Q

What is a disadvantage of standard deviation?

A

Time consuming and more difficult to calculate than the range score

Psychology (44 decks)

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