General Terms Flashcards
What is internal and external validity
Internal validity = whether the design, conduct, and analysis of the study answer the research questions without bias
External validity = whether findings can be generalized to other contexts
What is ecological validity
extent to which researchers can accurately generalise experimental findings to real-world situations
high levels are desirable as it allows a study’s results to provide insights into how people behave in the real world
What are demand characteristics
the behaviour displayed when the participants try to make sense of the research and act accordingly to support the aim of the research
what is beta bias
refers to theories that ignore or minimise sex differences
often assume that the findings from studies using males can apply equally to females
What is a nomothetic approach?
seeks to identify general laws of human behaviour by looking at the similarities between them
opposite of the idiographic approach.
What is experimental reductionism?
where a complex behaviour is reduced to a single (isolated) variable for the purpose of testing
What is cultural bias?
when individuals judge situations, actions and other individuals from different cultures, based on their own cultural views
What is population validity?
whether you can reasonably generalise the findings from your sample to a larger group of people (the population). depends on the choice of population and on the extent to which the study sample mirrors that population
What is a biased sample?
occurs when a sample is systemically more likely to be chosen for the study.
refers to a situation in which the research sample favors a certain group of people.
threatens the validity of a study because it doesn’t provide an accurate representation of the population
What is mundane realism?
mundane realism is a type of external validity, which is the extent to which findings can generalize from experiments to real-life settings.
What are extraneous variables?
any variable not being investigated that has the potential to affect the outcome of a research study
What is historical validity?
extent to which the results of a study can be generalized to populations over time. For example, a study from many decades before may lack historical validity today, as people’s behaviour may have changed over time as a society, and this would make the result less valid
What are dispositional and situational factors?
Dispositional factors are caused by theinternal factors, such as attributes that are specific to the individual, whereas situational factors are a result of the environmentor external factors at play
What is ethnocentric bias?
What is environmental determinism?
