Lecture 1

Question 1

What is a hypothesis ?

Answer 1

A prediction regarding the outcome of a study

Question 2

What is a variable ?

Answer 2

An event or behaviour that has at least 2 values or anything that can change

Question 3

What is a discrete variable ?

Answer 3

Takes on a single value; always a whole number

Question 4

What is a continuous variable ?

Answer 4

Can be assigned many numbers

Question 5

What is a subject/participant variable ?

Answer 5

A chracteristic inherent in the participants that cannot be changed
i.e: ethnicity, age

Question 6

What is a control variable ?

Answer 6

Things you want to make sure are the same between groups

Question 7

What is a constant ?

Answer 7

Something that doesn’t and cannot change; one value

Question 8

What is a theory ?

Answer 8

An organized system of assumptions and principles that attempt to explain certain phenomena and how they are related

Question 9

What are the 3 parts of a theory ?

Answer 9

• Parsimony - use a few statemetns as possible to explain results
• Testable
• Percise - use words that are operationally defined

Question 10

What are the 3 goals of science ?

Answer 10

• Description
• Prediction
• Explanation

Question 11

What is a operational definition ?

Answer 11

Define something in terms of observable behaviour

Question 12

What does description allow ?

Answer 12

Allows us to learn about behaviour when it occurs and to observe that 2 event are systematically related to one another

Question 13

What are the 3 types of descriptive methods ?

Answer 13

1. Oberservational
2. Case study
3. Survey

Question 14

What is observational research ?

Answer 14

• making observations of human or other animals behaviour
• Naturalistic: oberserve people and animals in their natural setting; usually looking for a particular behaviour

Question 15

What is a problem with observational research ?

Answer 15

Reactivity: people act differently when they’re being observed

Question 16

What is case-study research ?

Answer 16

in-depth study of one or more individuals or an event

Question 17

What is the survey method ?

Answer 17

• questioning individuals on a topic(s) and describing their responses
• qualitative

Question 18

What does prediction allow ?

Answer 18

Allows us to identify the factors that indicate when an event(s) will occur

Question 19

What methods are under prediction (relational) ?

Answer 19

• Correlational
• Quasi-experimental

Question 20

What is correlational research ?

Answer 20

The association between two variables

Question 21

What is a positive correlation ?

Answer 21

as one variable increases, the other also increases

Question 22

What is a negative correlation ?

Answer 22

As one variable increases, the other decreases

Question 23

What is the symbol used to depict a correlation ?

Answer 23

Pearson’s correlation = r

Question 24

What does the sign of a correlation indicate ?

Answer 24

The direction of the correlation

Question 25

What is the range for a correlation ?

Answer 25

0-1.00

Question 26

What is a perfect predictor ?

Answer 26

When you can make a perfect prediction. This is when r= +1.00

Question 27

What are the numbers for how good a predictor is ?

Answer 27

• 0-0.4: poor accuracy predictor
• 0.5-0.7: moderate accuracy predictor
• 0.8-1.0: good accuracy predictor

Question 28

What is quasi-experimental ?

Answer 28

Allows us to compare naturally occuring groups of individuals

Question 29

What does explanation allow ?

Answer 29

Allows us to identify the causes that determine when and why a behaviour occurs

Question 30

What are the 2 branches of statistics ?

Answer 30

1. Descriptive: describe people, event, animals, etc (behaviour or performance)
2. Inferrential: infer behaviour of larger groups by using a small group and can predict future events

Question 31

What are the 4 steps for conducting research ?

Answer 31

1. Design - research question
2. Collect data
3. Analyze data
4. Interpret data - explain what data means (theoretical and general interpretation)

Question 32

What is the basis of all statistics ?

Answer 32

Random sampling: every member of the parent population has an equal probability in being in the sample

Question 33

What are the 4 properties of measurement ?

Answer 33

• Identity: objects that are different recieve different scores
• Magnitude: when the ordering of the numbers reflects the ordering of the variable
• Equal unit size: when a difference of 1 is the some amount throughout the entire scale
• Absolute zero: assigning a score of 0 indicates an absence of the variable being measured

Question 34

What are the 4 scales of measurement ?

Answer 34

1. Nominal
2. Ordinal
3. Interval
4. Ratio

Question 35

What is a nominal scale ?

Answer 35

Categorical or qualitative data; Name type data
i.e: children vs adults, gender, ethnicity

Question 36

What is a ordinal scale ?

Answer 36

• Numbers that are usually ranked
• has the properties of identity and magnitude

Question 37

What is the interval scale ?

Answer 37

• Number based, but the distance between the numbers mean something
• has the properties of mag., idenitity, and equal unit

Question 38

What is a ratio scale ?

Answer 38

• Is number based, but has a true zero, where ZERO has a meaning
• has all 4 properties

Question 39

What is inductive research ?

Answer 39

Collect data, look at data, then come up with a theory to explain the data

Question 40

What is deductive research ?

Answer 40

develop a theory, and then look for theoretical support