Lecture 4 Flashcards
Explain what ideas lead to all the way through when it comes to research
ideas often lead to the development of theories: theories are comprehensive and systematic ways of testing ideas. From these theories we can derive a hypothesis. Restate how the theory says these variables are related to one another and develop our own test to see if the new hypothesis is supported. If the hypothesis fails that experiment it brings the theory into question as a whole. If a theory gets refuted frequently it will have to be replaced or updated/
What are three steps of research (hint: first one is starting with an idea or theory)
- Started with an idea or theory
- Derived a hypothesis that stated a general
relationship between two concepts - Made a prediction about how two concepts interact specifically in our study
In order to conduct an experiment, what needs to be done (flow chart style) for you to be able to start your experiment?
Hypothesis → Prediction
General, Abstract → Specific, Practical
Conceptual → Operational
What are conceptual variables? Example?
Concept or meaning of a variable
- what is it?
Example: Schizophrenia
What do we think of when you say you’re studying schizophrenia? We might think sleep patterns, brain activity, positive and negative symptoms, (all of these are examples of different aspects of schizophrenia but it is important to note that a person with schizophrenia may not have any or all of those symptoms). You can’t just say I study schizophrenia and I would be able to audit, replicate or check your work
conceptual variables are what we mention in the hypothesis and theory real, the operational variables are more similar to the prediction phase.
What is a variable?
“event, situation, behavior, or characteristic that takes on more than one value”
a variable is anything that can take on more than one charateristic. This contrasts with constants like the speed of light which is always the exact same. In psych, we are more interested in variables.
What does the idea of operationalization correspond with?
it corresponds with the transition from being general/abstract or more practical
What is an operational definition?
A definition of the variable in terms of the techniques used to measure or manipulate it
- How did you measure/manipulate it?
The question we want to ask here is how. How did you measure it?
Does the person have a diagnosis? How were they diagnosed? What symptoms do they have. The way you develop the operational definiition oftne depends on what exactly you want to explore in respect to the variable.
What type of definitions do theories and hypotheses use? Example?
Theories and hypotheses use conceptual definitions of variables
“I hypothesize that schizophrenia is related to virus exposure”
What type of definitions do predictions use?Examples?
Predictions use operational definitions of variables
“To quantify schizophrenia, I will add up the number of symptoms from the DSM-V manual of disorders”
“To quantify virus exposure, I will assay viral antibodies in 50cc of blood”
What are two possible value types of a variable?
nominal or quantitative
What is a quantitative variable?
Quantitative
Amounts or quantities
Numerical
Kilos of dog treats given
Give 2 situational examples of relationships between variables.
Is age related to physical activity?
Do younger or older people exercise more?
Is distraction while studying related to exam performance?
Do people perform better when they are not distracted than when distracted?
What does a positive relationship look like on a graph?
/
What does no relationship look like on a graph?
__
What does a negative relationship look like on a graph?
\
What is the correlation coefficient? What does it allow us to do? How do we determine the strength, and direction?
r
correlation coefficient = pierson’s r coefficient. This allows us to quantify the strength or relationship and the direction of the relationship
strength = absolute value
direction = positive or negative
are real relationships likely to be more complex than positive, negative, or no relationship?
real relationships are more likely more complex than these three options
What are most relationships in psych?
most relationships in psych are non linear in some way. Usually we talk about relationships as being generally positive or generally negative, however, this may not describe some of the boundary conditions (the difference between having 10 pets and 50 pets)
PLAY GUESS THE CORRELATION GAME ON SLIDE 10
LOOK AT THE CURVILINEAR GRAPH ON SLIDE 12
What are the 2 ways of studying relationships?
non-experimental method
experimental method
What are the advantages of the non-experimental method?
Advantages:
-Natural behavior, no interference § Example, littering behavior (you might have a hypothesis about the types of clothing people where and whether or not they litter)
- Some variables cannot be manipulated § Example, height/sex (The only way we can learn about these variables is by asking about them)
-Great for prediction!
- Because we can closely replicate real-world
What are seme disadvantages of the non-experimental method?
- Unknown direction of cause and effect
- Does exercise cause happiness ?
- Or does happiness cause exercise?
(Its probably the case that both of those things are true) - Unknown number of cause and effect relationships
- Uncontrolled third variables
- Perhaps wealth causes both happiness and
exercise!?!
- If so exercise and happiness will appear to be causal, even when they are not causally related
Disadvantages:
- no interference = no control
- No causal inference
Explain the experimental method in 3 points.
- Manipulate variable 1 and observe the effect on variable 2
- Control, or keep constant, all other variables
- Allows cause and effect inferences!
What are the advantages of the experimental method?
Advantages:
- Causal inference!
- High researcher control
- Can observe small or transient effects (transient = short lived)
- # milliseconds to identify words
(There are ways you can improve people’s speed at which they identify words)
What are the disadvantages of the experimental method?
- Unrealistic (The more we control our studies, the less likely it is to represent the real world)
- Crappy predictions (its hard to make predictions about the outside world from a highly controlled study)
- Not always possible to manipulate variables (we can’t draw causal influences from things like sex or height)
What is an independent variable?
Independent variable
“cause”
aka, manipulated/situational variable or IV
Variable that we manipulate, or change
What is a dependent variable?
“effect”
“Depends” on manipulated variable
aka, outcome/response/measured variable
Variable that we measure
