PSY395 Exam 2 Flashcards
Science
A systematic form of inquiry, based on observation, prediction, reasoning, and testing. A method. Used to -Test our hypotheses: -can be refined or accepted -scientific knowledge is refined/altered -findings should be replicated -science should be self-correcting
Empiricism
Using verifiable evidence as the basis for conclusion.
Confounding
Too much going on at once.
Dr. Benjamin Rush
Pioneer of “bloodletting” treatment.
Too much blood –> illness
After bleeding, some people recovered, some people died.
Theory was not falsifiable (right if patient lied, right if patient died).
Should have had a comparison group to compare treat patients to untreated patients.
Probabilistic
Science is intended to explain a certain proportion (but not necessarily all) of the possible cases.
Look for patterns across large groups of people.
Conclusions should apply to a certain (opefully high) proportion of people.
Intuition
Thinking the easy way - some ideas are easier to believe than others.
The Good Story
Easier to believe something that “makes sense”
Self-verification theory - you want people to verify what you believe about yourself. Even the bad.
The Present/Present Bias
The tendency to rely only on what is present and ignore what is absent when evaluating the evidence fro a conclusion.
-We tend to remember events in which the treatment and the desired outcome was present but not other instances (desired outcome did not follow treatment or treatment did not precede desired outcome)
Availability Heuristic (pop-up principle)
The tendency to rely predominantly on evidence that easily comes to mind rather than use all possible evidence in evaluating some conclusion (death by fire or death by falling).
Cherry-picking evidence (positive test bias)
People tend to seek and accept evidence that supports what we already think and what we want to think.
Overconfidence (sort of bias blind spot)
People tend to be overconfident in our ideas.
Research shows that confidence does not mean one is correct.
-Eyewitness testimony.
Asking biased questions (confirmatory hypothesis testing)
Told participants ot interview fellow students
-Half were told to decide if the target person was introverted
-Half were told to decide if the target person was extraverted
Asked biased questions
-Introverted condition: “What factors make it hard for you to really open up to people?”
-Extraverted condition: ‘What would you do if you wanted to liven things up at a party?”
Goals of (Psychological) Science
Description: observational research
Prediction: correlational research
Explanation: experimental research
Change/Application: real world uses.
Basic Research
Research driven by a scientists curiosity in a scientific question. Goal is to enhance the general body of knowledge. (How did the universe begin?)
Applied Research
Research designed to solve practical problems, rather than acquire knowledge for knowledge’s sake. (Do dopamine levels shape the severity of schizophrenia?)
Translational Research
Conducting research in a way that makes the results of basic research applicable to solving practical problems. Translate the findings from basic efficiently and quickly to practice.
Laboratory Research
Research taking place in a controlled setting, Our aim is to improve our ability to draw causal conclusions. - Control to determine causality.
Field Research
Research taking place outside of the lab where the researcher gives up the control a lab offers in hopes of improving the ability to generalize the results to settings outside the lab.
Quantitative Research
A category of research in which results are presented as numbers, typically in the form of descriptive and inferential statistics.
Qualitative Research
A category of research activity characterized by a narrative analysis of information collected in the study: can include case studies, observational research, interview research.
-Typically the conclusions in a qualitative research are understood as sample specific.
Experiment
A research procedure in which some factor is varied, all else is held constant and some result is measured.
Relational
Research investigating the relationships between naturally occurring variables and with studying individual difference.
Research Question
Can be answered through objective observations.
Question is broad, but precise enough to allow predictions to be made in the form of research hypotheses.
Be able to answer question with data.
Terms must be precisely defined or at least be able to be precisely defined.
Operational definitions.
How to develop research/empirical questions
Everyday observations of behavior Serendipity: act of discovering something while looking for something else entirely. (penicillin, lazy grad student let mold grow). The need to solve a practical problem Common Sense Other research Theory
Theory
A set of logically consistent statements about some behavioral phenomenon that
-best summarizes existing empirical knowledge of the phenomenon
-organizes this knowledge in the form of precise statements of relationships among variables (laws)
-provides a tentative explanation for the phenomenon
serves as the basis for making predictions about future data
A systematic body of ideas about a particular topic of phenomenon (not just an idea), grounded in data collected from actual research.
Never complete, continually updated in light of new scientific evidence supporting or negating a theory’s claims.
New theories can emerge that can replace existing theories.
