quantitative and qualitative research Flashcards
what is the hypothetico-deductive method?
- observation
- formulate theory
- derive testable hypotheses and test these
what is a hypothesis?
a testable idea
how to form a hypothesis?
what do we know?
What are we interested in?
what is a null hypothesis?
there is no correlation between variables
steps to forming a hypothesis?
- define key concepts
- think about the practical issues and the design of the study
- how to test
- where to test
- who is being tested
- what to measure
what is experimental design?
used to determine the causal relationship between variables
what is the independent variable?
what you change and manipulate in the experiment
structure:
- has a IV and DV
- has two conditions
- compare the two conditions
what is a dependent variable?
what you measure/ the outcome
what are confounding variables?
variables which have unwanted influences on the results
how to eliminate confounding variables?
- conducting the study in a standardised manner
- testing each participant in the same
setting
- testing each participant in the same
- ensure no consistent differences between conditions
- randomly select/allocate participants
- randomly testing at different times/conditions
- within subjects design
- participants attended ALL conditions
- between subject design
what is quasi-experimental design?
When randomly allocating participants is impossible, e.g. to explore the differences between two populations and therefore participants only attend one condition
what is correlational design?
used to investigate relationships between two variables
- correlation doesn’t equal causation
- how does a change in variable A effect variable B
what is a correlational design plan?
- how to measure variables
- survey: give people questionnaires
- observation: watch and record
what happens - document research: review publications, newspapers and diaries etc
what is a positive correlation?
When variable A (social circle) increases, variable B (happiness level) also increases
what is a negative correlation?
When variable A (social circle) increases, variable B (happiness level) decreases
what is no correlation?
No relationship between the two variables
what is the criteria for quality?
reliability - the results are replicable / the consistency of results
validity - the experiment tests the variables we want to test / accuracy of measurements
generalizability - The extent to which the experiment results can be applied in real-world
How can validity be improved?
Think of the confounding variables when designing
Try to use setting and tasks similar to real life
how to improve reliability?
Increasing sample size
Repeating the experiment
- A clear description of how it was carried out in onestudy.
what is generalizability across people?
Fundamental processes are presumably universally shared.
What processes are universal and what are not?
How can i improve generalizability?
repeating a study with different participant populations
what is qualitative research?
Aims to describe the nature of relationships, situations, processes,systems and people
why do we use the qualitative method?
o uncover information impossible to be collected via quantitative methods.
When the information relates to the complex use of language or meaning
when is the qualitative method used?
Studying the complexity of something in its natural setting
To evaluate the implementation of social policies
When there is little or no research on the topic
As a preliminary phase to clarify a research question
As a preliminary phase to guide quantitative research
