research methods Flashcards
test retest
administering the same test/ questionnaire to each person
inter observer reliability
measures the degree of agreement between different people observing or assessing the same thing
correlation coefficient
the correlation needs to be +0.8 to be reliable
significance
the level at which the null hypothesis is accepted or rejected due to the low probability of the results being due to chance
probability equation
number of particular equations / number of probable outcomes
n value
number of participants
the sign test
a non parametric statistical test of difference that allows a researcher to determine the significance of their investigation
p value
level of significance
ordinal data
data is ranked
nominal data
data is in categories
confounding variables
changes systematically with the iv
population
a group of people who are the focus of the researchers interest, from which a smaller sample is drawn
investigator effects
when a researcher acts (consciously or unconsciously) in a way to support their prediction. they communicate their feelings, possibly altering a participants results
counter balancing
both groups do the same thing in different orders
standardised procedures
clear set of instructions
behavioural categories
an observational technique wherein participants possible behaviours are separated into new specific components
reliability
if the findings are the same or similar when the test is repeated they are reliable
natural experiments
researcher has no control over the IV. e.g gender or age
quantitative data
data expressed numerically
