Science Inquiry Skills

Question 1

What is the negative participant role?

Answer 1

where the participant attemptts to discern the experiments hypothesis, but only to destroy the credibility of the study

Question 2

What is the good participant role?

Answer 2

occasionally participants behave in socially desirable ways in attempt to live up to the experiments expectations & support the hypothesis

Question 3

what are experimenter effects?

Answer 3

personal characteristics of the experimenter and their behaviour during the experiment, that may affect the research

Question 4

What is the placebo effect?

Answer 4

The placebo effect is a participant variable that refers to an improvement in health or wellbeing, due to the participants belief that the treatment wil be effective

Question 5

What are participant variables?

Answer 5

variables that affect the way the participants respond in an experiment

Question 6

What is a constant?

Answer 6

A value that remains the same

Question 7

What is a research question used for?

Answer 7

Qualitative research

Question 8

What is a hypothesis?

Answer 8

A statement or testable prediciton about the likley results of the research

Question 9

What must a hypothesis include?

Answer 9

• Testable prediction
• Independent variable
• Dependent variable
• Sample Population

Question 10

What is operationalising variables?

Answer 10

This is used to ensure that the researcher is specific about what the IV is and how the DV will be measured

Question 11

What is the dependant variable?

Answer 11

is what is measured in the research

Question 12

What is the independent variable?

Answer 12

is deliberately changed by the researcher to determine its effect on another variable

Question 13

when may observational design be used?

Answer 13

in research topics where it is unethical to deliberately expose a group to an independent variable

Question 14

What are the benefits of independent groups design?

Answer 14

controlled groups creates a baseline of the data to compare the impact of the independent variable on the dependent variable

Question 15

How might a longitudinal study impact the results?

Answer 15

repeating similar tests over a period of time may affect the results of the test as the participants “learn” it and get used to being testes

Question 16

What is an example of a repeated measure design?

Answer 16

A longditudinal study

Question 17

Why is the repeated measures design effective?

Answer 17

has the advantage of participants being identical in characterisitics and abilities between experimental condtitions, eliminating participant variables as an extraneous variable (EV)

Question 18

What is a repeated measure design?

Answer 18

uses only one group of participants who are exposed to different experimental conditions

Question 19

What does every research design include?

Answer 19

at least one independent and one dependent variable

Question 20

What is a variable?

Answer 20

a researchable factor that can increase or decrease in amount or kind

Question 21

what is random sampling?

Answer 21

is a technique in which each person id equally likley to be selected. Allows for increased likliness for equal participant variables in an experimental design

Question 22

What is random allocation?

Answer 22

is the method used to randomly select members of a sample to recieve the treatment in an experiment

Question 23

what is the best way to sort individuals into groups in an experimental design?

Answer 23

Random allocation.
Any method that gives each participant an equal chance of being in either group

Question 24

What is a common experimental design?

Answer 24

An independant group design, which includes allocating participants into an experiemntal group & a controlled group

Question 25

What is convenience sampling?

Answer 25

involves selecting the sample from the a group of poeple that the research has access to

Question 26

What is stratified sampling?

Answer 26

breaks population down into smaller groups, and random samples are taken from the smaller groups in the same proportion as they appear in the population

Question 27

What is a sample?

Answer 27

the group of participants who are selected and participate in the research

Question 28

What is an experimental design?

Answer 28

investigator examines behaviour by manipulating the independent variable

Question 29

What are the three investigation types?

Answer 29

observational, experimental or qualitative

Question 30

What is an observational design?

Answer 30

-Where groups are participants are obvious or the groups are pre-existing

-The investigator collects data in a natural setting by means of behavioural observations or self-report methods

Question 31

What is independent group design

Answer 31

involves allocating participants to two types of groups - experimental group and controlled group (Experimental design)

Question 32

What is a repeated measure design?

Answer 32

uses only one group of participants who are exposed to different experiemental conditions

Question 33

What is a matched participant design?

Answer 33

elliminates differences between the participants by allocating participants with similiar characterissitcs to each group

Question 34

What is a longitudinal study?

Answer 34

ame test is repeated over a number of weeks, months or even years with the same participants (observational)

Question 35

What is naturalistic observation?

Answer 35

involves observing and recording variables of interest in a natural setting without interference or manipulation (observational)

Question 36

what is cross sectional studies?

Answer 36

used when the independant variable is age and used for a wide range of groups done at the same time

Question 37

what is qualitive designs?

Answer 37

involves gathering data through methods such as interviews, focus groups and delphi technique

Question 38

advantages and disadvantages of experimental designs?

Answer 38

advantages: randomised and blind, can determine causality, more validity

disadvantages: may require MORE resources/time, ethical considerations, may become difficult if rare

Question 39

advantages and disadvantages of observational designs?

Answer 39

advantages: may require LESS resources/time, less ethical concerns when dealing with potentially harmful exposure

disadvantages: less validity –> hard to determine causality, not randomised or blinded

Question 40

What is quantitative data?

Answer 40

represented by numbers snd can be statistically analysed and presented in tables and graphs to be interpretated - (objective)

Question 41

what is qualitative data?

Answer 41

expressed in words or sentences and describes qualitity of behaviour (subjective)

Question 42

What is mean? what are its strengths and limitations?

Answer 42

calculated by adding all the values in the data and then divding by th enumber of data sets.

Strengths: ,akes use of all the data

Limitations: is not representative when outliers exist. Susceptible to the influnece of outliers

Question 43

What is mode? what are its strengths and limitations?

Answer 43

Is the most frequently occuring value in the data. Often the highest barwhen represented on a histogram

Strengths: useful when data involed categories

Limitations: not used in psychological data unless representing catagory based data. Not useful if there is more than 1 mode occuring in a data set. It does not tell us anything about the other values

Question 44

What is median? what are its strengths and limitations?

Answer 44

Is the middle value in a data set when the data has been ordered from the smallest to largest value

Strengths: not affected by outliers. Can be used with skewed data

Limitations: is less useful when there is a small or large amount of data

Question 45

what is standard deviation?

Answer 45

is a measure which tells use how dispersed the scores are around the mean in any data

Question 46

Define reliability

Answer 46

measure of consistency, if a particular measurment is repeated and the same result is obtained

Question 47

Define validity

Answer 47

concerned with the extent to which something measures what it sets out to measure

Question 48

what is ethnocentrism?

Answer 48

refers to the tendency to use your own cultures as the standard by which you judge and evaluate other cultures