TOPIC 2

Question 1

How do you begin the research process?

Answer 1

• Start asking questions.
• Search the literature.
• Begin shaping the idea into a hypothesis.

Question 2

What are Theories?

Answer 2

• An organised set of principles used to explain observed phenomena.

Question 3

What is are Conceptual variables?

Answer 3

An abstract concept one may attempt to

measure.

Question 4

What are Operational definitions and how do they relate to Conceptual variables?

Answer 4

Operational definition states how conceptual variable will be manipulated or measured.

Question 5

What are the 3 main categories of research designs?

Answer 5

• Descriptive Research
• Correlational Research
• Experiments

Question 6

What are the goals of Descriptive Research?

Answer 6

• To describe people and their thoughts, feelings, and
behaviours.

• Discovers trends and tendencies.

Question 7

What are methods of conduction Descriptive Research?

Answer 7

• Observational studies.
• Archival studies.
• Surveys -Importance of random sampling

Question 8

What is the limitations of Descriptive Research?

Answer 8

Limited in what questions it can answer.

Question 9

What are the goals of Correlational Research?

Answer 9

To learn about the relationship between variables.

• How well does one variable predict another variable?

Question 10

What are the advantages and disadvantages of Correlational Research?

Answer 10

Advantages:
• Can study the associations of naturally occurring variables that cannot be manipulated or induced.
• Can examine phenomena difficult or unethical to create for
research purposes.
• Offers freedom in settings in which the variables are measured.

Disadvantage:
• Major disadvantage: CORRELATION IS NOT CAUSATION!

Question 11

What are the goals of Experiments?

Answer 11

• Experiments used to examine cause-and-effect relationships.

Question 12

What are two essential characteristics of an experiment?

Answer 12

• Researcher has control over the experimental procedures.

* Participants randomly assigned to different treatment conditions.

Question 13

What is a variable?

Answer 13

Any characteristic of an object, event, or a person

which can take two or more values.

Question 14

What is an Independent Variable?

Answer 14

The factors experimenters manipulate to

see if they affect the dependent variable

Question 15

What is a Dependent Variable?

Answer 15

The factors experimenters measure to see

if they are affected by the independent variable.

Question 16

What are Subject Variables?

Answer 16

Variables that characterize pre-existing differences among study participants (e.g. gender, race, culture, etc).

Question 17

What is a Independent Measures style experiment?

Answer 17

Between-subject design

• Where a group of participants are recruited then split into 2 groups
• Each group receives different independent variable conditions (e.g. placebo vs an actual drug)
• The dependent variable is then measured for each group and compared

Question 18

What is a Repeated Measures style experiment?

Answer 18

Within-subject design

• A group of participants are recruited
• All members of the group experience the same conditions of the independent variable (both do condition 1 & 2)
• Compare the results for the two conditions

Question 19

What is Counterbalancing and what is its purpose?

Answer 19

Manipulating order of presentation of materials

• Helps to control for order effects
• Especially important in repeated measures design

e.g. Half the participants in a repeated measures experiment receive drug A then B, the other half receive drug B then A.
• Random Assignment to the Order conditions

Question 20

What is Internal Validity?

Answer 20

Degree to which there can be reasonable certainty that the independent variables caused effects obtained on the dependent variables

• Control groups are important in ruling out alternative explanations.

Question 21

What are Confounds?

Answer 21

Variables confounded when two or more variables are manipulated simultaneously in such a way that we are unable to distinguish the effect of each on the dependent measure.

Question 22

What is External Validity?

Answer 22

The degree to which results of a specific study can be generalised to other people, places, times, or operational definitions of the IVs.

External validity considerations:
• Representative vs. convenience samples.
• The setting in which the research is conducted.

Question 23

What are variables that psychologists measure (tool kit)?

Answer 23

• Self-Report
• Reaction Times
• Virtual Environments
• Actual Behaviour
• Brain-imaging technology
• Social Media
• Archival Records

Question 24

Measuring Variables: Self-report

Answer 24

• Participants disclose
thoughts, feelings, and desires.

• Convenient and can provide easy data.
• However, not always accurate and affected by the way in which questions are asked.

Question 25

Measuring Variables: Behaviour

Answer 25

• Participants’ actual behaviour studied.
• May include a range of behaviours.
• Great source of data!
• However, sometimes difficult to assess or code, and time-consuming.

Question 26

Measuring Variables: Reaction Times

Answer 26

• Reaction time measures increasingly used (e.g. priming tasks, go/no-go association tasks, etc.)
• Provides access to unconscious or automatic processes.

Question 27

Measuring Variables: Brain Imaging

Answer 27

• Includes a number of possible technologies (e.g. fMRI, ERP, etc).
• Provides access to unconscious or automatic processes.
• However, expensive and difficult to collect and analyse data.

Question 28

Measuring Variables: Virtual Reality

Answer 28

• Utilizes virtual worlds and simulations.
• Participants can engage in tasks that are difficult or impossible to assess in the real world.
• However, difficult to set up and analyse; plus, it’s expensive.

Question 29

Measuring Variables: Other Technologies

Answer 29

• Includes other techniques such as measures of heart rate, GSR, eye-movements, etc.
• Now also using big data analyses from twitter, twitch, facebook, google searches, etc.