Week 1 - Introducing Social Psych & Research Methods Flashcards
What is social psychology?
The scientific study of how peoples thoughts, feelings, and behaviours are influenced by factors in the social world.
What do social psychologists study?
How people explain their own and other peoples behaviour, how people influence each other, and how people connect with each other.
Gordon W. Allport’s definition of social psychology…
…“an attempt to understand and explain how the thought, feelings and behaviour of individuals are influenced by the actual, imagined, or implied presence of other human beings”
Scientific method
a technique for investigating phenomena, acquiring new knowledge, and/or correcting previous knowledge
Self-Perception is…
how we think about ourselves
Self-presentation
how people work to convey certain images of themselves to others
Social perception
how people form impressions of and make inferences about other people and events in the social world
Social cognition
how we think about the social world, and in particular how we select, interpret and use info to make judgements about the world
social influence
the impact of other peoples attitudes and behaviours on our thoughts, feelings, and behaviour
Self-fulfilling prophecy
the process by which peoples expectations about a person lead them to elect behaviour that confirms these expectations
Behaviourism
a theory of learning that describes peoples behaviour as acquired through conditioning
Gestalt Psychology
a theory that proposes objects are viewed holistically
Gestalt Psychology
a theory that proposes objects are viewed holistically (the whole is more than merely the sum of its parts)
Who is Kurt Lewin
a German-Jewish professor, who is often considered the founder of social psychology
Positive Psychology
a recent branch of psychology that studies individuals strengths and virtues
hindsight bias
the tendency to see a given outcome as inevitable once the actual outcome is known
Social Neuroscience
a sub-sidcipline of social psych examining how facts in the social world influence activity in the brain, as well as how neural processes influence attitudes and behaviour
sociocultural perspective
a perspective describing peoples behaviour and mental processes as being shaped in part by their social and/or cultural context
individualistic
a view of the self as distinct, autonomous, self-contained, and endowed with unique attributions
collectivistic
a view of the self as part of a larger social network, including family, friends, and co-workers
Social constructionism
the view that there is no absolute reality and that our knowledge and what we understand to be reality are socially constructed
literature review
examining previous relevant studies on a given topic and critically appeasing them
hypothesis
a testable prediction about the conditions under which an event will occur
operational definition
a specific procedure or measure that one uses to test a hypothesis
theory
an organized set of principles that explain observed phenomena
correlational research
a research technique that examines the extent to which two or more variables are associated with one another
observational/naturalistic methods
a research approach that involves the observation and systematic recording of a particular behaviour
archival research
a research approach that uses already recorded behaviour
meta-anaylsis
a literature review that analyzes data from several studies that examine related hypothesis
inter-rater reliability
the extent to which two or more coders agree on ratings of a particular measure
event recording or experience sampling measures
a particular type of self-report or survey data where participants report various experiences they have at regular time intervals
covert measures
measures used by researchers that rely on participants behaviour or reaction not directly under participants control
experimental methods
a research approach that involves the manipulation of one or more independent variables and the measurement of one or more dependent variable
independent variable
the variable that is manipulated in experimental research
dependent variable
the factor that is measured to see if it is affected by the independent variable
random assignment
a technique for placing participants into the different conditions in an experiment that gives all participants equal opportunity of being placed in any of the conditions
internal validity
the degree to which one can validity draw conclusions about the effects of the independent variable on the dependent variable
demand characteristic
the cues in a research setting that may inadvertently guide participants behaviour
experimenter expectancy effects
when an experimenters expectations about the results of the study influence participants behaviour and thereby affect the results of the study
experimenter blind
the procedure that ensures the experimenter who is interacting with a study participants does not know which conditions the participants are in
experimental realism or psychological realism
the extent to which participants are engaged in a particular study and hence act in more spontaneous and natural ways
external validity
the degree to which there can be reasonable confidence that the same results would be obtained for other people in other situations
mundane realism
the extent to which the conditions of the study resemble places and events that exist in the real world
field experiments
experiments that are conducted in natural settings
random sample or representative sample
a sample that reflects the characteristics of the population of interest
Research ethics board
a panel of experts responsible for the ethical assessment of all research proposals conducted at an organization
informed consent
an individuals deliberate, voluntary decision to participate in research based on the researchers description of what such participation will involve
deception
giving false info to the participants in a study
debriefing
a disclosure made to participants after research procedures are in which the researcher explains the purpose of the study, answers questions, attempts to resolve any negative feelings, and emphasizes the study contributions to science
