Week 2 - Hypothesis, variables, and observational studies

Question 1

What is a hypothesis?

Answer 1

a prediction which is specific, unambiguous, and able to be supported or refuted.
We use data to test our hypotheses, ultimately helping form existing theories.

Question 2

What is a variable?

Answer 2

Things that ‘vary’
- What we’re often interested in is whether variations in one thing are related to variations in another thing

Question 3

What is a level of measurement?

Answer 3

A hierarchy for classifying types of data, ranging from normal (categorical) to ratio.

Question 4

What is an observational study?

Answer 4

• Can be structured or non structured
• Can involve the researcher as a participant or not
• There are clear strengths and weaknesses to this type of design

Strucutred: Zimbardos Stanford Prison Experiment, 1971.
Non-Structured: Rosenhan, On being sane in insane places, 1973

Question 5

What ae the advantages and disadvantages of observations?

Answer 5

+ + A direct measure of behaviour
+ + Can have high ecological validity
- - May be susceptible to demand characteristics or experimenter effect
- - can be difficult to determine cause and effect

Question 6

What is a theory?

Answer 6

A well substained explanation that intergrates and organises various observations and provides a framework for understanding a phenomenon

Question 7

What is the relationship between theory and experiments?

Answer 7

Theories guide the formulation of hypotheses and the design of the experiments,
and experimental results can support, refine, or challenge existing theories/

Question 8

what is a null hypothesis

Answer 8

there is no relationship between two variables

Question 9

In Zimbardo’s study, how did they attempt to avoid subjective interpreations of participant behaviour?

Answer 9

• Behavioural checklists
• Systematic coding schemes

used by multiple raters to standardise the assessment of behaviours.

Question 10

What are the strenghs of Rosenhan’s study on psychiatric diagnoses?

Answer 10

• Provided valuble insights into the experinces of individuals within psychiatric hospitals
• High ecological validity, as it was conducted in real psychiatric hospital settings
• Observational data collected was rich and detailed, providing in-depth information
• Using covert observation reduced the chances of demand characteristics affecting the data

Question 11

Give examples of nominal, ordinal, interval, and ratio data

Answer 11

Nominal: gender
Ordinal: Ranking position in a test
Interval: IQ
Ratio: Score on a recognition task

Interval and ratio data are similar; but RATIO has a TRUE ZERO, and cannot go into negative numbers.