That’s Not True!!!!

1. That’s Not True!!!! Research Methods in Psychology

2. Cause and effect • With an experiment, we can determine cause and effect because we are systematically manipulating variables • Hypothesis-what do we think will happen in the study? • Independent variable(s): this is the variable we are testing, that is, the variable we are going to manipulate. One group receives the independent variable (experimental group) and one group does not receive the I.V. (control group). There can be more than one • Dependent variable(s): this is the variable that will be affected by the I.V.

3. Operational definitions- • What do you mean by the I.V.? • What do you mean by the D.V.? • You need to define them so people who read your study know what you are talking about

4. Subjects: • Population-all the people from which a sample may be drawn • Sample – a portion of the population • Random Assignment-necessary to show that results are not due to chance. Everyone should have an equal chance of being in either experimental or control group. • Experimental group-group that receives the independent variable • Control group-group that stays ‘as is’ or receives a placebo

5. Extraneous vs. Confounding variables • Extraneous – may have some impact on experiment, but not enough to interfere with findings regarding I.V. • Confounding – has enough of an impact on the experiment so that researcher cannot tell the difference between the impact of the I.V. and the confounding variable

6. Flaws to look for • 1. Internal validity-This means that you have created a very good study in terms of the subjects being utilized within the study. • The problem with internal validity is that it becomes very difficult to generalize the results to the rest of the population. (This can also be a problem with case studies). • 2. External validity- don’t control for the variables as much, but easier to generalize the results of the study

7. 3. Sampling bias-when the sample utilized does not represent the whole population from which it was drawn • You need to draw a large enough sample to represent the population under study and then utilize random sampling

8. 4. Placebo effects-can occur when a person experiences the feelings from taking a “medication” that they believed they were supposed to experience. • Simply placing something in one’s mouth may cause one to experience a placebo effect • Placebo effects can ruin the experiment because you cannot tell if the drug actually had an effect on the subject or not.

9. 5. Distortion of self-report-Occurs when interview and surveys are given. The subject may lie in giving their answers (or just stretch the truth). Can happen in one of two ways: • A. Social desirability-when a person give socially approved answers. They answer the way they think would be considered socially acceptable • B. Response set-tendency to respond to questions in a particular way that is unrelated to content of questions. (Ex- when people agree with or disagree with everything on the survey. Most surveys are set up to elicit positive/negative answers or so that different choices should be made.

10. 6. Experimenter bias-when a researcher’s expectations or preferences about an outcome of a study influence the results obtained. This may be done intentionally or unintentionally • The best way to overcome this is to do a double-blind study, in which the experimenter does not know which subjects are in which groups

11. Developmental Studies • In order to study development of human beings, we use several different designs: • 1. Cross-sectional • 2. Longitudinal • 3. Sequential

12. Pros and cons with Research Methods • 1. Naturalistic Observation • Pros – You can observe people in their natural environment; the way people normally behave • Cons – Subject to experimenter bias, misunderstanding of subject behavior and uncontrolled variables

13. 2. Laboratory Experiment • Pros – Variables can be controlled. Easier to make statements about cause-and-effect relationship • Cons – People know that they are part of an experiment so they tend not to act naturally

14. 3. Surveys • Pros – Can obtain a lot of information in a short amount of time • Cons – People tend to distort the truth either through distortion of self-report and response sets

15. 4. Interviews • Pros – Can ask follow up questions that you can’t do with a survey. Can observe subject’s behavior when asking questions. • Cons – People lie or only give information that the feel necessary or that they think the experimenter wants to hear

16. 5. Case Study • Pros – Can get very detailed information about an individual • Cons – cannot generalize information to larger group of people

17. Ethical Issues in Psychology • 1. Subject participation – voluntary • Should not be forced or feel pressured • Should be informed of any factor of research that might make them decide not to participate • Should be allowed to end participation at any time and still get paid (if they are getting paid)

18. 2. Subjects are not to be harmed in any way Protect from psychological and physical harm Studies that may only effect one’s emotions in a slight way are acceptable

19. 3. Deception of participants – Is it okay? • Should be done to inform participants • Debriefing of subject is usually necessary

20. 4. Right to privacy should not be violated • Don’t give out information on your subjects • If data regarding subjects will be released, subjects must be informed and consent must be obtained

21. 5. Can we cause them harm? • Yes to animals – but you must be able to justify it • Animals should be maintained in a manner that is considered decent treatment

22. Animals are people too!!!

23. 6. Approval must be obtained from the institution that the researcher works for Research must be reported in an ethical fashion Research should be reported as soon as possible for verification

24. Measures of Central Tendency • Mean-Average of all the data • Mode-# that appears most often. You may have a bimodal distribution which means that two #’s appear the same # of times and are the most frequent #’s in the data set. • Median-# in the middle • Range – subtract the lowest # from the highest # Stats Rap

25. While experiments tell us about cause and effect, correlational studies do NOT tell about causation they ONLY tell us if there is a relationship Usually after the fact Often cannot experiment on humans Follow-up may be experiment with animals Correlational Studies

26. Correlational Research • Look for: • Positive vs. negative relationships • Strength of the number

27. Correlational Research • +1 – maximum value – perfect correlation • +.7-.9 – strong correlation • +.4-.6 – moderate correlation • +.1-.3 – weak correlation • 0 – no correlation