Research methods midterm

Dr. Jones is interested in studying how indoor lighting can influence people's moods during the winter. A sample of 100 households is selected. Fifty of the homes are randomly assigned to the bright-light condition where Dr. Jones replaces all existing light bulbs with 100-watt bulbs. In the other 50 houses, the existing bulbs are changed to 60-watt bulbs. After two months, Dr. Jones measures the level of depression for the people living in the houses In this example, how many dependent variables are there?

1

A researcher is examining motor skill development by observing children at 18-months old, 24- months old, and 30-months old. If the researcher uses a longitudinal design and obtains 20 scores for each age, how many children participated in the entire study?

20

A disadvantage of using an operational definition is that the operational definition may

All of the other options are disadvantages

Magazine advertisements that use celebrities to sell makeup employ which method of acquiring knowledge?

Authority

Cues given to the participants about how they are expected to behave are defined as

Demand characteristics

Dr. Jones is interested in studying how indoor lighting can influence people's moods during the winter. A sample of 100 households is selected. Fifty of the homes are randomly assigned to the bright-light condition where Dr. Jones replaces all existing light bulbs with 100-watt bulbs. In the other 50 houses, the existing bulbs are changed to 60-watt bulbs. After two months, Dr. Jones measures the level of depression for the people living in the houses. In this example, the level of depression is the ________ variable.

Dependent

Which of the following accurately describes what is evaluated by differential research?

Differences in scores between preexisting groups of participants

Dr. Jones is interested in studying how indoor lighting can influence people's moods during the winter. A sample of 100 households is selected. Fifty of the homes are randomly assigned to the bright-light condition where Dr. Jones replaces all existing light bulbs with 100-watt bulbs. In the other 50 houses, the existing bulbs are changed to 60-watt bulbs. After two months, Dr. Jones measures the level of depression for the people living in the houses Assuming that the study uses people from different age groups, participant age would be a(n) __________ variable in the experiment.

Extraneous

A football player who knows that his performance will be better if he wears his lucky shirt is using the method of faith

False

A researcher records the number of mathematics problems answered correctly during a 15-minute period. This is an example of measurement on a ratio scale.

False

A researcher reports that participants made fewer errors on a simulated air-traffic-control task when quiet background music was playing than when there was no music. For this study, the number of errors is the independent variable.

False

All books are secondary sources

False

As a person ages, the changes that occur from child to adult to elderly are called cohort effects.

False

Demonstrating that scores from a new measurement procedure are related to scores from an established measure is called convergent validity.

False

Differential research is an example of the quasiexperimental research strategy.

False

Humans who participate in a research study are called research subjects

False

The purpose of the descriptive research strategy is to describe the relationship between two variables.

False

Using shoe size as a measure of intelligence would produce measurements that have very high test-retest reliability.

False

You have dinner reservations at 7:30 at a restaurant that is 30 minutes away and it is already 7:20. Based in this information, you know that you are going to be late. This is an example of using the empirical method

False

A researcher moves an experiment out of the laboratory and into the real world. This type of research is called a

Field study

A researcher evaluates the effectiveness of an art class by having an art expert judge the quality of student's paintings at the beginning of the class, in the middle of the class, and at the end of the class. If the art expert's standards for judgment change during the class, then the internal validity of the study is threatened by

Instrumentation

Which section of a research article is most likely to help you develop ideas for selecting participants and measuring the variables for your own study?

Method

The mode of inquiry that is called the method of faith is a variant of which other method of inquiry?

Method of authority

Which method of acquiring knowledge is being used by students who are learning from teachers and textbooks?

Method of authority

A restaurant chef tried replacing rice with pasta in one of her recipes to see what would happen. Which method of acquiring knowledge is she using?

Method of empiricism

Dr. Kim varies the amount of caffeine given to three groups of participants (0, 100, and 200 mg) and then observes the anxiety level for each group. The 0-mg condition represents the

No treatment control group

Which of the following is the correct classification for a posttest-only nonequivalent control group design?

Nonexperimental study

Differential history effects are a threat to internal validity for which of the following designs?

Pretest-posttest nonequivalent control group design

An empirical journal article is an example of a ________ source.

Primary

Which of the following is not a procedure for assessing the validity of a measurement procedure? Answer

Split-half

Which of the following is a potential problem with the method of authority?

The other three choices are all potential problems.

Questions you should ask when reading an introduction include which of the following?

The other three choices are all questions to ask

You can limit your PsycInfo search by limiting which of the following?

The other three sources are all ways to limit you search

Which of the following accurately describes nonequivalent group design?

The researcher cannot control which people go into each group and cannot ensure that the groups are equivalent.

A researcher has observed that children who eat more sugar tend to show a higher level of activity than children who eat less sugar. However, the researcher suspects that the apparent relationship may be explained by the fact that some children have a higher metabolism which causes them to eat more and to be more active than children with a lower rate of metabolism who eat less and are less active. This is an example of

The third-varible problem

Which of the following is closest to a true experiment?

Time-series design

A cross-sectional design comparing three different ages would require three separate groups of participants.

True

A good hypothesis should make a positive statement about the existence of a relationship, a difference, or a treatment effect

True

A longitudinal developmental design can be viewed as an example of a one-group pretest-posttest design.

True

A measurement procedure can be reliable without being valid.

True

Before searching in PsycINFO, it is wise to identify the official subject terms for the list of terms you have identified.

True

Holding a specific variable constant guarantees that the variable cannot be a confounding variable.

True

If the participants in one treatment condition are noticeably older than the participants in another treatment condition, then participant age is a confounding variable.

True

In a time-series design, a researcher makes multiple observations before and after the introduction of a treatment.

True

In the scientific method, the process of forming a hypothesis means that you are trying to find a possible explanation for the phenomenon that you have observed

True

Nonexperimental and quasiexperimental designs involve comparing groups or conditions.

True

Nonexperimental studies always contain a threat to internal validity, which means that these studies cannot establish unambiguous cause-and-effect relationships.

True

Of all the research strategies that investigate relationships between variables, the correlational strategy is the only one that does not involve comparing groups of scores.

True

Preventing an extraneous variable from becoming a confounding variable by holding it constant can result in a threat to external validity.

True

Reliability of a measurement procedure is usually established with a correlation.

True

To demonstrate a cause-and-effect relationship between two variables, a researcher must make one of the variables change rather than waiting for it to change naturally.

True

Using the amount of class participation as a definition of self-confidence is an example of an operational definition.

True

When the data points in a scatter plot form a circular pattern, this indicates a lack of consistent relationship between the two variables.

True

Whenever an operational definition is used for a hypothetical construct, the question of reliability is important to consider.

True

Participants taking on the negativistic subject role are participants who

Try to act so that their data are in contrast to the hypothesis

Which of the following questions can be addressed with the descriptive strategy?

What is the average number of text messages that a typical adolescent sends in a month?

A research study that evaluates changes in behavior related to age by examining groups of individuals, each group representing a different age, is called

a cross-sectional developmental design.

A researcher studies language development by selecting a sample of 2-year-old children, a sample of 3-year-old children, and a sample of 4-year-old children. Each child's language skill is measured, and the researcher plans to compare the scores for the three groups. This study is an example of

a cross-sectional developmental design.

If people score low on one measure and also score low on another measure, there is

a positive relationship between the two measures

In an experiment, a researcher manipulates people's mood to determine what changes in mood cause changes in memory performance. However, the researcher is not sure that the manipulation is really causing people's mood to change. In this case, the research should

add a manipulation check by measuring mood.

A limitation to using the method of empiricism is

all of the previous answers are limitations.

Experiments allow researchers to

answer cause-and-effect questions about the relationship between two variables

A researcher notices that her children eat a good, nutritious breakfast on some mornings, but on other days they eat doughnuts. The researcher then observes that the children seem to have less energy at midmorning on the days they eat doughnuts. This is an example of getting research ideas from

casual observation.

Suppose a researcher wants to evaluate a self-esteem program by measuring students' self-esteem before and after a self-esteem program is administered. If all of the students score very high in self-esteem before the program begins, then the measurement procedure has a sensitivity problem known as

ceiling effect

The primary problem with a cross-sectional developmental design is that differences between age groups may not be caused by age but rather are caused by

cohort effects

A researcher designs a study to determine whether female preschoolers prefer sweetened or unsweetened cereal. The researcher uses a box of sweetened colorful cereal and a box of unsweetened tan colored cereal. The research finds that the group of preschoolers ate more of the sweetened colorful cereal and therefore prefers the sweetened cereal. Which two variables are confounded in this experiment?

color of the cereal and sweetness of the cereal

In the discussion section of a research article, you can expect to find

conclusions and applications of the research.

In an experiment, any variable that varies systematically with the treatment conditions and might influence the participants' scores is called a _____________ variable.

confounding

A variable such as intelligence that cannot be seen or measured directly is known as a

construct

A research study records a score measuring alcohol use, and a score measuring income level for each individual in a group of 40-year-old men. The study intends to determine a relationship exists between the two variables. This study is an example of the ____________ research strategy.

correlational

The pre-post designs are similar to within-subjects designs; however in a pre-post design it is impossible to

counterbalance order of treatments.

In an experiment, the score for each participant is obtained by measuring the __________ variable.

dependent

The measured variable in an experiment is the

dependent variable

A study examining what percentage of married couples is satisfied with their marriages is an example of what research approach?

descriptive

Which research strategy is not concerned with examining relationships between variables?

descriptive

Which research design is used by a researcher comparing self-esteem scores for children from divorced families versus scores for children from families with no divorce?

differential research design

A researcher has observed that people who suffer from an eating disorder tend to have lower self-esteem than people without a disorder. However, the researcher is not sure whether the lower self-esteem leads to an eating disorder or whether having an eating disorder leads to lower self-esteem. This is an example of

directionality problem

Any factor that limits the ability to generalize the results of the study is a threat to

external validity

Results from a research study suggest that a stop-smoking program is very successful. However, the participants who volunteered for the study were all highly motivated to quit smoking and the researcher is concerned that the same results may not be obtained for smokers who are not as motivated. This study has a problem with

external validity

The degree to which your research results generalize beyond the specific characteristics of your study refers to

external validity

A study examining the relationship between humor and memory compares memory performance scores for one group presented with humorous sentences and a second group presented with nonhumorous sentences. The participants in both groups consist of a mixture of males and females. In this study, gender (male/female) is a(n) ________ variable.

extraneous

You develop a new measure of honesty, and other researchers agree that it looks like an appropriate way to measure honesty. You have demonstrated

face validity

_______ effects occur when environmental events other than the treatment influence the participants' scores in one treatment differently than in another treatment.

history

A researcher decides to use only male participants in an experiment comparing two treatment conditions. For this study, what method is being used to control participant gender?

holding constant

An extraneous variable can be eliminated completely by

holding it constant

What is the advantage of a laboratory study over a field study?

increased internal validity

Sensitization can threaten external validity because the results obtained in a study may be limited to

individuals who have experienced a pretest

Two observers record similar measurements of behavior for a group of children they are watching. The researchers have established what kind of reliability?

inter-rater reliability

A research study finds that a group of participants who received relaxation training had lower exam anxiety scores than a group who did not receive training. However, the researcher suspects that the difference between groups may be caused by the fact that the participants in one group are generally smarter than those in the other. This study has a problem with

internal validity

Any factor that allows an alternative explanation for the results of a study is a threat to

internal validity

If participants in one treatment condition have characteristics that are different from the characteristics of participants in another treatment condition, then _______ may be threatened.

internal validity

Holding a variable constant is a technique for removing one threat to ________ but it can limit the ________ of an experiment.

internal validity; external validity

A person who buys a lottery ticket because he or she just feels lucky is using the method of

intuition.

The specific treatment conditions used in an experiment are called

levels of the independent variable.

A measurement procedure is valid if it

measures what you intend it to measure

As the values for one variable increase from one person to another, the values for a second variable tend to decrease. This is an example of a __________ relationship.

negative

For which of the following studies does the researcher not control which individuals are assigned to which group?

nonequivalent group design

A differential research design is an example of a

nonequivalent group design.

A cross-sectional developmental design is an example of the general category of

nonequivalent group designs.

Differential research is classified as

nonexperimental

The danger of full-text databases is that they contain

only a fraction of the publications in any given area.

Using the number of facial smiles in a 60-second period as a definition and a measurement of happiness is an example of ________ happiness.

operationalizing

Using letter grades (A, B, C, D, and F) to classify student performance on an exam is an example of measurement on a(n) _______ scale of measurement.

ordinal

Research results indicate that the more time individuals spend watching educational television programs as preschool children, the higher their high school grades will be. This is an example of a _________ relationship between variables.

positive

You develop a new measure of honesty, and you find that people who score high on your measure show more honest behavior than people who score low. You have demonstrated

predictive validity

In nonexperiments and quasiexperiments, different groups or conditions are defined in terms of

preexisting participant variables or time.

One primary advantage of a pretest-posttest nonequivalent control group design, in comparison to other nonequivalent group designs, is that the

pretest scores can help reduce the threat of assignment bias.

After measuring a set of individuals, a researcher finds that Bob's score is three times greater than Jane's score. These measurements must come from a(n) ________ scale.

ratio

Determining a person's reaction time (in milliseconds) would involve measurement on a(n) _____ scale of measurement.

ratio

The results of a study may be influenced by the fact that a participant knows he or she is being studied. This threat to external validity is

reactivity

Measurement that includes a large error component will have very low

reliability

A newspaper article discussing someone's research is an example of a ________ source.

secondary

A researcher moves the real world into the laboratory. This type of research is called a

simulation study

Pseudoscience is based on

subjective evidence

When you know that you do not want to eat fried worms, even when everyone around you says that they taste great, your decision is based on the method of

tenacity

What additional information is obtained by measuring on an ordinal scale compared to a nominal scale?

the direction of the differences

A researcher introduces a new mathematics program in one school district and uses a neighboring district as a no-treatment control group. After the program is in place for six months, the researcher intends to give the students in both districts a standardized mathematics test and then compare their scores. This research cannot be classified as a true experiment because

the researcher does not control the assignment of participants to groups and therefore has a nonequivalent groups design.

In a testable hypothesis,

the variables must be measurable.

When a group of individuals is tested in a series of treatment conditions over time, which of the following factors can cause progressive improvement in performance from treatment to treatment and thus provide an alternative explanation for the results?

to practice

An extraneous variable can become a confounding variable if it is allowed to change systematically along with the two other variables being examined in a research study.

true

An extraneous variable is any variable that is part of a research study but not directly investigated.

true

Any factor that limits the ability to generalize the results of a research study to different populations or different environments is a threat to external validity.

true

In an experiment examining how alcohol influences men's judgments of female attractiveness, one group of participants is given nonalcoholic beer before they make their judgments. This would be classified as a placebo control condition.

true

Simulation and field studies are used to increase the external validity of experiments.

true

The purpose of an experiment is to demonstrate that changes in one variable are responsible for causing changes in a second variable.

true