Psych 1 - Empiricism
What are the 4 steps to the scientific method?
1) Defining variables 2) Measuring variables 3) Identifying associations between variables 4) Drawing conclusions about the relationships observed between variables.
What are the ways that our intuition can be undermined?
1) Hindsight bias 2) Anecdata 3) Confirmation bias 4) Overconfidence 5) Tendency to perceive patterns in a random sequence
What are the 3 reasons that we need psychological science?
1) The human brain is COMPLEX 2) Humans are HIGHLY VARIABLE 3) Humans are REACTIVE
What is a double-blind technique?
A double-blind technique keeps both the subject and the study administrator blind to the study's purpose and hypothesis, reducing both subject bias and observer bias.
What is a hypothesis?
A hypothesis is a testable prediction, usually based on theory.
What is negative correlation?
As X increases, Y decreases
What is positive correlation?
As X increases, Y increases
What are confounding variables?
Confounding variables are factors other than the independent variable that might produce an effect on the dependent variable.
What is correlation?
Correlation is a measure of the extent to which 2 factors vary together and thus of how well either factor predicts the other.
What are demand characteristics?
Demand characteristics are aspects of an observational setting that cause people to behave as they think an observer wants or expects to them to think. To reduce subject bias, address demand characteristics through: 1) A 2-way mirror for anonymity 2) Keep the subject "blind" to the hypothesis
What is dogmatism?
Dogmatism is the belief that knowledge is to be gained through theorizing and reasoning (including introspection).
What is empiricism?
Empiricism is the belief that accurate knowledge of the world requires observation of it. We cannot simply trust evidence from our eyes (or from our personal experiences) to make claims about the world.
What is anecdata?
Essentially, "research is 'me search,'" or the fact that out intuition is based on our own experiences and describes what HAS happened to ME more than what WILL happen, GENERALLY.
What is external validity?
External validity is the extent to which your conclusions apply to other people in other places.
What is hindsight bias?
Hindsight bias is the tendency to believe after learning an outcome that one would have foreseen it
What do we need in order to prove causation?
In order to prove causation, we need to run an experiment. The hallmark of an experiment is random assignment.
What do we mean by identify associations?
In the identifying associations step of the scientific method, we must make sure that IV actually overlaps with the DV -- that there is a correlation between the two.
What is observer bias?
Observer bias is seeing what the observer expects to see.
What does it mean to operationalize variables?
Operational definitions are carefully worded statements of the exact procedures (operations) used in a research study.
What is random assignment?
Random assignment is the only research that permits causal conclusions. It is assigning experiment participants to the experimental group and the control group, by chance. The treatment of the 2 groups is exactly the same, except that the experimental group gets treated with the independent variable and the control group does not.
What is subject bias?
Subject bias is the subject giving the researcher what s/he thinks the researcher expects to see. The main kind of subject bias is demand characteristics.
How do we measure our variables?
Through sampling! We should pick a sample to represent the population we want to generalize to. When sampling, we should: 1) Sample randomly - a random sample fairly represents a population because each member has an equal chance of being included. Plus, random sampling increases external validity. 2) Sample generously - the law or large numbers (the larger the sample, the more closely it represents the population).
What does is mean to define variables?
To assign one independent variable and one dependent variable. The IV will be manipulated, the DV will be observed and we must try to control confounding variables. We must operationalize our variables. After we operationalize our variables, we must formulate a hypothesis to test.
What can we do with correlation?
When we have a correlation between our DV and IV, we can make predictions about the behavior of one variable based off of the behavior of the other variable. HOWEVER, correlation does NOT MEAN CAUSATION.
