Psych Lecture 02

5/2/2012 6:31:00 AM

Quiz 1 may 9 open for 48 hours, 10 questions each. 1 attempt and 20 min. Levels of analysis and research methods. Scientific method is important because things need to be tested so we can see why people do the things they do. To figure this out precise experiments must be conducted. Has 7 steps: -Theory: Idea or question of the way something works. -Hypothesis: Form a set of testable conditions. Where you see what direction your theory is going to go in. -Research Method: Design an experiment, find an independent and a dependent variable and conduct the experiment. -Collect Data: Be sure to avoid biases, follow methods to ensure your data is not biased. -Analyze Data: Use statistics to compare results. See if your information can be applied to a larger group. -Report Findings: Write and Publish, you send it to a journal and the journal sends it to a few experts who looks at it and make corrections before it goes to the public. -Revise Theory: Start over again if necessary to answer further questions or discrepancies in the expected results. Erics Theory: That Test performance can be influenced by external factors Erics Hypothesis: That Energy drinks can improve test performance. Designing an Experiment: You have to be very specific in how you choose to test your experiment because you may end up testing the wrong thing. Def. Experiment: Scientific tool used to measure the effect of one variable on another. Independent Variable: Variable manipulated by the Scientist, Erics was the energy drink. Dependent Variable: The one being observed and depends on the other variable, Erics was the test marks.

Its essential to have a control group. The problem with using one friend as a control group is that it is too small of a control group, you cant decide anything. A good control group has to be as similar as possible to the experimental group. Confounding Variable: External variable other than the independent variable that is affecting the experiment. This is fixed by using random sampling. Erics Population is all undergraduate students. You choose a sample at random from the entire population. Generally scientist use what is available to them. i.e. McMaster scientists generally use first year psych students. Randomly assign subjects to either the experimental or control group to prevent any biases that can occur from the differences of the students. Sampling Bias Ex. 10 nursing students and 10 engineering students may have different types of tests which affect stress. Before is being tested 1 day while after is being tested 2 weeks after. Coming on a sat to ask students about a potential raise in school fees, you will have a different group of students than you would on a week day. Subject Bias: When the subjects responses unconsciously change because they know they are being studied. You my be trying to help the experimenter and guessing what they are testing. Experimenter Bias: When the experimenter unconsciously influences the data because they expect some result. If you worked hard on your hypothesis you may be influencing the subject to do something in a way that would prove your hypothesis. Double Blind Studies: Experiments in which neither the experimenter nor the subjects know which group each subject belong to. Eric had a friend label the bottles so he nor the subjects knew what they were drinking. (Knee surgery was made where two groups received it and the third didnt, after two years all the patients said their knee felt better even though the third group didnt even have the surgery)

Within Subjects design is when you use the same subjects in two separate trials.(Between the trials, the subjects may catch on as to what the experiment is, it may also be too time consuming for the subjects to wait that time between and to have to come back.)

Between Subjects design is when you split the subjects and half do only one experiment while the other half do the other.(Ethical Roadblocks, In medical treatments you have to decide whether or not it is ethical to not give a subject a treatment which you honestly think may work.) Yawning Exp: Hypothesis-Whether seeing a yawn is enough or you have to see and hear. IV-Hearing the yawn DV-Whether they yawn Control-Video without sound, Exp-Video with sound Within or between-Within Double Dipping Exp: Hypothesis-That the double dipped dip will have negligible bacteria IV-Whether he double dips or not DV-Whether there is bacteria, amount of. Control-Untouched Dip, Exp-Double Dipped, Single Dipped Within or In-between- 3 Separate dips so between Correlation: A measure of the relationship between two variables. Useful when a fully controlled experiment is not possible. Some things cant be done for certain reasons therefore correlations are found between the variables. If correlation is close or to 0 are not closely correlated. As it approaches 1 or 1 it means they are closely correlated. Measure the slope to see. Correlation does not equal causation, if two things are closely correlated it doesnt necessarily mean that one is causing the other. Ex. As daily icecream sales and Drowning increase and are correlation. However ice cream sales dont cause drowning.

Descriptive Statistics are measure of central tendency which include mean median and mode. Measures of variability see how the information is grouped towards the middle. Measured using standard deviation. Larger means further out and more variability. Inferential Statistics: Our sample is a small group and we want to see if the information can be applied to a larger group. Use the t-test to see if the distributions are close together or far apart. Result is a p-test and that is the probability to see if you can obtain the result by chance. P,0.05 is considered a statistically significant result. Meaning there is a true chance that that is happening because of the experiment and not just randomly.

5/2/2012 6:31:00 AM

5/2/2012 6:31:00 AM