Psychology – Chapter 2
Scientific Attitudes
• Curiosity, scepticism, and open-mindedness are driving forces behind scientific inquiry
• Kitty Genovese incident
• Bystander apathy explanation – researchers believed it was unlikely that every one of the
bystanders could have been apathetic
• The bystander effect
• (look in hs notes for study – Darley and Lantane (1968) – smoke in the room study)
• They suggested that in ambiguous situations, we tend to look to other people of information
when in a group
• diffusion of responsibility: psychological state in which each person feels decreased
personal responsibility for intervening; happens with a group of people
Gathering Evidence: Steps in the Scientific Process
• Step 1: Identify a question of interest
o curiosity – why?
• Step 2: Gather information and form hypothesis
o try to answer questions using studies, theories, etc that already exist
o then they form a hypothesis – a specific prediction about some phenomenon that
often takes form of an “If…,Then…” statement
• Step 3: Test hypothesis by conducting research
o Experiments, observations, etc
• Step 4: Analyze data, draw tentative conclusions, report findings
o Researchers analyze the info (data) they collect and reference their findings to their
hypothesis
o Publishing research is essential to scientific progress – it allows fellow scientists to
learn about new ideas and finding, to evaluate research, and to challenge or expand
on it
• Step 5: Build a body of knowledge
o asking further questions, formulate new hypotheses and test them by conducting
more research
o as evidence mounts, scientists may attempt to build a theory – a set of formal
statements that explains how and why certain events are related to one another
§ theories are broader than hypotheses, and in psychology, theories typically
specify lawful relations btw certain behaviours and their causes
§ ex: dozens of experiments reveal that diffusion of responsibility has occurred
across many situations, Latane then combined the principle of diffusion of
responsibility with other principles of group behaviour to develop a broad
theory of social impact, which has been used to explain a variety of social
behaviours
o scientists use theories to develop new hypotheses, which are then tested by
conducting more research – scientific process becomes self-correcting
§ if predictions made by the theory are not supported, then it will be modified or
discarded
• See 36-37 for Kitty example!
Two Approaches to Understanding Behaviour
Hindsight (After-the-Fact Understanding)
• After-the-fact reasoning – “life is lived forwards, but understood backwards”
• Most common method we use to try to understand behaviour in our everyday life
• Flawed because there may be many possible explanations for behaviour and no way to
ascertain which one is correct
o If one result happened vs another would it still have been predicted?
• Main problem with relying solely on hindsight reasoning is that related past events can be
explained in many creative, reasonable, and sometimes contradictory ways
o No way to determine which – if any – of the alternatives are correct
• Can still provide valuable insights and is often the foundation on which further scientific
inquiry is built
Understanding through Prediction, Control, and Theory Building
• Scientists prefer this method “what causes what” – if we understand the causes of a
behaviour, then we should be able to predict the conditions under which that behaviour will
occur in the future – if we can control those conditions (ex: in the lab), then we should be
able to produce that behaviour
• Understanding through prediction and control is the scientific alternative to hindsight
understanding
• A good theory generates an integrated network of predictions and has several important
characteristics:
o Organizes info in a meaningful way – incorporates existing facts abd observations in
a single broad framework
o Testable – generates new hypotheses and predictions whose accuracy can be
evaluated by gathering new evidence
o Predictions made by theory are supported by findings of new research
o Conforms to the law of parsimony – if 2 theories can explain and predict the same
phenomena equally well, the simpler theory is the preferred one
• Even when many successful predictions support a theory, it is never considered absolute
truth
• Always possible that future research will contradict or displace it (this is the essence of
science)
• Not all predictions require understanding, however, predictions based on understanding has
important advantages
o Satisfies our curiosity, increases knowledge, and generates principles that we can
apply to new situations
Defining and Measuring Variables
• Variable – any characteristic or factor that can vary (ex: sex, height, age, GPA, etc.)
o Very from person to person and vary within a given person over time
• Many variables that psychologists study are abstract, such as self-esteem, stress,
intelligence – refer to internal qualities
• Scientists must define their terms clearly and must define variables operationally
• Operational definition – defines a variable in terms of specific procedures used to produce
or measure it; they translate abstract concepts into something observable and measurable
• Some processes are directly measurable but others aren’t
Self-Reports and Reports by Others
• Self-report measures – ask people to report on their own knowledge, beliefs, experiences,
feelings, or behaviour
o Often gathered through interviews or questionnaires
o Relies on participants answering honestly
o May be distorted by social desirability bias – tendency to respond in a socially
acceptable manner rather than according to how one truly feels or behaves
o This can be avoided by guaranteeing anonymity and confidentiality
• Reports by others – gathering info about someone’s behaviour by asking people who know
the person
o Researchers try to maximize honesty in this as well
Measures of Overt Behaviour
• This is another measurement approach where you record overt (directly observable)
behaviour
• Ex: In a learning experiment, researchers might count the errors made in a particular task; in
a drug experiment, reaction time (how rapidly they respond to a stimulus such as turning a
light on/off) might be tested for after drinking diff amounts of alcohol
• Since humans behave differently when they know they are being observed, researchers
may disguise their presence or use unobtrusive measures, which record behaviour in a
way that keeps participants unaware that certain responses are being measured
• Psychologists also gather info by using archival measures, which are records or
documents that already exist
• Psychological tests:
o Can be specialized self-reports - ex: personality tests
o Can consist of performance tasks – ex: intelligence tests (may ask people to
assemble objects or solve arithmetic problems), neuropsychological tests (help to
diagnose normal and abnormal brain functioning by measuring how well people
preform mental and physical tasks, such as recalling lists of words or manipulating
objects)
• Physiological measures:
o Used to assess what people are experiencing
o Ex: measures of heart rate, blood pressure, respiration rate, hormonal secretions,
and brain functioning
o Physiological responses can have their own interpretative problems – we don’t
always understand what they mean
§ Ex: w increased heart rate, what emotions or thoughts are expressed?
The neuroscience of the human brain at work:
• Use various techniques to identify localization of behavioural function in specific areas of
the brain
• Used case study methods to test patients with damage to a specific area of the brain to
uncover which of their abilities are preserved and which are lost – identifies the functions
of diff brain structures
• Recent advances in brain-imaging tech have allowed neuroscientists to monitor neural
activity in the intact brain of a person during mental or physical tasks
o PET and fMRI scans measure changes in local blood flow or oxygen content,
which have shown to reflect local neural acitivity
o (read page 45 and 46 for detailed info about fMRI, MRIs and DTI – or check hs
notes)
Methods of Research
Descriptive Research: Recording Events
• Descriptive research – seeks to identify how humans and other animals behave ,
particularly in natural settings
• Provide info about the diversity of behaviour and may yield clues about potential cause-
effect relations that are later tested experimentally
• Case studies, naturalistic observation, and surveys are research methods commonly used to
describe behaviour
Case Studies: Treating Cases of Failure to Thrive (Starvation) in Human Infants
• Case study – in-depth analysis of an individual, a group, or an event
• Data can be gathered through interviews, observations, psychological tests, physiological
recordings, and task performance or from archival records
• Often involve baseline, treatment, and follow up
• Case study advantages
o this method enables scientists to study a rare phenomenon closely
o a case study can challenge the validity of a theory / widely held scientific belief
o vibrant source of new ideas and hypotheses that subsequently may be examined by
using more controlled research methods
• Case study limitations
o poor method for determining cause-effect relations
§ changes can be as a result of other factors (not as controlled)
o Case study findings may not generalize to other people or situations
§ To establish generalization of a principle, investigators must conduct more
case studies, use other research methods, and test a variety of cultural
groups
o Observers may not be objective in gathering and interpreting the data.. there is often
measurement bias
§ A.k.a. observer bias – based on an observer’s subjective impressions –
case studies should be followed up by more controlled methods before they
are accepted
• SEE EXAMPLE ON 42-43
Naturalistic Observation: Bullying in Canadian Schoolyards (44)
• Researcher observes behaviour as it occurs in a natural setting, and attempts to avoid
influencing that behaviour
• Limitation: like case studies, it does not permit clear causal conclusions
o In the real world, many variables simultaneously influence behaviour, and they
cannot be disentangled with this research technique
• Bias in how researchers interpret observations are also possible
• Limitation: presence of an observer may disrupt a person’s behaviour, so researchers must
disguise their presence so that participants are not aware of being observed
o When disguise is not feasible, people and other animals typically adapt to and ignore
the presence of an observer as time passes – process called habituation –
researchers may delay their data collection until participants have habituated to the
observer’s presence
• SEE EXAMPLE ON 44
Survey Research
• Information about a topic is obtained by administrating questionnaires or interviews to many
people (ex: political polls)
• 2 key concepts in survey research are population and sample
• Population – all individuals about whom we are interested in drawing a conclusion
• Since it is impossible to study everyone most of the time, we use a sample – subset of
individuals drawn from the larger population of interest
• To draw valid conclusions about a population from a survey, the sample must be a
representative sample – meaning it reflects the important characteristics of the population
• To obtain a representative sample, random sampling is often used – every member has an
equal probability of being chosen to participate in the survey
• Stratified random sampling – first population is divided into subgroups (like gender or
ethnic identity) then random sampling is used after
• When a representative sample is surveyed, we can be confident (though never completely
certain) that the findings closely portray the population as a whole – strongest advantage if
survey research
• Unrepresentative samples can produce distorted results
o Large samples are better than smaller ones, but it’s better to have a small
representative sample than a larger, unrepresentative one
• Drawbacks to surveys
o Cannot be used to draw conclusions about cause and effect
o Surveys rely on self-reports, which can be distorted by social desirability bias,
interviewer bias, misinterpretations of questions, inaccurate perception of one’s own
behaviour, etc.
o Unrepresentative samples are possible and therefore inaccurate
• Examples 44-46 – Terracciano et al
Correlational Research: Measuring Associations between Events
• Examines relationships using 3 components
1) Researcher measures one variable (x)
2) Researcher measures a second variable (y)
3) Researcher statistically determines whether x and y are related
• Correlational studies involve measuring variables, not manipulating them
Correlation Does Not Establish Causation
• Correlational research cannot be used to draw a causation
• Must consider the possibility that variable X has caused variable Y, that Y has cause X, or
that both variables have influenced each other – bidirectionality (ie two-way causality)
problem
o The relationship could be spurious (not genuine, artificial) – maybe neither variable
has an effect on the other - maybe there’s a 3rd variable, Z that may be the cause of
the previous 2 in question
o Third variable problem – Z is responsible for what looks like a relation btw X and Y
– as Z varies, it causes X to change, but this is caused by Z, not by any direct effect
of X or Y on each other
o This is a major disadvantage of correlational research – no causations can be drawn
The Correlation Coefficient
• A statistic that indicates direction and strength of relation between 2 variables – can be
correlated positively or negatively
• Positive correlation – higher score on one variable = higher score on other variable
• Negative correlation – higher score on one variable = lower score on other variable
• Range from -1.00 to +1.00 (plus or minus tells us the direction of correlation)
• Absolute value of statistic tells you strength of the correlation – closer to +1.00 (perfect
positive correlation) or -1.00 (perfect negative correlation), the more strongly the 2 variables
are related
• 0.00 correlation means they aren’t related statistically
• Scatter plots – graphs that show the correlation btw 2 variables
Correlation as a Basis for Prediction
• Benefits:
o help establish whether relation found in the lab generalize to the outside world
o can discover associations that are subsequently studied under controlled lab
conditions
o for ethical and practical reasons, some questions cannot be studied with
experiments; correlational method used instead (ex. How religious someone is – can
determine whether it’s associated with other variables, such as personality traits)
o allows us to make predictions based on one known variable
Experiments – Examining Cause and Effect
• Powerful tool for examining cause-and-effect relations
• 3 essential characteristics of an experiment:
1) Researcher manipulates (ie controls) one or more variables – in the simplest
possible experiment, the researcher manipulates one variable by creating 2 different
condition to which participants are exposed
2) Researcher measures whether manipulation influences other variables (ie,
variables that represent the participant’s responses)
3) Researcher attempts to control other factors that might influence outcome of
experiment
• Start out w equivalent groups of participants
• Treat them equally in all respects except for the variable that is of particular interest
• Isolate this variable and manipulate it
• Measure how the groups respond
o If the groups respond differently, then the most plausible explanation is that these
differences are cause by the manipulated variable
Independent and Dependant Variables
• Independent variable – factor being manipulated / controlled by the experimenter (cause)
• Dependant variable – factor measured by experimenter and that may be influenced by the
independent variable (effect)
o Easy way to remember – the dependant variable depends in the independent
variable
Experimental and Control Groups
• Experimental group – group that receives a treatment or an active level of the independent
variable
• Control group – not exposed to treatment or receives a zero-level of the independent
variable; provides a standard of behaviour for comparison
• the independent variable MUST have at least 2 levels
o many experiments have an experimental (treatment) and a control (no treatment)
group – however, in some experiments, the concept of a control group may not apply
Two Basic Ways to Design an Experiment
• Between groups design (or between subjects) – each group in the experiment is
composed of a different set of participants, everyone must be equivalent at start of the study
• Random assignment – method used by researchers in which each participant has an equal
likelihood of being assigned to any one group within an experiment – used to balance
participant differences across the various conditions of the experiment
• Repeated measures design (or within subjects) – each participant is exposed to all the
conditions of an independent variable – can rule out alternative explanations for any results
obtained
o Flaws to this design – fatigue effect – participants can become bored or fatigued, or
overconfident as the trials go on
o Counterbalancing – a procedure in which the order of conditions is varied so that
no condition has an overall advantage relative to others (ensures not everyone is
tired/bored by the last condition)
Manipulating Two Independent Variables
• It’s good to manipulate both independent variables within the same experiment because it
allows us to determine if there is an interaction
• The concept of interaction means that the way in which one independent variable (X1)
influences the dependent variable (Y) differs depending on the various conditions of another
independent variable (X2)
• Example study – page 57 + 58
Table 2.1 – overview of research methods
Threats to the Validity of Research
• Validity – how well an experiment procedure actually tests what it is designed to test
• There are 2 classes of validity
o Internal validity: represents degree to which an experiment supports clear causal
conclusions – if an experiment is well designed and properly conducted, we can be
confident that the independent variable really was the cause of the differences in the
dependent variable – high internal validity
o External validity
Confounding Variables
• Confounding of variables means that 2 variables are intertwined in such a way that we
cannot determine which one has influenced a dependant variable
• Prevents us from drawing clear causal conclusions, and therefore ruins the internal validity
of the experiment
o Key reason why casual conclusions cannot be drawn from correlational research
(recall third-variable problem – variable Z is a confounding variable)
• Example study page 59 – the Mozart effect study
SEE SUMMARY ON 55 - ?
Placebo Effects
• In medicine, the term placebo refers to a substance that has no pharmacological effect
• In experiments testing the effectiveness of new drugs, one group (treatment group) receives
that actual drug being investigated; and a second (placebo control group) receives a
placebo
o Usually not told which drug (real or placebo) they will receive
• Placebo effect: people receiving a treatment show a change in behaviour because of their
expectations, not because the treatment itself had any specific benefit
• Placebo effects decrease internal validity by providing a alternative explanation for why
responses change after exposure to treatment
o This problem applies to evaluating all types of treatments, not just those that test the
effectiveness of drugs (ex: receiving psychotherapy)
• By carefully designing experiments to include placebo control conditions, reseachers can
determine whether behaviour change truly is caused by the various interventions or whether
a placebo effect might have played a role
Experimenter Expectancy Effects
• The subtle and unintentional ways researchers influence their participants to respond in a
manner that is consistent with their hypothesis
• Double-blind procedure – both participant and experimenter are kept blind as to which
experimental condition the participant is in
o This minimizes the participant placebo effect, as well as experimenter expectancy
effects
Replicating and Generalized the Findings
• External validity – the degree to which the results of a study can be generalized to other
populations, settings, and conditions
o Typically, judgements about external validity concern the generalizability of
underlying principles
• We determine external validity by replication – the process of repeating a study to
determine whether the original findings can be duplicated
o If the findings are successfully replicated, we become more confident in our
conclusions
• meta-analysis – statistical procedure for combining results of different studies that examine
the same topic in order to test the overall significance of the findings
o each study is treated as a “single participant” and it’s overall results are analyzed
with those of the other studies – inform researchers about the direction and statistical
strength of the relationships btw two variables
o it integrates multiple studies and reach overall conclusions about behaviour
• cross-cultural replication – examining whether findings generalize across different
cultures
• studies that consistently fail to replicate the original results of earlier research may suggest
that the original research was flawed or that the findings were a fluke
Review on 58
Ethical Principles in Human and Animal Research:
Ethical standards in human research:
• If a proposed study is considered ethically questionable, or if the rights of participants
are not sufficiently protected, then the methods must be modified, or the research cannot
be conducted
• Participants need to give informed consent and are ensured privacy and confidentiality
• (look at hs notes for ethics in human research)
• (look at textbook page 65 - 66 for animal ethics)
