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Unit 2. Research Methods. Why do we need research in Psychology?.
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Why do we need research in Psychology? • Myth # 1: Most people use only 10% of their brain powerThere are several reasons to doubt that 90% of our brains lie silent. At a mere 2-3% of our body weight, our brain consumes over 20% of the oxygen we breathe. It’s implausible that evolution would have permitted the squandering of resources on a scale necessary to build and maintain such a massively underutilized organ. Moreover, losing far less than 90% of the brain to accident or disease almost always has catastrophic consequences (Kolb & Whishaw, 2003). • How did the 10% myth get started? One clue leads back about a century to psychologist William James, who once wrote that he doubted that average persons achieve more than about 10% of their intellectual potential. Although James talked in terms of underdeveloped potential, a slew of positive thinking gurus transformed “10% of our capacity” into “10% of our brain” (Beyerstein, 1999).
Why do we need research in Psychology? • Myth # 2:It’s better to express anger than to hold it inIf you’re like most people, you believe that releasing anger is healthier than bottling it up. In one survey, 66% of undergraduates agreed that expressing pent-up anger--sometimes called “catharsis”--is an effective means of reducing one’s risk for aggression (Brown, 1983). • Yet more than 40 years of research reveals that expressing anger directly toward another person or indirectly (such as toward an object) actually turns up the heat on aggression (Bushman, Baumeister, & Stack, 1999; Tavris, 1988). Research suggests that expressing anger is helpful only when it’s accompanied by constructive problem-solving designed to address the source of the anger (Littrell, 1998). • Why is this myth so popular? In all likelihood, people often mistakenly attribute the fact that they feel better after they express anger to catharsis, rather than to the fact that anger usually subsides on its own after awhile (Lohr, Olatunji, Baumeister, & Bushman, 2007).
Why do we need research in psychology? • Myth # 3: Low Self-Esteem is a Major Cause of Psychological ProblemsMany popular psychologists have long maintained that low self-esteem is a prime culprit in generating unhealthy behaviors, including violence, depression, anxiety, and alcoholism. The self-esteem movement has found its way into mainstream educational practices. Some athletic leagues award trophies to all schoolchildren to avoid making losing competitors feel inferior (Sommers & Satel, 2005). Moreover, the Internet is chock full of educational products intended to boost children’s self-esteem. • But there’s a fly in the ointment: Research shows that low self esteem isn’t strongly associated with poor mental health. In a painstakingly - and probably painful! - review, Roy Baumeister and his colleagues (2003) canvassed over 15,000 studies linking self-esteem to just about every conceivable psychological variable. They found that self-esteem is minimally related to interpersonal success, and not consistently related to alcohol or drug abuse. Perhaps most surprising of all, they found that “low self-esteem is neither necessary nor sufficient for depression” (Baumeister et al., 2003, p. 6).
Why do we need psychology • “Water Water Everywhere”-Beyond Science Series • Can they find what they claim more often than chance? • Why do they persist in believing in their skills in face of disappointment?
Did We Know It All Along? Hindsight Bias • Hindsight Bias—Tendency to believe, after learning an outcome, that one would have foreseen it • “I knew it all along” • “Out of sight, out of mind” versus • “Absence makes the heart grow fonder”
Overconfidence • Overconfidence • Thinking we know more than we actually do • “Computers in the future may weight no more than 1.5 tons”-Popular Mechanics, 1949 • Together with hindsight bias, can lead to overestimate our intuition
Summary Outline • A. Experimental, Correlational, and Clinical Research • 1. Correlational (e.g. observational, survey, clinical • 2. Experimental • B. Statistics • 1. Descriptive • 2. Inferential • C. Ethics in Research
A. Experimental, Correlational, and Clinical Research • Testable Hypotheses • Operational Definitions • Correlational Relationships • “Correlation does not imply causation” • Causal Relationships
A.1. Correlational (e.g. observational, survey, clinical • Naturalistic Observation • Case Studies • Surveys • Correlational Research
Naturalistic Observation Professor Wainwright’s painstaking field research to decode the language of bears comes to a sudden and horrific end • Describes behavior • Does not explain behavior
Survey form of natural observation • Widely used to observe attitudes,, opinions, and reported behaviors • Advantages • Targets specific information • Can gather large amounts of information in a relatively short time • Disadvantages • Based on subject’s responses which can be distorted due to • Misleading answers (Outright lying, bias, etc.) • Misunderstanding of the question • Poorly devised questions • Placebo effect
Survey Questions • Structured (Fixed Response) • Yes/No • Are you a college graduate? • Multiple Choice • Which of the following: • Which response describes you • Rating / Ranking questions • Rank the following activities from favorite to least favorite • Non-structured (Open ended) • What do you like to do in your free time? • Partially structured (List of choices with other______ )
Survey Question Problems • Yes/No • No can have many meanings • Have you finished college? • Do you still beat your wife? • Range of meanings attached to terms in question • Have you ever been sexually harassed? • Offering irrelevant or inconsistent choices • Having a choice that is out of place with the other choices
Misleading information in the question • Are the teachers and students satisfied with the lunch schedule at your school? (Double barreled / two different questions) • Biased or leading questions • Is the new president more communist than the old president?
Correlation • How well does A predict B • Positive versus negative correlation • Strength of the correlation • -1.0 to +1.0
CorrelationCorrelation and Causation • Correlation helps predict • Does not imply cause and effect
CorrelationIllusory Correlations • Illusory Correlation • Perceived non-existent correlation • A random coincidence
CorrelationPerceiving Order in Random Events • Comes from our need to make sense out of the world • Coin flip • Poker hand
Experimentation “No amount of experimentation can ever prove me right, a single experiment can prove me wrong.” Albert Einstein
Experiment • Can isolate cause and effect • Control of factors • Manipulation of the factor(s) of interest • Hold constant (“controlling”) factors
Key Ideas in Experiment Design • Treatment of Groups • Variables • Independent Variable (IV) • Dependent Variable (DV) • Placebo • Experimenter Bias (double-blind design)
Steps of the Scientific Method • Ask a question • Why does something happen? What is the cause? • Do background research • Who has already studied this? Related studies and ideas. • Form a hypothesis • If “a” then “b” / causal relationship • Test the hypothesis by doing an experiment • Analyze your data and draw a conclusion • Statistical analysis / Accept or reject hypothesis • Communicate you findings • Fully report hypothesis, methodology, statistical methods • Allows for informed review and replication
A researcher is interested in how the activity level of 4-year-olds is affected by viewing Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. He shows one group a 30-minute video of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and another group a 30-minute video of Barney. • IV:______________DV:_______________ • Experimental group:__________________ • Control group:_______________________
An Exercise in Designing Research • Turn the saying “An apple a day keeps the doctor away” into a hypothesis and design an experiment to test its validity. • Need to state it as a testable hypothesis and identify the IV and DV • Use the following steps to design or analyze and experiment
Confounding Variable “When Dr. Henderson comes in, everybody play dead.”
Flawed Experiment (Source unknown) • A psychologist wishes to study the effect of a reinforcement of food on the performance of a fine motor skill involving eye hand coordination. To accomplish this, he had his subjects thread as many needles as possible in a five minute period. • The subjects were divided into two groups: • Males Females Total • Group A 20 30 50 • Group B 28 22 50 • The psychologist explained the tests to each group in the same way. However, she offered Group A a voucher for a free lunch for every 20 needles threaded. After the five-minute time period had expired, he counted the number of needles threaded by each group.
Flawed Experiment • The results were as follows: • Total Number of Needles Average Number of Needles • Threaded Threaded per Person • Group A 80 1.8 • Group B 45 0.9 • From these results, the psychologist concluded that the reward of food caused Group A to thread more needles that Group B. • What was the independent variable? What was the dependent variable? • Which of the two groups was the control group? Why? • Which of the two groups was the experimental group? Why? • How could the following variables negate the psychologist’s conclusions? • Age of the subjects? • Sex of the subjects?
