Psych 255 Exam 1

Evidence-based treatments

Therapies that are supported by research

Empiricism

Involves using evidence from the senses

Theory

Set of statements that describes general principles about how variable relate to one another

Hypothesis

Prediction, the specific outcome the researcher will observe in the study if the theory is accurate

Data

Set of observations

Preregistered

The expected outcome is said before the results are found

Theory Data Cycle

Theory—research question—research design—hypothesis—preregistered—data

Replication

The study is conducted again to test consistency

Weight of evidence

The collection of studies, including replications of the same theory

Falsifiability

The hypothesis could fail to support the theory

Merton’s scientific norms

Universalism, communality, disinterestedness, organized skepticism

Basic research

Enhance general body of knowledge rather than address a specific practical problem

Translational research

Uses what is learned from basic research and translates it to health care, psychotherapy, or other forms of treatment or intervention

Applied research

Done with a practical problem in mind and is conducted in a local, real world context

Comparison group

Enables us to compare what would happened both with or without a variable

Confederate

Actor playing a specific role for the experimenter

Proballistic

Research result finding do not explain all cases all of the time

Availability heuristic

Things that pop easily into mind tend to sway our thinking

Present/present bias

Failure to consider appropriate comparison groups

Ex. Only looking at those who succeeded with treatment

Confirmation bias

Only look for information that we want to believe

Ex. Cherry Picking

Bias blind spot

Belief we will not call into biases at all

Empirical journal articles

The results of a research study

Review journal articles

Summarize and integrate all the published studies that have been done in a research area

Meta-analysis

Combines the results of many studies and gives a number that summarizes the magnitude or effect size of a relationship

Components of an empirical journal article

\-abstract

\-introduction

\-method

\-results

\-discussion

\-references

Variables

Something that varies

Constant

Something that could change, but only has one level in the study

Conceptual variables

The abstract names of what is going to be studied

Operational variables

Concept turned into a measured or manipulated variable

Claim

Argument one is trying to make

Frequency claim

The rate of a single variable

\-1 DV

\-construct, external, statistical validity

Association Claim

Is there a correlation between two variables?

\-2 DV

\-construct, external, statistical validity

Positive association

High with high and low with low

Negative association

High with low or low with high

Causal claims

One variable is responsible for changing the other

\-1 DV and 1 IV

\-all four validities

Validity

The appropriateness of a conclusion or decision

Is it reasonable, accurate, and justifiable

Construct validity

How well a conceptual variable is operationalized, is the test measuring what is says it’s measuring

Generalizability

How well do the participants represent the overall population

External validity

How well the results reflect the larger population

Statistical validity

Do the stats match what I am trying to accomplish?

Are the numbers significant?

Confidence interval

Margin that includes the range for the entire population

Internal validity

Is there anything else that might account for the data?

Covariance

As A changes, B also changes

Temporal precedence

The causal variable comes before the effect variable

Experiment

One variable is manipulated and the other is measured

Debriefing

Ensure the participants are informed of the study’s hypothesis

Principle of respect for persons

Autonomy of the research subject, informed consent

Beneficence

Protect participants from harm, confidential, do the benefits of the study outweighs the risks?

Justice

Are the participants representative of the population, is there a balance between the participants and the researchers

Institutional Review Board

Committee responsible for interpreting ethical principles

Deception

Can withhold information through omission or commission of information

Data fabrication

Data is invented

Data falsification

Data is influenced by the researchers, they might delete data

Openness

Open access to the information

Transparency

Everything is reported

Self report measure

Recording people’s answers to questions about themselves

Observational measure

Recording observable behavior or physical traces of behaviors

Physiological measures

Biological data

Categorical variables

Qualitative data

Quantitative variables

Numbers have meaning

Ordinal scale

Ranked numbers, uneven intervals

Interval scale

No true zero, equal intervals

Ratio scale

True zero

Reliability

How consistent the results of a measure are

Test-retest reliability

The same outcome will occur after multiple tests

Interrater reliability

Consistent scores across multiple researchers and studies

Internal reliability

Consistent answers, no matter how it is phrased

Correlation coefficient

Indicate how close the scatter plot dots are

Average inter-item correlation

Average of all the correlations

Cronbach’s Alpha

Combines AIC and the number of items on a scale

Face validity

It looks like what you want to measure

Content validity

Measure contains all the parts your theory says it should contain

Criterion validity

The measure is correlated with a relevant behavioral outcome

Known groups paradigm

Can scores discriminate groups

Convergent validity

Self report is strongly associated with self report of SIMILAR concepts

Discrimination validity

Self report measure is less strongly associated with self report measures of DISSIMILAR constructs