How does contemporary psychology conduct and validate psychological research?

U1AOS3

participant rights

informed consent, confidentiality, voluntary participation, withdrawal rights, deception, debriefing

informed consent

must be told about nature, risks and rights

deception

only if justified and debriefing occurs

debriefing

always provide info about nature, results and conclusions at end of study

beneficence

maximise benefit and minimise risks

integrity

honest reporting of info and results

justice

no unfair burden on a particular group

non maleficence

avoid harm

respect

consideration of the value of living things

controlled experiment

investigation between IV and DV, other variables are controlled

controlled experiment strengths and weaknesses

• can identify a cause and effect relationship

• can control people and environment in study

• can be repeated to get more data and test reliability

• ingenuine because it’s artificial

• behavior could be influenced by artificial environment

• external validity may be low if conditions are too artificial

case studies

individuals or small groups of people

case studies strengths and weaknesses

• participants are limited so less data to follow

• produces a lot of qualitative data

• can be used to study things that would b unethical to experiment on

• low external validity

• bias may influence recording and collation

• may not be repeatable

field work

involves collection of info by observing and interacting, correlation between variables as extraneous variables aren’t controlled, participant and direct observation

fieldwork strengths and weaknesses

• large amount of quotative data

• natural settings more likely to show behavior that reflects real life

• observed behavior is subjective and open to interpretation and bias

• responses may be inaccurate because of dishonesty, memory issues, misunderstandings

• minimal control over extraneous variables

data collection methods

questionnaire, interviews, observations

extraneous variables

any variable other than the IV that may affect the DV if not controlled discussed prior to experiment

confounding variable

a type of extraneous variable that has a direct and unintended impact on the DV making it unclear whether the IV caused the effect

internal validity

the extent to which the results are due to the manipulation of the IV rather than confounding variables

external validity

the extent to which the findings can be applied to similar individuals in different settings

repeatability

how close results are when an investigation is conducted again under the same conditions

reproducibility

how close results are when investigation is replicated under changed conditions

validity

whether you’re actually measuring the DV

correlational studies

planned observation and recording of behaviors that have not been manipulated or controlled for, helps to identify and understand relationship or association between variables

strengths and weaknesses of correlational studies

• measures the strength of relationship

• can use secondary data

• can be used to observe real life behaviors

• doesn’t imply causation, can’t assume it’s the variable causing change to the other

• relationship is bi directional so you can’t confirm which variable has more influence