PSYC 2015 TEST 1

Replication Crisis

• People felt less guilty about the unethical ways when washing their hands (Williams & Bargh)

When replicated it all the experiments failed to show the same result

Daryl Ben

Released a journal with 4 studies of ESP → how people were able to see into the future

What Went Wrong?

Fraud 

Questional Research Practice

What Went Wrong —> Fraud

Diederik Stapel had 58 articles retracted after data fabrication

Pressure to find something and write about it 

What Went Wrong —> Questionable Research Practice

Selective reporting of variables → doing a bunch of things to see which one sticks, and only ever writing about the results that showed the desired result

Psychological Science Goals:

• Replicable science led to open science 

• Reporting all science

• Making data public

• Large samples

• Stop focusing on new and exciting research

Social Psychology Methods

• Empirical science → “Common sense” & Need to prove/research it

• Research Design

• New Frontiers

• Ethical Issues

Hindsight Bias:

Overestimation of predicting an outcome after it has occurred

Theory:

Set of principles that are used to explain observed event

Hypothesis:

Testable statement about the relations between two or more variables

Observation Method:

Observing people and systematically recording measurements of their behavior

2 ways of Observation Method:

Ethnography → Observe group/culture inside without imposing any of their preconceived notions

Archival Analysis → Examination of collected documents of culture - Diaries, novels, newspapers

Correlational Method:

Finding relationships between two or more variables

Ex —> Size (strength) & direction

Advantages in Correlation: 

• Useful when you can't use experimental manipulation

• Inexpensive, efficient research strategy

Measuring Correlation:

Direction

• Positive → Higher score on X with higher score on Y

• Negative → Higher score on X with lower score on Y

• 0 → No correlation - X tells nothing about Y

Effect Size Correlation:

• Small = .10

• Moderate = .30

• Large = .50

Experimental Method:

Determine causation through experimentation

Internal Validity:

Making sure nothing except for the independent variable is changing the dependent variable

External Validity:

Extent to which the results of the study can be generalized to any situation/people

Generalized:

Doing study with one group and thinking it applies to everyone else

Generalizability

Best way to ensure a random selection of people from the population

Probability Level:

Number calculated with statistics to show how likely the result was by chance and not actually the IV

Field Experiments:

Experiments conducted in natural settings → NOT laboratory

Trade Off:

Between Internal and External validity → having control over the situation, and the results can be generalized in everyday life

Replication:

Repeating a study with different subject populations/settings

Meta-Analysis:

Technique used to make sense of the results from multiple experiments → looking at the average

Basic Research:

Designed to find out why people behave the way they do because of curiosity

Applied Research:

Studies designed to solve a social problem, building based on behaviour 

Cross-Cultural Research:

Study to see if psychological processes are different in each culture

Social Neuroscience:

Study connected between biological processes and social behaviour

Ethical Issues: 

• Required to take action to keep the health and welfare of

• Comfort of participants & must obtain informed consent 

• Participants can leave at any time

• Confidentiality & Anonymity with participants

Deception:

People are misled about the purpose of the study/event that will happen

Social Cognition:

How people think about themselves & the social world —> Select, interpret & remember

Dual Systems Thinking Model:

Automatic Thinking & Slow and conscious thinking

Automatic Thinking:

Non-conscious, involuntary thinking process

Schema:

People use to organize social knowledge & influence information that people notice

Schema Applied - Automatic Thinking:

Accessibility & Priming

Accessibility:

The Extent to which concepts are at the forefront of people's minds

Priming:

Process in which recent experience increases schemas or traits accessibility

Functions of Schema:

Continuity, Reduce ambiguity of information & Guide memory

Perseverance Effect:

People's beliefs about themselves and the social world continue even after their beliefs are discredited

Self-Fulfilling Prophecy:

Expectations about a person that influence how people act towards that person

Judgmental Heuristics:

Mental shortcuts used to make decisions quickly and efficiently

Two Types of Heuristics:

 Availability Heuristics & Representative Heuristics

Availability Heuristics:

People base judgments on ease when they can bring something to mind

Representativeness Heuristics:

Classifying something according to how similar it is to a typical case

Base Rate Information

Information about the frequency of members of different categories in the population

Controlled Cognition:

High effort thinking

Controlled Thinking:

Conscious, intentional, voluntary, and effortful

Counterfactual Thinking:

Mentally changing aspects of the past, imagining what might have been

Illusory Correlation:

Perception of a relationship where none existsn

Illusion of Control:

Idea that chance events are subject to our influence

Confirmation Bias:

Tendency to search for information confirming someone's preconceptions

Overconfidence Phenomenon:

Tendency to overestimate the accuracy of one's judgment → planning fallacy

Social Perception:

Study of how we form impression and makes inferences about others

Nonverbal COmmunication:

Way people communicate intentionally or unintentionally without words

Darwin:

All humans encode emotions & decode emotions with equal accuracy

Display Rules:

Culturally determined rules about what nonverbal behaviour is appropriate

Emblems:

Nonverbal gestures that are well understood definitions within given culture

Impicit Personality Theory:

Type of schema to group various kinds of personality traits together

Attribution:

Way people explain the cause of their own and other people's behaviour

 Fritz Heider:

Came up with Internal and External Attribution

Internal Attribution:

Inference that person behaviour is because of personal characteristics

External Behaviour:

 Inference that person's behavour is because of someone about the situation

Kelly Covariation Model:

Form an attiribution, systematically noted the pattern between presence of possible causal factors and whether the behaviour occurs

Three Types of Info → Kelly Covariation:

Consensus Information, Distinctiveness Information & Consistency Information

Fundamental Attribution Error:

Tendency to inder people's behaviour corresponds or matches their mood/attitude

Two Step Process → Attribution:

Make internal attributions & attempt to adjust this attribution by considering the situation

Actor/Observer Difference:

Tendency to see others behaviour as dispositionally caused

Self Serving Attribution:

aking credit for one's own successes and blame others for their own failure

Defensive Attribution:

Explanation for behaviour that avoids feeling of vulnerability and morality

Unrealistic Optism:

Good things are more likely to happen to them than to peers & bad things are less likely to happen to them than to other

Belief in a Just World:

Form of defensive attribution where people assume that bad things happen to bad people and that good things happen to good people