Module 1: 1 EXPERIMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY AND THE SCIENTIFIC METHOD

sensation and perception

how people sense and perceive the world

memory and learning

how people learn and remember information

cognition and emotion

how people act and feel

motivation

what drives people to act

social psychology

how people interact with each other

developmental processes

how people change and develop over time

empiricism, falsifiability, determinism

central components of experimental psychology

empiricism

the collection of data that can support or refute a theory--concerned with observations that can be tested

Falsifiability

a foundational aspect of all contemporary scientific work; the capacity for some proposition, statement, theory, or hypothesis to be proven wrong

karl popper

he formulated the concept of falsifiability

determinism

the notion that any event has a cause before it

highly controlled conditions; precise measurement

Laboratory experiment is an experiment conducted under ____________________ (not necessarily a laboratory) where _______________ are possible

laboratory, field, natural experiment

methods used in experimental psychology

laboratory experiment

A method of experiment where the experiment will take place, at what time, with which participants, and under what circumstances, the researcher decides to use a standardized procedure.

everyday events

Field experiments are conducted in an environment that consists of _____________

field experiment

a type of experiment where the experimenter is still manipulating the independent variable, but in a real environment (so he can't really control the extraneous variables).

natural experiment

a method of experiment where experiments are conducted in the day (ie real-life) environment of the participants, but here the experimenter does not have control over the independent variable as it occurs naturally in real life

purposeful, dynaminc, specific, controlled, objective, reliabble and valid

characteristics of experimental psychology

ernst heinrich weber

gustave theodor fechner

wilhelm maximilian wundt

sir francis galton

the four wise man of experimental psychology

ernst heinrich weber

He is regarded as one of the founders of experimental psychology and psychophysics who is best known for his work on sensory response to weight, temperature, and pressure

just-noticeable difference

it states that the experience of differences in the intensity of sensations depends on percentage differences in the stimuli rather than absolute differences.

Gustav Theordor Fechner

He is a German physicist and philosopher who was a key figure in the founding of psychophysics. He developed experimental procedures for measuring sensation in relation to the physical magnitude of stimuli.

psychophysics

It is the science concerned with quantitative relations between sensations and the stimuli producing them

Gustav Theodor Fechner

He postulated that mind and body, though appearing to be separate entities, are different sides of one reality

Weber Fechner Law

it demonstrate the non-linear relationship between psychological sensation and the physical intensity of a stimulus via the formula: S = K\ln I

Weber-Fechner Law

It is a rule that explain how we perceive the strength of things. It suggests that our perception of the intensity of a stimulus grows at a slower rate than the actual physical intensity.

Wilhelm Maximilian Wundt

considered the father of experimental psychology opened the first laboratory dedicated exclusively to psychological research

Institute for Experimental Psychology

he opened the first experimental psychology laboratory in Leipzig, Germany in 1879 and named it __________________

Contributions to the Theory of Sense Perception

first book of wilhelm wundt

Philosophische Studien

it is the first journal in psychology

Wundt's Principles of Physiological Psychology

it is the first psychological textbook

sensation and perception

they refer as the physiological response to stimuli and the interpretation of those stimuli, respectively.

Sir Francis Galton

He was an English explorer, anthropologist, and eugenicist known for his pioneering studies of human intelligence. He created the statistical concepts of regression and correlation and was the first to apply statistical methods to the study of human differences and heredity

eugenics and nature vs. nurture

two terms that Sir Francis Galton coined

over confidence bias

We feel more confident about our conclusions than is warranted by available data. This form of nonscientific inference can result in erroneous conclusions when we don't recognize the limitations of supporting data.

Dunning-Kruger Effect

the more poorly people performed, the more they actually overestimate their own performance.

pseudoscience

it is any field of study that gives the appearance of being scientific but has no true scientific basis and has not been confirmed using the scientific method.

regression, reparenting, and rebirthing

Modern pseudosciences include past life _______________, _________________, and ________________

phrenology, physiognomy, mesmerism, spiritualism

psychology pseudoscience includes __________________, ___________________, ________________,and ___________________

whitehead scientific mentality

it assumes that behavior follows a natural order and can be predicted

science

it connotes content and process

methodology

it consists of the scientific techniques we use to collect and evaluate data.

data

these are the facts we gather using scientific methods

Theory

it explains why natural phenomena occur

law

it summarizes a set of observation about natural phenomena

good thinking

It is critical to the scientific method. We engage in this when data collection and interpretation are systematic, objective, and rational.

principle of parsimony

it states that we prefer the simplest useful explanation

karl popper

he proposed that science advances by revising theories based on the "weight of evidence."

principle of modus tollens

it allows us to disprove statements using a single, contrary observation ("denying the consequent by denying the antecedent")

if p, then q not q thus, not p

hypothesis testing and falsification

The principle of modus tollens plays a significant role in science, particularly in the process of ______________ and ________________

falsifiability

The principle of modus tollens is closely related to the concept of ___________________, which is a key criterion for scientific theory

replication

it is an exact or systematic repetition of a study. it increases our confidence in experimental results by adding to the weight of supporting evidences

description, explanation, prediction, control

four main objectives of science

description

it is a systematic and unbiased account of observed characteristics of behaviors

prediction

it is the capability of knowing in advance when certain behaviors should occur.

explanation

it is knowledge of the conditions that reliably produce a behavior.

control

it is the use of scientific knowledge to influence behavior

observation, measurement, experimentation

main tools of psychological science

measurement

it assigns numbers to objects, events, or their characteristics. This is an inherent feature of quantitative research.

experimentation

it is the process we use to test the predictions we call hypotheses and establish cause-and-effect relationships.

obervation

it is the systematic noting and recording of events

systematic

it means that the procedures are consistently applied. The events or their signs must be observable.

manipulate; measure

We must be able to _____________ the independent variable and _____________ its effect on the dependent variable.

two treatment conditions

An experiment requires that we create at least _______________________ and randomly assign subjects to these students

extraneous variables

these are the variables that we control so we can measure what we intend to measure

common sense psychology

everyday, nonscienctific collection of psychological data used to understand the social world and guide out behavior

fritz heider

he coined the term common sense psychology

free fall explained

In Galileo's famous demonstration, a 10-kg cannonball and a 1-kg stone strike the ground at practically the same time. This experiment demolished the Aristotelian idea that an object that weighs ten times as much as another should fall ten times faster than the lighter object.

when data are observed or experienced

what makes data empirical?

nonscientific interference

is the nonscientific use of information to explain or predict behavior

Gambler's Fallacy

people misuse data to estimate the probability of an event, like when slot machine will pay off.

barnum effect

People tend to see themselves in vague, stock descriptions of personality