AP Psych Unit 0 Vocab

  1. the tendency to believe that after learning an outcome, one would have been able to for see its occurrence (I-knew-it-all-along phenomenon) hindsight bias

  2. a cognitive bias characterized by an overestimation of one’s actual ability to perform a task successfully, by a belief that one’s performance is better than that of others, or by excessive certainty in the accuracy of one’s beliefs. overconfidence

  3. the evaluation of scientific or academic work, such as research or articles submitted to journals for publication, by other qualified professionals practicing in the same field. peer review

  4. a societal rule, value, or standard that delineates an accepted and appropriate behavior within a culture. cultural norms

  5. the tendency to gather evidence that confirms preexisting expectations, typically by emphasizing or pursuing supporting evidence while dismissing or failing to seek contradictory evidence. confirmation bias

  6. any systematic errors in the research process or the interpretation of its results that are attributable to a researcher’s behavior, preconceived beliefs, expectancies, or desires about results. For example, a researcher may inadvertently cue participants to behave or respond in a particular way. experimenter bias

  7. a technique for ascertaining the self-reported attitudes or behaviors of a particular group, usually by questioning a representative, random sample of the group. survey 

  8. an explanation using an integrated set of principles that organizes observations and predicts behaviors or events. theory

  9. the extent to which a test measures or predicts what it is supposed to. validity

  10. an observation technique in which one person is studied in depth in the hope of revealing universal principles. case study

  11. a factor other than the independent variable that might produce an effect in an experiment. confounding variable

  12. a research method in which an investigator manipulates one or more factors (independent variables) to observe the effect on some behavior or mental process (the dependent variable). By random assignment of participants, the experimenter aims to control other relevant factors. experiment

  13. observing and recording behavior in naturally occurring situations without trying to manipulate and control the situation. naturalistic observation

  14. in an experiment, the group that is not exposed to the treatment; contrasts with the experimental group and serves as a comparison for evaluating the effect of the treatment. control group

  15. a statement of the procedures (operations) used to define research variables. For example, human intelligence may be operationally defined as what an intelligence test measures. operational definition

  16. effect experimental results caused by expectations alone; any effect on behavior caused by the administration of an inert substance or condition, which the recipient assumes is an active agent. placebo

  17. the post-experimental explanation of a study, including its purpose and any deceptions, to its participants, mandatory by APA ethical standards. debriefing

  18. the experimental factor that is manipulated; the variable whose effect is being studied. independent variable

  19. the outcome factor; the variable that may change in response to manipulations of the independent variable. dependent variable

  20. an experimental procedure in which both the research participants and the research staff are ignorant about whether the research participants have received the treatment or a placebo.  Commonly used in drug-evaluation studies. double-blind procedure

  21. in an experiment, the group that is exposed to the treatment, that is, to one version of the independent variable. experimental group

  22. a testable prediction, often implied by a theory. hypothesis

  23. in experimental design, the assignment of participants or units to the different conditions of an experiment entirely at random, so that each unit or participant has an equal likelihood of being assigned to any particular condition. In clinical trials, this decreases the confounding of the treatment factor with other factors by making the treatment and control groups approximately comparable in all respects except for the treatment. random assignment

  24. repeating the essence of a research study, usually with different participants in different situations, to see whether the basic finding extends to other participants and circumstances. replication

  25. a principle of professional ethics requiring providers of mental health care or medical care to limit the disclosure of a patient’s identity, their condition or treatment, and any data entrusted to professionals during assessment, diagnosis, and treatment. Similar protection is given to research participants and survey respondents against unauthorized access to information they reveal in confidence. confidentiality

  26. rules of acceptable conduct that members of a given profession are expected to follow. professional ethics

  27. a person’s voluntary agreement to participate in a procedure on the basis of their understanding of its nature, its potential benefits and possible risks, and available alternatives. Informed consent is a fundamental requirement of research with humans and typically involves having participants sign documents, prior to the start of a study, that describe specifically what their involvement would entail and noting that they are free to decline participation or to withdraw from the research at any time. informed consent

  28. a committee named by an agency or institution to review research proposals originating within that agency for ethical acceptability and compliance with the organization’s codes of conduct. IRBs help protect research participants and are mandatory at any U.S. institution receiving federal funds for research. institutional review boards (IRB)

  29. a process through which minors agree to participate in clinical trials. This is different from informed consent, because minors cannot provide consent in the full meaning of the word, as they don’t meet the legal age requirements and are considered to be a vulnerable population. informed assent

  30. any study in which participants are deliberately misled or not informed about the purpose of the investigation in order to avoid the possibility that their responses may be given to meet the perceived expectations of researchers. deception research

  31. a type of direct attitude measure that consists of statements reflecting strong positive or negative evaluations of an object. Five-point scales are common and a neutral middle point may or may not be included. likert scale

  32. a procedure in which participants are unaware of the experimental conditions under which they are operating. single blind study

  33. the tendency of participants to give answers that are in accordance with social norms or the perceived desires of the researcher rather than genuinely representative of their views. social desirability bias

  34. a method for gathering information, used particularly in surveys and personnel selection, in which questions, their wordings, and their order of administration are determined in advance. The choice of answers tends to be fixed and determined in advance as well. With structured interviews, answers can be aggregated and comparisons can be made across different samples or interview period. structured interviews

  35. a clinically significant response to a therapeutically inert substance or nonspecific treatment (placebo), deriving from the recipient’s expectations or beliefs regarding the intervention. It is now recognized that placebo effects accompany the administration of any drug (active or inert) and contribute to the therapeutic effectiveness of a specific treatment. This term is also used more generally in nonclinical studies to indicate any effect arising from participants’ expectations regarding the study. placebo effect

  36. a method of research that produces descriptive (non-numerical) data, such as observations of behavior or personal accounts of experiences. The goal of gathering this qualitative data is to examine how individuals can perceive the world from different vantage points. A variety of techniques are subsumed under qualitative research, including content analyses of narratives, in-depth interviews, focus groups, participant observation, and case studies, often conducted in naturalistic settings. qualitative research

  37. a method of research that relies on measuring variables using a numerical system, analyzing these measurements using any of a variety of statistical models, and reporting relationships and associations among the studied variables. For example, these variables may be test scores or measurements of reaction time. The goal of gathering this quantitative data is to understand, describe, and predict the nature of a phenomenon, particularly through the development of models and theories. Quantitative research techniques include experiments and surveys. quantitative research

  38. the logical possibility that an assertion, hypothesis, or theory can be shown to be false by an observation or experiment. falsifiability

  39. the extent to which results or findings obtained from a sample are applicable to a broader population. For example, a theoretical model of change would be said to have high generalizability if it applied to numerous behaviors (e.g., smoking, diet, substance use, exercise) and varying populations (e.g., young children, teenagers, middle-age and older adults). A finding that has greater generalizability also is said to have greater external validity, in that conclusions pertain to situations beyond the original study. generalizability

  40. he fact that an observed correlation between two variables may be due to the common correlation between each of the variables and a third variable rather than any underlying relationship (in a causal sense) of the two variables with each other. a confounding variable that influences both the independent variable and dependent variable. third variable problem

  41. a statistical measure of the strength of the relationship between the relative movements of two variables. (from −1 to +1). correlation coefficient

  42. a measure of the extent to which two factors vary together, and thus of how well either factor predicts (but doesn’t cause) the other. correlation

  43. the arithmetic average of a distribution, obtained by adding the scores and then dividing by the number of scores. mean

  44. the most frequently occurring score(s) in a distribution. mode

  45. the middle score in a distribution; half the scores are above it and half are below it. median

  46. a symmetrical, bell-shaped curve that describes the distribution of many types of data; most scores fall near the mean and fewer and fewer near the extremes. normal curve

  47. all the cases in a group being studied, from which samples may be drawn. population

  48. a sample that fairly represents a population because each member has an equal chance of inclusion. a process for selecting a sample of study participants from a larger potential group of eligible individuals, such that each person has the same fixed probability of being included in the sample and some chance procedure is used to determine who specifically is chosen. A group selected in this way is known as a random sample. The main value of this form of probability sampling is its positive impact on generalizability and external validity. random sample

  49. the difference between the highest and lowest scores in a distribution. range

  50. a graphed cluster of dots, each of which represents the values of two variables. The slope of the points suggests the direction of the relationship between the two variables. scatterplot

  51. a computed measure of how much scores vary around the mean score. standard deviation

  52. a statistical statement of how likely it is that an obtained result occurred by chance. The resulting difference between 2 groups (control and exp) is not due to chance if p value is less than .05. the degree to which a research outcome cannot reasonably be attributed to the operation of chance or random factors. It is determined during significance testing and given by a critical p value, which is the probability of obtaining the observed data if the null hypothesis (i.e., of no significant relationship between variables) were true. Significance generally is a function of sample size—the larger the sample, the less likely it is that one’s findings will have occurred by chance. statistical significance

  53. a set of scores with two peaks or modes around which values tend to cluster, such that the frequencies at first increase and then decrease around each peak. bimodal distribution

  54. the middle or center point of a set of scores. The central tendency of a sample data set, for instance, may be estimated by a number of different statistics (e.g., mean, median, mode). central tendency

  55. any process for selecting a sample of individuals or cases that is neither random nor systematic but rather is governed by chance or ready availability. Interviewing the first 50 people to exit a store is an example of convenience sampling. Data obtained from convenience sampling do not generalize to the larger population; there may be significant sampling bias, and sampling error cannot be estimated. convenience sampling

  56. a systematic and directional error involved in the choice of units, cases, or participants from a larger group for study. Sampling bias can threaten the internal validity of a study if there is a possibility that preexisting differences arising from the sampling process may interact with the variable of interest. Similarly, if the procedure used to choose participants tends to favor specially motivated individuals or people from a certain segment of society, there would be a threat to the study’s external validity (i.e., inferences to a larger population would not be viable). Sampling bias is associated with a lack of random sampling and with nonrandom assignment to conditions. sampling bias

  57. in correlational research, the situation in which it is known that two variables are related although it is not known which is the cause and which is the effect. directionality problem

  58. a type of study in which relationships between variables are simply observed without any control over the setting in which those relationships occur or any manipulation by the researcher. correlational research

  59. any of various measures of the magnitude or meaningfulness of a relationship between two variables.Often, effect sizes are interpreted as indicating the practical significance of a research finding. Additionally, in meta-analyses, they allow for the computation of summary statistics that apply to all the studies considered as a whole. effect size

  60. a quantitative technique for synthesizing the results of multiple studies of a phenomenon into a single result by combining the effect size estimates from each study into a single estimate of the combined effect size or into a distribution of effect sizes. meta-analysis

  61. a relationship between two variables in which the value of one variable increases as the value of the other decreases. For example, in a study about babies crying and being held, the discovery that those who are held more tend to cry less is a negative correlation. Also called inverse correlation. negative correlation

  62. a relationship between two variables in which both rise and fall together. For example, one would expect to find a positive correlation between study hours and test performance. Also called direct correlation. positive correlation

  63. When a distribution has a few extreme scores toward the high end relative to the low end (e.g., when a test is difficult and few test takers do well), it has a __________________ such that the mean is greater than the mode. positive skew

  64. When a distribution has a few extreme scores toward the low end relative to the high end (e.g., when a test is easy and most test takers do well), it has a __________________ such that the mean is lesser than the mode. negative skew

  65. the degree to which a set of scores, measurements, or other numbers are asymmetrically distributed around a central point. skew

  66. the location of a score in a distribution expressed as the percentage of cases in the data set with scores equal to or below the score in question. Thus, if a score is said to be in the 90th percentile, this means that 90% of the scores in the distribution are equal to or lower than that score. percentile rank 

  67. the tendency for extremely high or extremely low scores to become more moderate (i.e., closer to the mean) upon retesting over time. regression to the mean

  68. the selection of study units (e.g., participants, homes, schools) from a larger group (population) in an unbiased way, such that the sample obtained accurately reflects the total population. representative sample

  69. a subset of a population of interest that is selected for study with the aim of making inferences to the population. It is important to ensure that a sample is representative of the larger population. Characteristics that describe observations in this subset, such as the mean, median, or standard deviation, are called statistics. sample

  70. in statistics, the degree of variance or dispersion of values that is obtained for a specific variable. variation