Psychology 2070A/B Lecture Notes - Lecture 6: Narcissism, Dieting, Folk Psychology
9 May 2018
School
Department
Course
Professor
Methodology
Branches of Empirical Work
• Basic research
o Designed to build and test basic theoretical constructs (intellectual curiosity)
• Prediction
• Mechanisms
• Applied research
o Theoretical ideas as they apply to real-world problems (problem solving)
• Understanding
• Solutions
Hindsight Bias
• Tendency for people to overestimate their ability to predict an outcome after it has already occurred
• Folk psychology:
o Many chances to observe social behaviour in the real world
o Research findings may correspond with some of your observations
o This makes findings seem obvious
Formulating Hypotheses and Theories
• Theory: organized set of principles used to explain observed phenomena
• Hypothesis: testable statement about the relationship between two or more variables
• Where do hypotheses come from?
o Personal observation
• Observe a phenomenon
• Construct a theory about the phenomenon (why/how)
• Develop a prediction based on the observation
o Previously developed theory
• Develop a prediction based on the theory
• If a phenomenon occurs then X should result
o Previous research
Hypothesis Testing
• Operationalization
o Precise specification of how & what variables are measured and/or manipulated
• What are you studying?
• How are you studying it?
• Design study
• Collect data
• Statistical analysis
Research Designs
• 3 types of methods:
1. Observational
• Observe & describe a phenomenon
• Observe population & systematically record behaviour
▪ Involvement may vary across studies
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• Ethnography: A form of the observational method whereby researchers observe a group or culture from the
inside, without imposing any of their own preconceived notions
• Archival Analysis: An examination of the accumulated documents or archives of a culture
• Measurement issues
▪ Important to clearly define behaviours being studied using operational definitions
▪ Reliability and accuracy of reporting assessed by interjudge reliability
▪ High interjudge agreement indicates that the findings are more than just one person's subjective
impressions; enhances trustworthiness and validity of data
2. Correlational
• Systematically measure two or more variables and assess the relation between them
▪ Measures how much one can be predicted by the other
• Correlation coefficient: A calculated statistic that assesses the relationship between 2 variables
▪ Ranges from -1.0 to +1.0
• Positive Correlations indicate that an increase in one variable is associated with an increase in the other
• Negative Correlations indicate that an increase in one variable is associated with a decrease in the other
• Surveys - a representative sample of people are asked questions about their attitudes, experiences or
behaviour
▪ Advantages: Allow researchers to judge the relationships between variables that are often difficult
to observe, and sample representative segments of the population through random selection of
people from the population
• Limitations:
▪ Problems arise when samples are not randomly selected
▪ Self-selection bias
▪ Accuracy is questionable
▪ Correlation can't tell you the causal direction of the relationship
▪ Correlations are sometimes caused by extraneous variables
3. Experimental
• Only method for determining causal relations
▪ Researcher randomly assigns participants to different conditions
▪ Conditions must be identical except for the independent variable
• You must:
▪ Manipulate the independent variables
▪ Control extraneous variables
▪ Observe the effect of the independent variable on the dependent variable
• IV - Presumed cause of an outcome
• DV - Presumed outcome, predicted by IV
• Some IV's are manipulated to elicit different responses on a DV
• Some DV's are straightforward
• Calculate p-value - represents the probability that the present result could have occurred if the IV has no
effect on the DV
▪ P < .05 is the current standard for significance
▪
Validity
• How well does the research correspond with the real world?
• Internal validity
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o The degree to which we can make cause & effect conclusions, given the methodology
• Only the IV is affecting the DV
• Only difference between experimental conditions is the presentation of the IV
• Control all extraneous variables
• Strongest in experimental research
• External validity
o The extent to which the results of a study can be generalized to other situations & people
• Generalizability across situations
• Generalizability across people
o Generalizability : The extent to which we can generalize from the people who participated in the experiment to
people in general
Realism (Ecological Validity)
• The degree to which an effect might occur in the real world/real life
o Mundane Realism: how similar a study is to a real-life situation
o Psychological Realism: how similar the psychological processes triggered in a study are to psychological processes
triggered by a real-life situation
Trade-Off
• Almost always a trade-off between internal and external validity
o Having enough control over a situation to ensure no extraneous variables are influencing the results
o Ensuring the results can be generalized to everyday life
• Rare to capture both internal & external validity in a single experiment
o Many social psychologists opt first for internal validity (well-controlled lab experiments)
o Joined with field studies which sacrifice a degree of control for external validity
Field Studies
• Take place outside the lab
• Excellent for increasing external validity
o Advantage: take place in the real world, participants are sometimes unaware they’re in a study
o Disadvantage: reduced internal validity
o Disadvantage: Random assignment is much harder, if not impossible
• Lab & field studies testing the same idea can be combined to provide the most convincing validity for the idea
New Frontiers
• Cross-cultural research
o Studying whether psychological processes differ in different cultures
o Researchers have to avoid imposing their own viewpoints and definitions onto another culture
• Social neuroscience
o Studying the connection between biological processes & social behaviour
o Ex. Studying brain activity and its relation to behaviour & social information processing
• Functional MRI (fMRI)
• Electroencephalography (EEG)
Social Cognition & Social Perception
Social Cognition
2 Types of Thinking
1. Low-effort thinking
o Automatic thinking
o Fast
o Emotional (impulses/drives, habits, beliefs, interests)
2. High-effort thinking
o Controlled thinking
o Slow/effortful
o Logical (reflection, planning, problem solving)
Auto-Pilot: Low Effort
• Automatic thinking
o Thinking that is unconscious, unintentional, involuntary & effortless
• Ex. Recognizing a common object (sunglasses) or a situation (birthday party)
o We rely on schemas for this information
o Not trying to control thoughts they just occur
• Ex. Morning routines, effortless, little to no control from the executive
• Ex. Driving home on a short route you take on a regular basis
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Document Summary
Basic research: designed to build and test basic theoretical constructs (intellectual curiosity) Theoretical ideas as they apply to real-world problems (problem solving: understanding. Tendency for people to overestimate their ability to predict an outcome after it has already occurred. Folk psychology: many chances to observe social behaviour in the real world, research findings may correspond with some of your observations. If a phenomenon occurs then x should result: previous research. Hypothesis testing: operationalization, precise specification of how & what variables are measured and/or manipulated, what are you studying, how are you studying it, design study, collect data. Research designs: 3 types of methods, observational, observe & describe a phenomenon, observe population & systematically record behaviour. Important to clearly define behaviours being studied using operational definitions. Reliability and accuracy of reporting assessed by interjudge reliability: high interjudge agreement indicates that the findings are more than just one person"s subjective impressions; enhances trustworthiness and validity of data, correlational.
