PSY 302 Chapter Notes - Chapter 6: Null Hypothesis, Dependent And Independent Variables, Test Statistic
Document Summary
Hypothesis: a proposed explanation for observed facts. Hypothesis testing: procedure in which data from sample are used to evaluate a hypothesis about a population. Ten facts about hypotheses and hypothesis testing: a hypothesis is a statement about a population, not a sample. If the experiment doesn"t turn out as the null hypothesis predicted, the researcher disproves, or rejects the null hypothesis. The null hypothesis can be nullified: if the null hypothesis is rejected, then one has to accept the mutually exclusive alternative hypothesis as true. If one hypothesis is not true, then the other has to be true: if the researcher fails to disprove the null hypothesis, he or she can"t say that the null hypothesis is true. They can say that they have not found enough evidence the reject the null hypothesis. Six steps of hypothesis testing: test: pick the right statistical test.