research methods section B

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  • research methods
    • experimental method
      • IV - brings about change and can be manipulated
      • DV - is being measured
      • extraneous variables - may influence the DV which skews the results and becomes confounding (noise, mood, practise, fatigue)
      • advantage of experimental is that cause and effect can be established
    • experiment types
      • lab - IV is manipulated in a controlled artificial setting (less EVs, more replicability, more DCs)
      • field - IV is manipulated in a natural setting (high eco validity, less DVs, more EVs)
      • quasi - IV is naturally occurring in a field or lab setting (high eco validity, less DCs, many EVs, hard to find ps)
    • sampling techniques
      • opportunity - people who are available at the time (quick and easy, biased as they want to please researcher)
      • random - every member of sample population has an equal chance of being chosen (representative, hard to get truly random)
      • self-selected - ps volunteer when asked or respond to an advert (ethical due to consent, biased people pleasers)
      • snowball - ps contact others to take part (convenient way to find specific people, not representative as ps are similar)
    • hypotheses
      • operationalise- clearly specifies the IV and DV
      • directional (1 tailed) - predicts one condition of the IV will perform better than the other
      • non-directional (2 tailed) - predicts a difference in performance of 2 IV conditions
      • null - no difference in DV between 2 IV conditions (used to remove bias)
    • extraneous variables
      • participant variables - (personality, age, mood, health) controlled by random allocation of ps, use RM or MP design
      • situational variables - (noise, temp, room layout, disruptions) controlled by lab setting, consistency of situations
      • demand characteristics - (ps guess true aim and perform in favour of researchers expected outcome) controlled by deceiving of aim, distraction techniques, field setting
      • social desirability - ps report a more socially acceptable answer than a true one
      • investigator effects - (researcher projects expectations of the study outcome) controlled by double blind technique
      • order effects - (ps performance is improved by practise or worsened by boredom) controlled by time breaks, IM design, counter-balancing
    • experimental design
      • independent measures - different ps for each condition (quicker, less DCs, twice as many ps, p variables)
      • repeated measures - same ps take part in each condition (no p variables, fewer ps needed, order effects, more DCs)
      • matched pairs - matched on an important factor (reduces p variables, no order effects, no DCs, time consuming, twice as many ps needed)
    • observation
      • naturalistic: behaviour is freely observed in a non-controlled environment (high eco val, lack of control over EVs)
      • structured: tally in behaviour category each time a specific behaviour occurs (specific objectives, restricted to simple categories)
      • overt: ps are aware (consent given, possible DCs)
      • non-structured: note any behaviours that relate to the study (record a range, hard to record/view all behaviours)
      • controlled: behaviour is observed as a response to a controlled environment (high control, low eco val)
      • covert: ps are unaware (natural behaviour, no consent)
      • participant: experimenter partakes in what they are observing (natural behaviour, less time/ opportunity to record)
      • non-participant: experimenter sits aside or in another room to record (accurate recordings, unnatural behaviour)
      • event sampling: observe all ps at once, tally when specific events occur (easy to analyse, accurate recordings, no order or time given on each event given)
      • time sampling: observe ps separately for amount of time and record behaviours (gives order and time spent on behaviours, hard to record, stopwatch for timing may produce DCs)
      • researcher bias: observes project expectations onto what is observed
      • researcher effects: effect the observation has on behaviour changes in ps

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