Psychology Revision Notes

Psychology revision

Quantitative data – information that is collected in course of a research study that is in number form

Qualitative data – information that is collected in course of a research study that is not in number form, it is someone’s opinion

Experimental methods – in order to find cause and affect relationships we must use experimental methods

Experiment => research method involving changes to 1 variable (IV) in order to see its effects on other variables (DV) and to establish the cause and affect variable.

IV – Independent variable manipulated by the experimenter

DV – Dependent variable measured by the experimenter

There are 3 types of experiments:

Lab experiments – experiment carried out in a lab allowing researcher to have a high level of control over the IV and to control confounding variables  

:) The procedures can be easily repeated

:) It is easier to control EV and other variables

:) Consent – the researcher can gain full consent at beginning of experiment

:( High level of control makes it less like a real-life situation

:( Demand characteristics – the participants seek cues from the environment about how to behave

:( Consent – once in a lab setting it might become difficult to withdraw from the procedure

Field experiments – carried out in the real-world setting rather than the artificial setting of a lab. It is more costly and time consuming to carry out.

:) Has high ecological validity

:) Reduction of demand characteristics as participants may be unaware that they are taking part in a study

:( Low control over IV and DV but also surrounding people who might but in conversations or their presence alone could affect results => less control over EV

:( The results can’t be generalised to other real-life situations

:( No consent gained 

Natural experiment – a type of quasi- experiment (resembling but not really the same as) where the allocation of participants to the different experimental conditions is outside the control of the researcher, but rather reflects naturally occurring differences in the IV an example would be 2 schools using different methods to teach reading. Researcher exploits naturally occurring differences.

:) Reduction of demand characteristics as participants is unaware that they are taking part in an experiment

:) The experimenter doesn’t intervene directly in the research situation.

:( Loss of control as IV is not directly controlled by investigator.

Non-experimental investigations in psychology:-

Investigations using correlational analysis – the extent to which 2 or more variables are associated with one another. It is a descriptive technique that measures relationships between variables. As it is a statistical technique, correlation is not strictly a research method, but the term is also used to refer to the overall design of non-experimental investigations that specifically try to identify relationships between variables

“Variable A could cause variable B” or “variable B could cause variable A” an example of this could be that “stress could cause divorce” or “divorce could cause stress”

:) Measures strength of relationships…