Social Psychology
Module 1: doing Social Psychology
Wednesday, August 29, 2012 3:54 PM
Social Psychology: The art of people-watching in a scientific manner. Theory: a broad explanation for a wide set of phenomena, strongly supported Concise: coherent, systematic, predictive, widely accepted. Strongly supported by many lines of evidence. Must be testable and falsifiable Generated more exploration Applicable to life Hypotheses: the edited Theory. What constitutes a good theory? Have your theory; generated your hypothesis; now what? Laboratory approach Field approach
Controlled environment Natural environment Remember: correlational research does not specify cause and effect Experimental Research: manipulating variables to test hypothesis Everyday processes simulated in a laboratory when feasible and Ethical
More control over variables and can manipulates individual ones to better test hypothesis -Independent Variable -Dependent Variables
Correlation ≠ Causation
NEVER MAKE ASSUMPTIONS
Random Assignment: Everyone involved in an experiment has an equal chance to be assigned to any group. Ethics in Experiments: Sometimes it is a grey area between harmless and risky
Limits of Research: Experiments results may not carry over exactly into real life (cannot control for everything in a lab) guideline as to what you could expect - Also need to keep in mind wad the population sampled represented of the general population
- Content □ Attitudes and beliefs that very from culture to culture - Process □ How the experiment may effects behavior
Module 1 Page 1
Module 2: Did You Know it All Along?
Wednesday, August 29, 2012 4:47 PM
Common Sense: Seems obvious after you know the facts
Hindsight bias: the event doesn't seem surprising after it happens. people are likely to find an explanation of results after they are told the facts. Pitfalls of I-knew-it-all-along: - Arrogance - More likely to criticize for bad choices than to praise for good choices. Consider:
Wednesday, August 29, 2012 3:54 PM
Social Psychology: The art of people-watching in a scientific manner. Theory: a broad explanation for a wide set of phenomena, strongly supported Concise: coherent, systematic, predictive, widely accepted. Strongly supported by many lines of evidence. Must be testable and falsifiable Generated more exploration Applicable to life Hypotheses: the edited Theory. What constitutes a good theory? Have your theory; generated your hypothesis; now what? Laboratory approach Field approach
Controlled environment Natural environment Remember: correlational research does not specify cause and effect Experimental Research: manipulating variables to test hypothesis Everyday processes simulated in a laboratory when feasible and Ethical
More control over variables and can manipulates individual ones to better test hypothesis -Independent Variable -Dependent Variables
Correlation ≠ Causation
NEVER MAKE ASSUMPTIONS
Random Assignment: Everyone involved in an experiment has an equal chance to be assigned to any group. Ethics in Experiments: Sometimes it is a grey area between harmless and risky
Limits of Research: Experiments results may not carry over exactly into real life (cannot control for everything in a lab) guideline as to what you could expect - Also need to keep in mind wad the population sampled represented of the general population
- Content □ Attitudes and beliefs that very from culture to culture - Process □ How the experiment may effects behavior
Module 1 Page 1
Module 2: Did You Know it All Along?
Wednesday, August 29, 2012 4:47 PM
Common Sense: Seems obvious after you know the facts
Hindsight bias: the event doesn't seem surprising after it happens. people are likely to find an explanation of results after they are told the facts. Pitfalls of I-knew-it-all-along: - Arrogance - More likely to criticize for bad choices than to praise for good choices. Consider: