Exam 2: Methods in Psychology

Given two theories that are equally consistent with observations about the world,the _____ theory is preferred,illustrating the principle of _____.

Dogmatism is a desired characteristic of science.

_____ occurs when participants are assigned to the experimental or control group by a coin flip.

When participating in psychological research,participants sometimes report not their true beliefs,but rather what they feel to be the socially acceptable answer.This illustrates that people can be highly _____ when studied.

A correlation coefficient of 1 indicates that two variables covary perfectly.

Identifying a group of children who watch violent television and a group of children who do not is an example of manipulating exposure to violent television.

The numerical difference between the smallest and largest measurements in a frequency distribution is the:

Mike wants to know how many licks it takes to get to the centre of his lollipop.He tells his friends that "one full gyration of the tongue around the outer surface of the lollipop" is what constitutes a "lick." In an informal way,Mike is offering a(n)_____ but lacks a reliable _____ to answer the question.

Which statement is TRUE if scores on an examination are positively skewed?

The function of a research ethics board is to help ensure that research is in compliance with the law and ethical guidelines.

It is common to assign experimental participants to groups by random assignment.

What is the BEST way to make it LESS likely that people will be influenced by demand characteristics?

Externally invalid experiments are not problematic when the goal of the research is to:

A schoolteacher seeks help from the school psychologist because a child in her class is particularly unruly.The psychologist visits the class one day to observe the child.Knowing that she is being watched,the child is on her best behaviour.Which quality illustrated in this scenario makes it difficult for psychologists to study human behaviour?

Research ethics boards (REBs)ensure that data are ethically:

In an experiment,researchers exposed half the children to 2 hours of violence on television every day for a month and made sure the other half saw no violence on television at all.At the end of the month,they measured the aggressiveness in the children.The fact that the researchers arranged for some children to watch violence on television and for others to not do so is an example of:

Henri suspects that the amygdala is involved in emotional memories.He asks participants to recall emotionally charged events while in a brain-scanning machine and makes the specific prediction that amygdala activation will be observed during the task.This testable prediction is termed a(n):

Which statement about ethical research in psychology is TRUE?

The more frequently people go to church,the less likely they are to use drugs and alcohol.This is an example of:

The public gets suckered into buying the latest weight-loss supplement from television infomercials featuring many testimonials that the supplement is effective,precisely because they rarely consider which question?