Exam 2: Studying Behaviour Scientifically

Dr.Deshi has gathered the results of 52 studies on antenatal (during pregnancy)and subsequent postpartum depression to learn whether antenatal depression is a significant risk factor for postpartum depression.To combine the results of all 52 studies and see how strongly the two problems are related,she should use a

Stephanie conducts an experiment to learn if brunettes have more fun.She has three brunette female friends and three blonde female friends go to the same party,and record how many times they are asked to dance.In her experiment,Stephanie has defined her ____________ as the number of times the friends were asked to dance,and her ____________ as hair colour.

Emily does a study to see if people who are learning difficult tasks are hungrier than people who are learning easy tasks.She carefully develops one task that is easy and one that is difficult,controls the temperature and noise of the room for each group,and randomly assigns people to either the difficult or the easy group.She provides each group with Rocky Road ice cream and observes how many people eat it in each group.There is a confounding variable in her experiment.What is it?

Sitting in the park one sunny day,Chaim notices that people who are walking dogs smile at him more often than people without dogs.Chaim concludes that people who own dogs are happier than those who do not own dogs.Based on the principles of psychological research there are many problems with Chaim's conclusion.What is the biggest problem?

In a memory experiment,the subjects are asked to learn three lists of words.Each of the word lists is of equivalent difficulty.The first list contains university names,the second list is of dog breeds,and the third list contains kitchen appliances.After running 20 participants,the researchers notice that recall of university names,the first list that the participants learn,is much higher than recall for either of the other two lists.How can the researchers make sure that one list is actually easier to recall and not just an artifact of the way the test is set up?

Samantha conducts an experiment on her college campus.She learns that more women than men talk to their fathers on the phone daily.Samantha may not be able to generalize her findings to the larger population of all college women,because most of the students at her college come from extremely patriarchical surrounding towns.Samantha's problem is a lack of

In 1971,Phillip Zimbardo and colleagues conducted an experiment to learn about the power of roles.The subjects were randomly assigned to a "prisoner" group or a "guard" group.The guards were to do whatever they deemed necessary to maintain control.Less than two days into the experiment,one prisoner had a "nervous breakdown." Because the experimenters believed that the prisoner was trying to trick them into releasing him,they chided him for being weak and made him stay.If this experiment were done today,it would be in violation of the APA's ethical standards for informed consent,because

Lelani wants to know what percentage of all American college students receive financial aid in their freshman year.She attends a two-year community college,to which many students commute to campus every day.She stands outside the dining hall one weekday evening and hands out surveys to every third person entering the hall for dinner.Her data will

Andrew has taught his dog to do a number of tricks.On command,his dog can sit,beg,roll over,fetch,and speak.Andrew tells his friend Jacob that if a dog can learn all of these tricks and a cat cannot,then dogs must be smarter than cats.Jacob is impressed with the dog's tricks,but he's also convinced that his own cat is extremely smart.He tells Andrew that if a cat refuses to do all the silly tricks a dog does,then the cat is smarter than the dog: "It isn't that the cat can't learn the tricks,it's that the cat is too smart to be pushed around." Whose hypothesis is right?

Kathy is uncomfortable with some of the things she's learning in her science classes,and she becomes convinced that many scientists are just buying in to the theories they've been taught and perpetuating inaccurate information in their own research.In reality,

Dr.Sesay is testing a new antidepressant.He gives the experimental group the new medication and the control group sugar pills that look exactly the same as the real medication.However,some of the people who are taking the sugar pills start to feel less depressed.What is the most likely explanation?

Dr.Sesay is testing a new antidepressant.He gives the experimental group the new medication and the control group sugar pills that look exactly the same as the real medication.He is excited about all the good he believes this new medication will do for people.When he gives his control group the sugar pills,he shows little emotion,but when he hands out the antidepressants,he grins at his participants.To control for ______________,Dr.Sesay should use a _______________________ design instead.

Dr.Sesay is testing a new antidepressant.He carefully screens his subjects and assigns them to either the control group or the experimental group.He gives one group the new medication and the other one sugar pills that look exactly the same as the real medication.By doing this,he is hoping to control for ____________ effects.

Ashley does a correlational study and learns that the less students study,the worse their grades are.She has gotten a strong ___________ correlation.

Ramon is studying bullying behaviour among elementary schoolchildren.He arranges to spend one day following around a class of children,making notes on their behaviour.Unfortunately,when he presents his research to his professor,his professor says that Ramon's data were compromised by the way he collected it.What did Ramon forget to do?

Dr.Child has developed a straightforward theory on emotional eating (the tendency for people to eat for emotional reasons rather than hunger).Dr.Gordion has also developed a theory,though hers is far more complicated.Both theories generate a number of new hypotheses.Both theories predict the phenomenon well.In the scientific community,Dr.______________ theory will probably be preferred because _____________.

Adira is driving to work when she sees a car fire at the side of a busy highway.She considers stopping,but then thinks that in the age of cell phones,and with so many cars passing by,someone must have already called the police.She passes the fire by.The next day,she sees an article in the newspaper about the person who had the car fire.He says he was astonished that nobody stopped to try to help him.The reaction Adira and the other drivers had produced was a

Nahele has agreed to participate in a survey so he can receive extra credit in his psychology class.When he arrives,he is given a questionnaire that contains questions like "I enjoy playing team sports," "I often worry about getting things done," "I prefer to try new ways of doing things," and "I sometimes find it hard to trust other people." He is most likely taking a/an ___________ test.