Exam 4: How Psychologists Use the Scientific Method: Data Collection Techniques and Research Designs

Measuring how quickly individuals can perform a scrambled sentence task is an example of ______ observation technique.

The primary difference between case studies and small-n designs is the goal of the researcher.

A negative relationship indicates that as values on one variable increase, the values on the other variable decrease.

Analyzing the data from a closed-ended response scale would also require the development of a coding scheme because the responses are qualitative rather than quantitative.

If a predictive relationship is examined, the variable that is used to make the prediction is called the outcome variable, and the variable that is being predicted is called the predictor variable.

Asking individuals to complete a task under controlled conditions uses the ______ observation technique.

Some of the observation techniques and research designs that psychologists use tend to allow for higher external validity than others.

Discuss the goal of case study research and briefly describe what one would look like.

The third-variable problem is the reason researchers cannot determine causation from correlational studies.

When surveys are used, participants are often asked to use a response scale or response category (e.g., often, sometimes, not very often, never) that matches how they feel about a behavior or how likely they are to exhibit the behavior. This is called a(n) ______ response scale.

Of the following, ______ is a not a good operational definition for "hunger."

______ indicates that a survey measures the behavior it is designed to measure.

A ______ relationship means that the values on the variables change in the same direction (up and down) at the same time.

A measure of the degree to which different observers rate behaviors in similar ways is called ______.

Describe what archival data research analysis is briefly. Include an example and explain why this analysis is considered time-consuming.

A study is conducted to examine the effect of instruction type on test scores. Participants in the study are asked to complete a simple math test with either time limit instructions (i.e., the participants are told they must complete the test within 3 minutes) or no time limit instructions (i.e., the participants are not given a time limit for the test). Participants are randomly assigned to one of the instruction types. The independent variable in this study is ______.

The degree to which the behavior observed in the study is realistic, would occur naturally, and can be generalized beyond the boundaries of the study to other individuals and situations is ______ validity.

Disadvantages of using archival data include all but ______.

Naturalistic observations have the highest level of external validity amongst the data collection techniques.

Using a validated survey typically gives a researcher observations of behavior that are a step ahead of the other techniques discussed because the validity and reliability of a survey will already have been tested and the survey revised (if necessary) to maximize its accuracy.