Exam 2: Scientific Methods in Psychology

Which of the following is a desirable feature of a scientific theory?

You apply for a job selling diet marshmallows because an ad says that the average company employee earns $50,000 a year. Later you discover that the company has a president, a sales manager, and 30 salespeople; you also learn that each salesperson earns $14,000 a year. How can the company's claim be correct?

People give one answer to a survey question when they are told the survey was sponsored by the Republican Party and a different answer when they are told it was sponsored by the Democratic Party. One possible reason for the difference is

A study of the relationship between two variables that the investigator does not control is known as a

According to the results of one survey, 95% of high-school students say they have been sexually harassed. Before you can decide how seriously to take these results, one of the most important questions you should ask is,

One of the problems with survey research is

In a double-blind study,

An investigator wishes to conduct a double-blind study to determine the effect of an experimental drug on memory. The investigator gives the drug to members of the experimental group and a ____ to members of the control group.

After using which of the following methods would an experimenter be most confident in making statements about cause and effect?

Several years ago, researchers examined the effect of listening to music from Mozart on psychological test performance. It appeared that those people who had listened to Mozart performed better on tasks of spatial reasoning than did those people who listened to a relaxation tape or had experienced silence. Later research revealed some problems with these findings. Specifically,

The advantage of randomly assigning participants to the experimental group and the control group is that random assignment

An illusory correlation is

To test the effects of eating on learning, Professor Lee permits her morning class to bring snacks to class but forbids her afternoon class from bringing snacks. To measure performance, she counts the number of "intelligent questions" asked by students in each class, and reports getting more such questions in the morning class. What are two serious flaws in this experiment?

Which of the following is the BEST conclusion from the research discussed on the effects of watching television violence and aggressive behavior?

Which of the following correlation coefficients indicates the strongest relationship between two variables? That is, which one would enable us to make the most accurate predictions of one variable from the other?

Which cause-and-effect conclusion, if any, can we draw from the correlational studies of watching violent television?

A survey

To determine whether a theory is parsimonious, psychologists pay attention to whether

If someone plans to administer a survey to determine which event people think is the most important one of the 20th century, the person who administers the survey should definitely

If the correlation between variable A and variable B is negative, then