Chapter 1: Thinking Critically with Psychological Science
Naturalistic observations are conducted in order to: A. describe behavior. B. explain behavior. C. predict behavior. D. control behavior.
Which of the following correlation coefficients indicates the strongest relationship between variables? A. positive .05 B. negative .25 C. positive .75 D. negative .95
Critical Thinking Questions
After watching their favorite team lose a game, Emma and her friends commented to each other about how they had always known the loss was inevitable. Psychologists call this: A. overconfidence. B. the false consensus effect. C. the hindsight bias. D. an illusory correlation.
Dr. Anderson conducts an experiment to see whether exposure to helpful models leads to helping behavior in young children. Of the forty girls and boys in his study, half are exposed to helpful models while the other half watch the same models not engaged in helping behavior. In this experiment, the dependent variable is: A. the gender of the children. B. helpful or non-helpful models. C. the age of the children. D. helping behavior.
Which of the following is the best way to generate a random sample of students for a research study? A. mail out a questionnaire that students could voluntarily complete and return B. stand by the door of the library and ask people who pass by to answer your questions C. offer extra credit for students in a particular classroom who choose to participate D. use a table of random numbers to pick participants from a student listing
A significant disadvantage of the correlational approach is that it: A. does not provide evidence of cause and effect. B. cannot be used to examine relationships between variables that exist naturally. C. does not aid in the process of prediction. D. does not provide information about how two variables are related.
After conducting an experiment, Dr After conducting an experiment, Dr. Fitzpatrick concluded that there was a statistically significant difference between the scores of the experimental and control groups. In other words, A. the difference is highly meaningful and important to scientists. B. the results are replicable. C. the scores differed by five points or more. D. it is unlikely that the difference occurred by chance.
Ethical issues in research (movie) How do we balance the need for research on new drugs to benefit millions with the right to individual research participants?
Death of a subject: The ethics of mental health research (movie) What, if any, recommendations would you make to the hospital for running experimental drug tests? Are persons with severe mental illness ever capable of giving, “Informed consent”? If not, how do we test new drugs designed to treat severe psychological disorders?
Do people prefer to be together or isolated when fearful? Schachter’s Affiliation Experiment (movie) Independent variable? Fear – Why is it the independent variable? Dependent variable ? Affiliation – Why is it the dependent variable? How was random assignment used? Why was random assignment used?
Schachter’s affiliation experiment cont. Is the use of deception ethical? Why or why not? How did he counter the effects of deception? What are the advantages of an experiment over correlational research?
Why do people help? (Movie) Why did these two office workers help? Do we have a biological instinct to help? Do we have a survival instinct? What about the terrorists? Instincts?
Why do people help? Cont. How does the social environment - parents, schools, communities foster helping or killing? What motivated Mike and John? Is human nature basically good or evil, or neither (being molded by the environment)?