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Getting Research Ideas & Reading the literature Psych 231: Research Methods in Psychology
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5 Goals of psychology Description of behavior Describe events, what changes what might affect change, what might be related to what, etc. Prediction of behavior Given X what will likely happen Control of behavior For the purpose of interventions (e.g., how do we prevent violence in schools) Causes of behavior Sometimes predictions aren’t enough, want to know how the X and the outcome are related Develop specific theories Explanation of behavior A complete theory of the how’s and why’s Simplest Complex
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Some terminology Hypothesis: Are specific predictions that are derived from theories (more specific than the theories) Theory: An interrelated set of concepts that is used to explain a body of data and to make predictions about the results of future experiments
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Where do ideas come from? Classic barriers “I’m not smart enough.” “Somebody else must have already done this.” “I don’t know how to pursue the idea.” “It’s too simple, something must be wrong.” “The idea will take too much work.” Do consider the practicality of the work load, but don’t be afraid of hard work. “I’m not interested in the topic.” Glued to your first idea. Be flexible, adjust your idea as you learn more You Great ideas
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Where do ideas come from? Research is often driven by curiosity. We typically study things that interest us. Continuum of the development of research ideas InformalFormal “This is interesting. I’d like to know more.” “The theory says X. Let’s test the theory.” “We’ve got a problem to solve.” “We understand some things, but there are still questions.”
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Where do ideas come from? Observation Direct observation - things that you observe: includes public observation, self observation, observing children, observing animals Vicarious observation - what somebody else has observed and reported
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Where do ideas come from? Observation Common Sense - things that we all think are true “Opposites attract” But note: a lot of our common sense is contradictory Absence makes the heart grow fonder Long distance affairs never last
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Where do ideas come from? Observation Common Sense Past research – find out what research has already been done and ask yourself “what don’t we know still” Follow-up studies, expanding the past research in more detail or new directions Improvements on past research studies, maybe you think the past research had some serious flaws or limitations
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Where do ideas come from? Observation Common Sense Past research Identify a problem – perhaps there is an important problem or issue that needs a (or some) solution(s). WWII - why did airplanes keep crashing? Led to development early cognitive theories of attention
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Are my ideas good? Focus: Is your idea specified enough to be manageable ROT rule: Replicable - one time deal? Observable - can you measure it? Testable - can you test it & can you falsify it? Evaluating your research ideas
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Replication Many interesting results are not accepted until they are replicated Cold fusion - a potential answer to our energy needs Cold fusion The results were never replicated and are not generally accepted by the scientific community Extrasensory perception (ESP) Some proponents claim that ESP only occurs under certain unknown conditions and that it is impossible to predict when the conditions are right.
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Observable Many interesting questions may not be examined experimentally because they aren’t observable (either directly or indirectly). Do dogs think like humans? Since we can’t directly observe a dog’s thoughts, we can only make inferences about their thoughts via their behavior Is my experience of the color blue the same as yours?
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Testable Other hypotheses may not have objective testability (e.g., imaginary events) What if the dinosaurs hadn’t become extinct?
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Example: A research idea Getting the idea How do people remember things? This is a pretty big question To begin to answer it we’ve got to FOCUS Break the general idea down into smaller more specific ideas Develop theories as to how & why Then we can begin using experiments to test parts of the theories
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Example: A research idea Focusing the idea What does memory involve? Encoding - getting the memories in Storage - keeping the memories Retrieval - getting the memories out Are all kinds of memory the same? Procedural vs. declarative memories Pictures vs. words How long do memories last?
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Example: A research idea Evaluating the idea (ROT) Can we re-do the experiments, do we get similar results? How do we observe memory? Recall tests, recognition tests, “brain waves,”,,, Are our predictions testable? Reading the literature will help greatly with evaluating research ideas
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Reviewing the literature Why do a review of the literature? What is the literature? How do you search the literature? Guest lecturer: Bruce Stoffel, psychology librarian, in labs W,Th,Fri, & M How do you read a research article?
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Why review the literature What are the underlying motivations for doing a review of the literature? Getting ideas. What has been done, what hasn’t been done? Understanding the relevant theories. What variables are important? Avoid past mistakes.
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What is the literature? Primary Sources - essentially reading the original report Journal articles Edited books (sometimes) Professional meetings Electronic publishing (fairly new, pluses and minuses) Faculty members & other personal communications Secondary Sources - reading a report of the report Literature Reviews Psychological Bulletin, Annual Review of Psychology Text books Citations in books and articles
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What is the literature? Secondary Sources: Advantages: Good starting place Often reviews a lot of relevant literature Relatively brief descriptions Disadvantages: Somebody else’s description May be incorrect May be biased Not enough detail
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Reading a research article How is it different from reading a novel? Style Objectives Structure
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Reading a research article What's the goal of a research article? The reader to: Know about the research Understand what was done Be convinced by the research (hopefully) Standardization of research report format APA style Organization and content reflects the logical thinking in scientific investigation Standardization helps with clarity Read with a critical eye
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The anatomy of a research article The basic parts of a research article: Title and authors - gives you a general idea of the topic and specifically who did it Abstract - short summary of the article States the issue, the methods, major variables of interst, the findings, and the conclusions (in 120 words or less) First contact Shows up in PsycInfo Gets skimmed before reading the article
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The anatomy of a research article Introduction - gives you the background that you need What are the issues What is/are the theory(ies) What does the past research say What the rationale for doing this research What are the specific hypotheses Reading checklist 1) What is the author's goal? 2) What are the hypotheses? 3) If you had designed the experiment, how would YOU have done it? The basic parts of a research article :
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The anatomy of a research article Method - tells the reader exactly what was done Enough detail that the reader could actually replicate the study. Subsections: Participants - who were the data collected from Apparatus/ Materials - what was used to conduct the study Procedure - how the study was conducted, what the participants did Reading checklist 1 a) Is your method better than theirs? b) Does the authors method actually test the hypotheses? c) What are the independent, dependent, and control variables? 2) Based on what the authors did, what results do YOU expect? The basic parts of a research article :
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The anatomy of a research article Results - gives a summary of the results and the statistical tests Reading checklist 1) Did the author get unexpected results? 2 a) How does the author interpret the results? b) How would YOU interpret the results? c) What implications would YOU draw from these results? The basic parts of a research article :
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The anatomy of a research article Discussion - the interpretation and implications of the results Reading checklist 1 a) Does YOUR interpretation or the authors' interpretation best represent the data? b) Do you or the author draw the most sensible implications and conclusions? References - full citations of all work cited Appendices - additional supplementary supporting material The basic parts of a research article :
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