Exam 2: Psychologys Scientific Method

Dale,a researcher,conducts a study to determine the effects of color blue on mood.During the study,he is friendlier toward the female participants than he is toward the male participants,which makes the women feel more relaxed during the study.He concludes that blue color is more likely to have a relaxing effect on women than on men.Dale's study is vulnerable to

Which of the following statements is true of research samples?

_____ statistics are the mathematical methods that are used to indicate whether results for a sample are likely to generalize to a population.

Which of the following is an advantage of conducting psychological research in a laboratory?

In a study to determine whether viewing pictures of poverty-stricken children increases the tendency for people to donate money to charity,the experimental group sees pictures of poor children before being asked to donate to charity.The control groups sees pictures of random landscapes.In this study,the operational definition of the dependent variable is the

Dr.Smith conducts an experiment on motivation.His experimental group is administered the independent variable.His control group is not.Dr.Smith hires Jack to act as a research subject who has little motivation despite the encouragement provided to him during the experiment.Dr.Smith wants to see how Jack's behavior affects the motivation of the actual research subjects in the experimental group.In this experiment,Jack is serving as

Allie has developed a theory concerning test grades of high school students.She believes that there is a strong causal relationship between students' levels of happiness and their grades in school.In this scenario,her expectation that happier students get better grades is a _____ derived from her theory.

Explain the difference between a dependent variable and an independent variable in experimental research.

Which of the following is an advantage of using a double-blind experiment?

The head of accounting at Delores Inc.is computing a value that represents the company's financial performance for the previous year.The company made approximately $90,000 in 11 out of the 12 months.In the last month of the fiscal year,the company made $530,000.In this scenario,which measure of central tendency will be least effective as an accurate representation of financial performance?

Five adults had the following scores on a personality test: 10,10,20,30,and 50.The median of these five scores is

In the context of psychological research methods,a(n)_____ is a carefully regulated procedure in which the researcher manipulates one or more variables that are believed to influence some other variable.

Aaron wants to study the association between sleep deprivation and the number of hours spent on computer every day.He is not keen to establish causation,but would like to determine whether and how the increase or decrease in one variable is associated with the increase or decrease in the other variable.Which of the following research methods is likely to be most effective for Aaron's study?

Dr.Matthews has submitted a proposal to the institutional review board (IRB)of a university.At this university,she intends to conduct research on the socialization patterns of students from foreign countries.In the context of ethics guidelines,the IRB at the university will decide

A(n)_____ consists of participants in a study who are exposed to the change that the independent variable represents.

A psychological study indicates a strong positive correlation between two variables.This means that

In surveys conducted by Gerald,many adolescents report that they started smoking cigarettes because of peer pressure.While observing adolescent groups,however,Gerald rarely sees adolescents offering each other cigarettes or putting pressure on others to smoke.Gerald predicts that if he conducts further studies on this topic,he will be able to prove that peer pressure is not the primary reason that adolescents start smoking cigarettes.In the context of psychology's scientific method,Gerald is basing his further studies on

A key aspect of the process of testing hypothesis is

Professor Stenson is examining the effects of color on patients' anxiety levels.She randomly assigns patients to either a room painted white or a room painted black,and then she records their blood pressure.In this case,the independent variable is the