Section A

Section A

1. experimental design

   • Repeated measures measures
     • performance of participants in one condition compared to the performance of the same participants in another condition
     • strengths
       • avoids participant variables/individual differences as the same participants are used
     • weaknesses
       • the could gain order effects - get better with time or get worse due to bordom
     • counter balancing
       • splitting the sample 50/50 chance of having either condition first or last
   • Independent measures
     • performance of participants in one condition compared to performance of different participants in another conditions
     • strengths
       • no order effects as different participants are used in each conditions
     • weaknesses
       • participant variables, as everyone is different in the groups could effect results e.g. one group could contain 8 people with high IQ and the other group only 1
   • matched pairs
     • people in the different conditions are matched on variables such as sex, IQ, age etc so its like they are the same person but in different groups
     • strengths
       • no order effects and reducing the likely hood of participant varibles taking effect
     • weaknesses
       • can be costly and time consuming as needs to be some method of matching the participants e.g. IQ test

2. hypothesis

   • experimental hypothesis
     • the effect of the IV on the DV
   • operationalised hypothesis
     • how it will be tested

3. types of experiment

   • lab
     • in highly contolled conditions and usually in lab settings 
     • strengths
       • - high levels of control mean: . objective . extraneous variables can be avoided . the IV can be isolated to measure the effect on the DV enabling us to infer cause and effect  . High reliability  . standardised procedure - making it easy to repeat 
     • weaknesses
       • . low in ecological validity making it hard to generalise results outside of that situation as people may behave differently  .high control produces an artifical situation which could lead to the participant guessing the aim and showing social desirability or showing demand characteristics  . low in mundane realism and not representative of the task in real life 
   • field
     • conducted in the participants own enviroment 
     • strengths
       • . high in ecological validity beacuse are there own surroundings reducing demand characterstics and social desirability enabling the researcher to generalise findings to other situations/people . participants may not know that are being watched and therefor this increases validity as they are testing what they are meant to be testing 
     • weaknesses
       • can't isolate the IV to measure the effect on the DV due to lack of control and therefore cannot infer cause and effect as could be caused be extraneous variable  . not very reliable as lack of control means a very unstandardised procedure making it difficult to replicate in exactly the same way and get the same findings  .could be ethical issues with withdrawal because the participant doesn't know they are being observed and it would lower validity if they knew
   • quasi
     • the IV is naturally occuring and therefore not manipulated 
     • strengths
       • the IV is not manipulated so therefore there is less control making it more ecologically valid and enabling the research to generalise results to other situations/ people
     • weaknesses
       • so they have to wait a long time for the conditions to occur as they cannot manipulate the IV this could also lead to a small sample which cannot be generalised to many people & isnt representative of the target population 

4. self report

   • questionaire
     • where the participant gives a written response or responds on a computer
     • strengths
       • . more reliable as the same questionaire can be produced again and again it is standardised  . people are more willing to give out personal infomation on paper compared to face face interveiw, especially if it is annonomous . lots of results very quickly from lots of different poeple it also cheap to produce and carry out
     • weaknesses
       • people could just tick a box without properly the question reducing validity only people who are literate and have time will take the questionaire producing a bias towards these type of people 
       • lead questions exam q
         • leading questions suggest a particular answer biasing results
     • likert scale
       • +from 1 - 5 how happy are you lots of quantitaive data which easy to compare and analyse  - don't know they pick the answers the do, lacks qualitative 
     • open
       • +get alot of indepth information, the person can get their opinon across. - hard to analyse - may be interpretted in different ways by different people 
     • closed
       • fixed choice response - easily just tick the box without thinking or reading the question correctly + easy to analyse
       • exam q
         • weakness of using closed questions no detailed qualitative and respondants cannot express themselves, forced choice questions are not valid
     • exam q
       • how would you make sure questionair does not distress participants. tell them it is confidential, they have the right to withdraw, the right to not answer any questions, don't ask them personal questions
   • interveiw
     • questions asked face to face or over the phone
     • strengths
       • if structured is very reliable and the same set of pre determined questions can be used on multiple people all over the world . If unstructured can gain large amounts of qualitative data which is indepth because the researcher can dig deeper
     • weaknesses
       • there could be a interveiwer bias or social desirability and the participant may not answer truthfully due to this lowering validty and reliability . lacks ecological validity if done face to face in artifical surroundings 
     • structured
       • plan questiuon before hand to get a particular response,  + you will definetly get the answers that you want - could be more information that could make a big difference which isn't found out
     • semi structured
       • have a rough idea but let flow also + gain both the answers that you are looking for and gain extra information that you wouldn't have found other wise - could interpreted differently -
     • unstructured
       • do not plan anything let it flow naturally  + get lots of qualtative data with alot of insight into the ppts mind - could gain alot of information that is completly irrelevant to your study
   • psychometric test
     • a questionaire that measure a particular psychological variable e.g. IQ, the type they are or the type of learner
     • strengths
       • . can be given to a large number of people quickly and cheaply as it is easy to give out . produces large amounts of quantitaive data that is easy to analyse and compare with other participants 
     • weaknesses
       • .could have researcher bias, they could interpret the data differently to other researchers = subjective = invalid . labeling some one in a particular way to cause them to change their behavouir and cause them harm
   • exam q
     • an individual reporting on their own thoughts behavouirs and attitudes. can be in the form of questionair, interveiw, survey or psychometric test. questions will be on a specfic topic and answers can be qaultative or quantitative. interveiw is more qualitative can be done face to face or over the phone 
   • exam q
     • is it possible to produce ethical results using the self report method. may be decieved, if personal could cause pschological harm, avoid confidentiality and privacy as they can answer anon

5. observation

   • naturalistic
     • participants behavouir is recorded in their own envrioment
     • strengths
       • - high ecological validity - no demand characteristics/social desirability due to high levels of control
     • weaknesses
       • - if they guess they are being watched = demand characteristics  - no control over the enviroment so therefor not realable/replicable - no maniuplation of IV so cannot infer cause and effect
   • controlled
     • participants behavouir is recorded in a situation set up by the researcher
     • strengths
       • - extraneouse variables can be controlled - can be repeated therefor it is reliable  - standardised
     • weaknesses
       • - low validity as they know they are being watched which can lead to social derirability and demand characterisitcs - low in ecological validity 
   • participant
     • researcher pretends to be a participant and observes them 
     • strengths
       • accsess data that is unobtainable in other methods alot of rich insightful data is they become a member of the group they are observing  high in validty
     • weaknesses
       • could change the group when joins = lower validity subjective  researcher bias hard to record everything without being caught, could forget important events if relying on memory 
   • event sampling
     • recording behavouir every time a particular behavouir occurs  + no behavouir is missed so a full set of data is gathered - diffuicult to record behavouir if many are displayed at once 
   • time sampling
     • recording behavouir at particular time intervals e.g. 10 mins  - less intensive as not as many behavouirs displayed at one time  - behavouir displayed outside the time intervals cannot be recorded and are therefor missed

6. writing it

   •  Sampling method you are going to use   How many participants? Where will you find them? How will you approach them? What age range, what sex? Will you have equal numbers of each sex? Why? (more generalisable) Why are you using the particular sampling method you are using?   
   • What will you do when you have your participants?  Will you brief them and ask for consent or will this affect the results? Will you ask them to meet you somewhere at a particular time or will you ask them to come with you now? Will you take them to a room? What will the room be like? Or will you test them in the place you are currently at? Will you test them separately or in a group? Will you split them into groups or if it is an experiment, will you test the same participants in different conditions (repeated measures) or will you test different participants in different conditions (independent measures OR matched pairs)? Will you carry out a pilot test?   
   • How are you going to test the participants? Self-report method or       questionnaire/interview (make sure you tell the examiner some questions) If it is an experiment, what is the IV and what is the DV? What controls will you use to avoid extraneous variables? Will you use any controls? Why? If it is a self-report, how will you give the questions to them? In what order and why? If it is an observation, what behaviour will you record? Will you split the behaviours up into categories and tally them?    
   • How will you collect the data?
   • Will you debrief the participants or tell them the full aim at the end? [ETHICS]

7. Stat tests

   • Nic is cool - nominal independent chi squared Nic rides scooters - Nominal reapeated sign test  Ollie is mad - ordinal reapeated mann whitney ollie runs wild - ordinal  repeated measures wilcoxn  ollie can swim - ordinal corrolation spearmens rho 
   • data
     • nominal
       • data being in catergories or frequencys - how many said yes
     • ordinal
       • numbers can be put in order but have no mathmatical properties like rating scales. it is like ranking order. 
     • interval
       • using a scale that has equal intervals between the units - minutes or seconds
   • exam Q in p
     • what does P<0.05 mean? it means that the probability of the results being due to chance is less than or equal to 0.05 and the results not being due to chance is 95%
     • null hypothesis
       • determine whether the null hypothesis is rejected or accepted - if o.o5 the null hypothesis would be rejected