The Science of Social Psychology

Copyright ©2012 by Pearson Education, Inc.All rights reserved.

THINK Social PsychologyKimberley Duff

THINKSOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY

Chapter

The Science of Social Psychology

2



How Can Research Methods Impact You Every Day?

• Research assists with critical evaluation of information

• Accurate evaluation assists with making choices

• People often misjudge the outcomes of their actions.

• Research allows subjective, rather than objective, analysis



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How Can Research Methods Impact You Every Day?

• People often make mistakes when estimating odds or value Such estimates are based on past

experiences Advertisements can influence assessments We underestimate current gains and

overestimate future value• These mistakes are due to subjective

biases



Common Sense Does Not Hold True

• Not all research affirms widely known facts

• Intuition is valuable, but also risky in research



Using Research in Your Own Life

• Hindsight Bias – "I knew that was going to happen!"

• False Consensus Effect – "Everyone thinks the way that I do!"



How do Social Psychologists Find the Truth?

• Research is a process of gathering evidence in specific ways



Steps in the Research Process

• Theory – a general framework that allows us to make and test predictions

• Step 1 – craft a research question

• Step 2 – examine existing literature for answers



Steps in the Research Process(continued)

• Step 3 – form a testable hypothesis

An hypothesis is an educated guess about the answer to your question

An operational definition identifies the specific variable to be examined

Take care of validity and reliability in your study



Steps in the Research Process (continued)

• Step 4 – select the best method to explore your research question

• Step 5 – conduct the research and analyze data

• Step 6 – Draw Conclusion



Steps in the Research Process (continued)

• Step 7 – Publish findings

This allows for peer review

This allows for replication



Steps in the Research Process(continued)

• These are the primary steps in the scientific method

• If these steps are followed, then the findings can be useful

• If these steps are ignored, the findings may be of little or no value



Why Publish?

• Martin Fleischmann and Stanley Pons in 1989 that they had produced cold fusion in a 1989 research The reported results received wide media

attention and raised hopes of a cheap and abundant source of energy

Many scientists immediately tried to replicate the experiment without success

Eventually error in the original experiment was established



What can Descriptive Methods Show Us?

• What is the current status of a population?

• What is the current status of a phenomenon?

• Who, what, when, where, and how?



Observation

• Can occur in a natural setting or controlled environment

Albert Bandura (1977) Social Learning- Laboratory based observational research was

employed



Observation (continued)

• Naturalistic observation

Watching behavior in a real-world setting

It is sometimes best to observe people in their natural environment

Focuses on both people and environments



Correlations

• Exploring the relationship between two variables without inferring cause-and-effect



Limitations and Advantages of Correlation

• Demonstrates a relationship between two variables

• Cannot be used to demonstrate causation

• Third variable – an outside factor can create the illusion of a relationship between two factors



Limitations and Advantages of Correlation (continued)

• Matched samples design – helps reduce third variable problem

• Some variables that are correlated do have a causal relationship, but correlation alone cannot demonstrate this



Positive Correlation

• As one variable goes up, so does the other



Negative Correlation

• As one variable goes up, the other goes down



No Correlation

• No discernable relationship between two variables



Types of Correlations



Self-Report and Survey Measures

• Asking participants to describe their behaviors or mental statuses



Archival Studies

• Gathering information from existing records



What do Experimental Methods Have to Say?

• Experiments attempt to control factors that can affect results

• Allows for cause-and-effect conclusions• Experiments always include three

components: Independent variable(s) Dependent variable(s) Random assignment to groups



What do Experimental Methods Have to Say? (continued)

• External validity Do results generalize to a larger population?

• Internal validity Can cause-and-effect conclusions be relied

upon?• Generally as one increases, the other

decreases



Independent and Dependent Variables

• Independent variable (IV) That condition that is controlled/altered by the

researcher• Dependent variable (DV)

That condition that is measured by the researcher

• Experiments ask if the IV has an impact on the DV, and if so what is that impact?



Independent and Dependent Variables (continued)

• Experimental group The participants who receive the main

treatment or manipulation• Control group

The group that does not receive the main treatment and can be used for comparison

• Without both groups, there is no way to be certain of the relationship between an IV and a DV



Random Assignment

• All participants have an equal chance of being in an experimental or control group

• Is required to allow cause-and-effect conclusions

• Research without random assignment cannot be considered experimental



Experiment Examples

• Scientific Cause to Effect

• Non-scientific Cause to Effect

• Non-scientific Effect to Cause



Confounds

• Anything other than the IV that affects the DV is a confound

• Impairs the ability to determine a relationship between an IV and a DV



Participant Bias

• Do participants have assumptions about the research?

• If these assumptions impact their behavior, participant bias can skew results

• The placebo effect when the belief that a treatment will be

effective causes it to be effective



Participant Bias (continued)

• Experimenter bias – researchers’ expectations can skew results Single-blind or double-blind studies

- The participant and/or researcher don’t know which participant is in which subject group

- Helps eliminate participant and experimenter biases



A Placebo Effect



Ethics

• Deception – giving participants false information about the study

• Debriefing – telling participants the true nature of the study after their involvement is over

• APA Ethical Guidelines Beneficence Autonomy Justice



Ethics

• Institutional Review Board (IRB) Evaluates potential research to ensure ethical

treatment of participants• Informed consent

Participants are given as much information about the research as possible

This allows them to participate without taking unnecessary risks



Emile Durkheim and Suicide• Egoistic Suicide

Low social integration Low social integration means that an individual

is not influenced by a collective conscience

• Altruistic Suicide Extremely high social intigration The Individual is literally forced to commit

suicide by virtue of the collective conscience



Emile Durkheim and Suicide• Anomic Suicide

Low social regulation This occurs when the regulative powers of

society are disrupted resulting in normlessness

• Fatalistic Suicide Extremely high social regulation This occurs when social regulation is so

repressive all hope is lost

The Science of Social Psychology

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