Psychology scientific enquiry

• Ethics/ethical guidelines in psychological research

  Ensuring the wellbeing of human participants and animals involved in studies
• Ethics committee approval and monitoring of conduct for psychological research


  Promoting the ethical practice of psychology by ensuring all studies follow the ethical guidelines and standards
• Ethical guidelines and practices related to human participants

  • Protection from harm (physical and psychological)
  • Informed consent
  • Withdrawal rights
  • Deception
  • Confidentiality
  • Privacy
  • Voluntary participation
  • Debriefing
• Protection from harm (physical and psychological)


  Ensuring physical and psychological safety is a fundamental ethical consideration in psychological research. Any potential harm must outweigh the potential benefits.
• Informed consent


  Participants must be fully informed about the study, its potential risks and benefits, before agreeing to participate. It must be submitted in a written confirmation form.
• Withdrawal rights


  Participants should have the right to withdraw from the study at any point without facing any negative consequences
• Deception


  Sometimes concealing certain aspects of the study is necessary for the validity of the study. Deceiving participants must only be done when absolutely necessary and must be followed by an adequate debrief
• Confidentiality


  This involves assurance that the privacy of the participants personal information is maintained at all times
• Privacy


  The participants rights to have the collection, storage and sharing of their personal information is protected
• Voluntary participation


  All participants must have agreed to participate in the study on their own without coercion or pressure
• Debriefing


  After the experiment, the true aim, results and conclusions drawn must be shared with the participants. Participants are able to ask any questions and should be provided with support options.
• Investigations involving animals must satisfy

  • Valid
  • Humane
  • Justifiable
  • Consideration
• Replacement


  Methods that replace totally or partially, must be explored, considered and where possible implemented.
• Reduction


  The number of animals used must be the minimum possible as long as it doesn't increase the stress or distress the participating animals.
• Refinement


  Supporting and safeguarding animal well being must be reviewed and monitored continuously during the study. Proper training is required for ethical animal handling.
• Variables


  • Independent
  • Dependent
  • Control
  • Extraneous
• Independent variable


  What is being manipulated or deliberately changed
• Dependent variable


  The outcome that is measured by the researcher to determine whether or not the IV has had an effect.
• Control variables


  Any factor/variable that the researcher holds constant in an experiment. It is controlled so that it doesn't influence the DV in any way and therefore bias the results.
• Extraneous variables


  Any factors that may affect the DV. This makes it difficult to ascertain if it was the IV causing a change or some other uncontrolled factor
• Types of extraneous variables


  • Participant
  • Environment
  • Researcher
• Participant extraneous variables


  Individual characteristics of participants that may impact the study
• Environment extraneous variables


  Factors in the environment the study takes place in that may affect participant response
• Researcher extraneous variables


  Personality characteristics, appearance and conduct of the researcher that may unintentionally impact participant response
• Confounding variables


  Variables that impact the dependent variable and also have a causal or correlation relationship with the independent variable. They alter the relationship between independent and dependent variables and can complicate result making them difficult to interpret.
• Directional hypothesis


  A statement that compares the predicted outcome of each prediction (usually past research provides some evidence to suggest a specific outcome will occur)
• Non-directional hypothesis


  A statement that declares a difference between the conditions but doesn't specify the type of difference. This is used when no previous research suggests a particular outcome, or past research is contradictory.
• Inquiry questions


  Open ended questions used in qualitative research to inform the methodology that will be followed. The question starts with a question word – "what", "will".
• Research methods


  • Experimental
  • Non-experimental
  • Observational
  • Case studies
  • Correlational
  • Longitudinal
  • Cross-sectional
• Experimental research


  Research where the independent variable can be manipulated, a cause effect relationship can be found, and participants can be randomly allocated.
• Control group


  Group of participants exposed to the independent variable.
• Experimental group


  Group of participants exposed to the independent variable.
• Experimental research


  • Researchers can have control over variables, and a cause-and-effect relationship can be found.
  • Having a controlled environment reduces realism and may impact participant behaviour, and in trying to control variables in research, there is a risk of human error occurring.
• Non-experimental research


  Research where the independent variable cannot be manipulated, a cause-and-effect relationship cannot be found, and participants cannot be randomly allocated.
• Non-experimental research


  • Observing what occurs naturally in the environment means a controlled setting does not have to be created.
  • Reliable casual conclusions are not able to be made because there is no evidence of a cause-and-effect relationship. As there is no variable manipulation, larger sample sizes are required so more participants are able to be observed.
• Observational research


  Type of technique used to study behaviour. Researchers monitor participants and record notes.
• Observational research


  • Controlled observations can be replicated by other researchers, and participants are more likely to behave naturally rather than unconsciously or consciously act in a way that is socially appealing.
  • The researcher only sees what they expect to see observer bias may occur, participants may change their behaviour if they are aware of being observed, Voluntary participation and informed consent.
• Case studies


  An in-depth investigation of an individual person, group of people or single event.
• Case studies


  • Detailed information is collected and gathered from a range of perspectives.
  • Results are unable to be generalised to the population sample was taken from, and conclusions drawn from case studies are limited due to the lack of formal control groups.
• Correlational research


  Measures the linear relationship between two variables.