quali reviewer

• Research is the systematic method of finding out what is out there
• Research Process


  1. Identifying a Problem

  2. Reviewing Literature

  3. Specifying Purpose

  4. Collecting Data

  5. Analyzing and Interpreting Data

  6. Reporting Research
• Areas of Psychological Research

  • Psychobiology
  • Cognition
  • Human Development
  • Social Psychology
  • Psychotherapy
• Ways of Finding Out

  • Surveys and census
  • Images and drawings
  • Experiments
  • Lived Experiences
  • Interviews
  • Documents
  • Daily life
• Sources of Knowledge

  • Superstition
  • Intuition
  • Authority
  • Tenacity
  • Rationalism
  • Empiricism
  • Science
• Goals of Science

  • Description
  • Explanation
  • Prediction
  • Control
• Reviewing the Literature

  1. Selecting the Problem

  2. Literature Review

  3. Library Research

  4. Journals
• Abstract


  A brief description of the entire paper that typically discusses each section of the paper (Introduction, Method, Results, and Discussion)
• Introduction


  It has three basic components: an introduction to the problem under study; a review of relevant previous research; and the purpose and rationale for the study
• Method


  It is generally divided into Subjects (or Participants), Materials (or Apparatus), and Procedure subsections
• Results


  It summarizes the data collected and the type of statistic(s) used to analyze the data

  
• Discussion


  The results are evaluated and interpreted
• Ethical Standards in Human Participants

  • Informed Consent
  • Informed Assent
  • Risks
  • Deception
  • Debriefing
• Statistics


  A branch of mathematics that involves the data collection, analysis, and presentation
• Research and Statistics in Psychology

  • Organize Data
  • Describe Data
  • Make inferences based upon data

  
• Population


  The entire group of individuals that the researcher wants to study
• Sample


  A small group of individuals selected from a population, usually picked to describe the population
• Variable


  A characteristic or condition that is not constant - it can change or has different values for different individuals
• Levels of Measurement

  • Nominal
  • Ordinal
  • Interval
  • Ratio
• Two Categories of Statistics

  • Descriptive Statistics
  • Inferential Statistics
• Probability Sampling

  • Simple Random Sampling
  • Stratified Random Sample
  • Cluster random sample
• Non-Probability Sampling

  • Convenience Sample
  • Purposive Sample
  • Quota Sample
  • Snowball Sampling
• Frequency distributions are a way of presenting data that makes the pattern of the data easier to see
• Class Interval Frequency


  Individual scores are combined into categories, or intervals, and then listed along with the frequency with which each interval occurs
• Snowball sampling


  A sampling technique in which existing subjects provide referrals to recruit samples required for a research study
• Frequency distributions are used to illustrate the processes of organizing and describing data
• Frequency distributions make the pattern of the data easier to see
• After the scores are ordered, the data can be condensed into a frequency distribution - a table in which all of the scores are listed along with the frequency with which each occurs
• The relative frequency is the proportion of the total observations included in each score
• Class interval frequency


  Individual scores are combined into categories, or intervals, and then listed along with the frequency scores in each interval
• A rule of thumb when creating class intervals is to have between 10 and 20 categories
• Calculating class interval width

  Subtract the lowest score from the highest score and then divide the result by the number of intervals you want
• Types of graphs used to display distributions

  • Bar graphs
  • Pie charts
  • Line graphs
  • Histogram
  • Stem plot or stem and leaf plot

  
• Descriptive statistics


  Numerical measures that describe a distribution by providing information on the central tendency of the distribution, the width of the distribution, and the distribution's shape

  
• Measures of central tendency

  Representative numbers that characterize the "middleness" of an entire set of data (mean, median, mode)

  
• Mean


  The most commonly used measure of central tendency, calculated by adding all the scores together and dividing by the total number of scores

  
• Median


  Used when the mean may not be representative of the distribution
• Mode


  The score in a distribution that occurs with the greatest frequency
• Skewed distribution


  Distributions in which the mean, median and mode are located in predictably different positions

  
• Positively skewed distribution


  • The peak is to the left of the center point, and the tail extends toward the right