First Steps In Research and Statistics: A Practical Workbook for Psychology Students

BOOK COVER......Page 1
HALF-TITLE......Page 2
TITLE......Page 3
COPYRIGHT......Page 4
CONTENTS......Page 5
BOXES......Page 7
FIGURES......Page 8
TABLES......Page 10
WORKSHEETS......Page 12
PREFACE......Page 13
Part I  The basics of research......Page 14
INTRODUCTION......Page 15
THE HYPOTHESIS......Page 16
MAJOR STEPS IN TESTING A RESEARCH HYPOTHESIS......Page 18
ANSWERS TO SELECTED EXERCISES......Page 19
EXPERIMENTS......Page 22
Essential characteristics of experiments......Page 23
SURVEYS/NON-EXPERIMENTS......Page 24
Cause and effect in survey/non-experimental research......Page 25
OBSERVATION......Page 27
COMPARING RESEARCH METHODS......Page 28
SUMMARY......Page 29
WHAT ARE RESEARCH ETHICS?......Page 30
RESEARCH WITH ETHICAL PROBLEMS......Page 31
Protection of participants......Page 32
Consultation......Page 33
‘RULES’ FOR ETHICAL RESEARCH FOR BEGINNING RESEARCHERS......Page 34
RESEARCH ON SENSITIVE TOPICS: ADVICE FOR MORE ADVANCED STUDENT RESEARCHERS......Page 36
CONSENT FORMS......Page 37
SUMMARY......Page 38
INTRODUCTION......Page 39
DISCRETE AND CONTINUOUS VARIABLES......Page 40
Validity......Page 41
OBJECTIVE AND SUBJECTIVE MEASURES......Page 42
STRUCTURED VERSUS UNSTRUCTURED MEASURES......Page 43
SELF-COMPLETION SCALES......Page 44
Response formats for answers......Page 45
SCORING QUESTIONNAIRE SCALES......Page 47
Scoring a short scale of four items......Page 48
Response sets......Page 49
ANSWERS TO EXERCISES......Page 51
Part II  The statistical analysis of single variables and simple surveys......Page 52
DIFFERENT TYPES OF MEASUREMENT......Page 53
TYPES OF MEASUREMENT AND PSYCHOLOGY......Page 54
SUMMARY......Page 56
INTRODUCTION......Page 57
Percentages......Page 59
Rounding decimals in calculations......Page 61
Pie-charts......Page 62
SUMMARY......Page 64
ANSWERS TO EXERCISES......Page 65
INTRODUCTION......Page 67
FREQUENCY TABLES......Page 68
Median......Page 69
Mean......Page 71
Comparison of the mean, median and mode......Page 72
Variance......Page 74
Standard deviation......Page 75
SHAPE OF DISTRIBUTIONS......Page 79
The normal curve......Page 80
Getting histograms right......Page 81
REPORTING DESCRIPTIVE STATISTICS......Page 84
SUMMARY......Page 85
ANSWERS TO EXERCISES......Page 86
WHAT IS SAMPLING?......Page 87
Convenience sampling......Page 89
Stratified random sampling......Page 91
Cluster sampling......Page 92
Quota sampling......Page 93
STATISTICAL ANALYSIS APPROPRIATE TO SAMPLING......Page 94
SUGGESTIONS FOR PRACTICAL WORK......Page 95
SUMMARY......Page 98
Part III  Exploring correlational relationships in survey/ non-experimental studies......Page 99
Possibility 1: Students who are more intelligent may work harder because they enjoy the work more......Page 100
Possibilitly 2: Students who are more intelligent may work less hard because they find the work easier......Page 103
Possibility 3: Students who are either not very intelligent or very intelligent may work less hard because either they find the work too difficult or too easy......Page 104
Problems to consider......Page 105
SUMMARY......Page 106
INTRODUCTION......Page 108
Pearson’s correlation......Page 109
Spearman’s correlation......Page 112
Phi coefficient (correlation)......Page 113
SUMMARY......Page 118
ANSWERS TO EXERCISES......Page 119
PROBABILITY OF FINDING A RELATIONSHIP......Page 121
STATISTICAL SIGNIFICANCE......Page 125
What affects significance levels?......Page 126
Calculating statistical significance......Page 127
Worked example 11.1......Page 128
Statistical significance of the Spearman correlation......Page 130
ANSWERS TO EXERCISES......Page 131
CONCEPTUAL BACKGROUND......Page 138
Chi-square test for a 2×2 unrelated analysis......Page 139
Calculating chi-square......Page 141
Chi-square and phi......Page 145
ANSWERS TO EXERCISES......Page 146
EXAMPLES OF POTENTIAL SURVEY/NON-EXPERIMENTAL STUDIES......Page 148
STATISTICAL ANALYSIS......Page 149
SUMMARY......Page 151
Part IV  Exploring differences between group means......Page 153
WHAT IS THE PROBLEM?......Page 154
TYPE 1 AND TYPE 2 ERRORS......Page 155
SIGNIFICANCE TESTS......Page 156
A typical study in psychological research......Page 157
ESTIMATING THE CHARACTERISTICS OF THE POPULATION OR WHY THE NULL HYPOTHESIS IS IMPORTANT......Page 158
SAMPLING FROM THE ESTIMATED POPULATION......Page 160
SUMMARY......Page 164
INTRODUCTION......Page 167
THE ANALYSIS OF TWO GROUPS OF SCORES......Page 169
ANSWERS TO EXERCISE......Page 175
INTRODUCTION......Page 179
A further example......Page 180
Analysis of data from the Gestalt psychotherapy study......Page 181
SUMMARY......Page 184
ANSWERS TO THE EXERCISE......Page 185
Part V  The essentials of designing experiments......Page 187
WHAT IS AN EXPERIMENT?......Page 188
ESSENTIAL FEATURES OF EXPERIMENTS......Page 190
PLANNING EXPERIMENTS: BASIC CONSIDERATIONS......Page 191
RANDOM ALLOCATION TO EXPERIMENTAL AND CONTROL GROUPS......Page 193
SUMMARY......Page 194
INTRODUCTION......Page 202
STATISTICAL ANALYSIS......Page 203
SUMMARY......Page 211
ANSWERS TO EXERCISE......Page 212
INTRODUCTION......Page 215
AN EXAMPLE OF A COUNTERBALANCED RELATED EXPERIMENT......Page 216
Analysing a counterbalanced related samples design......Page 218
SUMMARY......Page 222
ANSWERS TO EXERCISE......Page 223
FIVE FACTORIAL DESIGNS......Page 227
Two unrelated factors......Page 228
PLANNED AND UNPLANNED COMPARISONS......Page 232
INTERACTIONS BETWEEN TWO FACTORS......Page 235
GRAPHICALLY DISPLAYING AN INTERACTION......Page 236
SUMMARY......Page 237
ANSWERS TO EXERCISE......Page 239
Part VI  The report......Page 243
Style......Page 244
The title......Page 246
Method......Page 247
Procedure......Page 249
Tables and diagrams......Page 250
Journal articles......Page 251
SUMMARY......Page 253
REFERENCES......Page 254
INDEX......Page 255