Research Methods

Peer Review of a piece of new psychological research should be conducted by

• A specially appointed government minister

• Another researcher working in a different field of psychology

• Another researcher working in the same field of psychology

• The head of department in the university where the research was conducted

A correlation coefficient of 0.8 is a _______________ and suggests that as one variable ____________, the other variable ______________.

• strong positive | increases | increases
• weak positive | increases | increases
• strong positive | increases | decreases
• weak positive | increases | decreases

Which answer lists two measures of the spread of data around the mean?

• mode and median
• standard deviation and range
• inferential statistics and descriptive statistics
• scattergrams and boxplots

Which statement is correct?

• A stratified sample is more likely to be representative of the population than a convenience sample.
• A sample is always representative of a population.
• A convenience sample is more likely to be representative of the population than a stratified sample.
• A small random sample is more likely to be representative of the population than a large stratified sample.

The population in a research study is...

• the whole group of research interest.
• the smaller group that has been chosen from the group of research interest.
• exactly the same as the sample.
• always smaller than the sample.

Which answer provides examples of participant variables?

• independent variables, dependent variables
• time of day, noise level, temperature, location
• prior experience, motivation, intelligence, educational background
• extraneous variables, confounding variables

Method of intense study of just one individual:

• Naturalistic Observation

• Experimental Study

• Case Study

• Survey

In an experiment, the _________________ variable is tested by the researcher to observe its effect(s) on the _________________ variable.

• A.independent; dependent

• B.first; second

• C.dependent; independent

• D.research; results

A type of observation conducted in the participants' normal environment without interference from the researchers.

• Controlled observation

• Naturalistic observation

Measure of central tendency calculated by adding up all scores and dividing by the number of scores in the data set.

• Median

• Mode

• Mean