Psychology as a science

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Psychology as a science
Hey kids, Im a social scientist. That means I
cant explain electricity or anything like that,
but if you ever want to know about people, Im
your man. Adapted from New Yorker Collection
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What is Psychology?

• Asking questions about the mind and behavior.
• How do my moods relate to my health?
• What is it like to be a soldier or a citizen in
  Afghanistan today? And how will todays
  experiences there affect my psyche and my
  relationships?
• Utilizing multiple perspectives in our attempt
  to understand these types of questions
• Applying research findings to the promotion of
  health, education, and the public welfare.

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What is Psychology?
Examples of Perspectives that Psychologists take
Perspective Focus
Neuroscience How the body and brain enable
emotions, memories, and sensory experiences
Evolutionary How nature selects traits that
promote the perpetuation of ones genes
Behavioral How much our genes, and our
environment, influence our genetics individual
differences
Psychodynamic How behavior springs from
unconscious drives and conflicts
Behavioral How we learn related to consequences
we experience
Cognitive How we encode, process, store, and
retrieve information
Social-cultural How behavior and thinking vary
across situations and cultures
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Perspectives and the Science of Psychology

• Candid Camera elevator segment
• Use perspectives to explain the subjects
  behavior
• Scientific Problem Solvers
• Conduct research
• Promote health
• Help educate
• Provide social services
• Assist business and industry

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Operational Definitions

• Defining and measuring are key aspects of the
  scientific method
• How to turn a concept into something that can
  be defined and detected
• Operational Definition Description of a
  property (e.g., happiness, intelligence) in
  measurable terms
• Happiness / Embarrassment (How to define and
  measure)
• One defn a state of mind or feeling
  characterized by contentment, satisfaction,
  pleasure, or joy. -- Cambridge Dictionary

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Scientific Psychology

• How do we go about asking and answering
  questions? We
• Are skeptical (but not cynical)
• Have humility (and actually try to prove
  ourselves wrong)
• Can tolerate uncertainty dont use emotional
  reasoning
• Use critical thinking (i.e., dont accept facts
  or conclusions blindly)
• Use common sense, but recognize that common
  sense has its own set of problems

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Challenges to critical thinking

• What about common sense and intuition in this
  whole process?
• Three envelopes and a dollar bill
• bullet dropped off of a 3-foot table vs. shot
  across a football field
• Next slides. Things arent always how they
  appear

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And things arent always consistent with what
weve heard or common sense
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Do they?
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Is aggression cathartic?
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Handout 1-2 Explaining Research
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Challenges to critical thinking

• Hindsight Bias
• tendency to believe, after learning an outcome,
  that one would have foreseen it
• Overconfidence
• we tend to think we know more than we do

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How do psychologists carry out observations?

• Descriptive Studies
• Correlational Studies
• Experiments

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Descriptive Studies

• Case Study
• an observation technique in which one person or
  group is studied in depth in the hope of
  revealing universal principles
• strengths and weaknesses?

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Descriptive Studies

• Survey
• technique for learning the self-reported
  attitudes or behaviors of people
• usually by questioning a representative, random
  sample of them
• strengths and weaknesses?

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Descriptive Studies

• Naturalistic Observation
• observing and recording behavior in naturally
  occurring situations without trying to manipulate
  and control the situation

• http//www.janegoodall.org/chimp_names

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Correlational studies

• Measure how two things are related how they
  co relate
• Question What is the relationship between a
  childs aggression level and his/her T.V. viewing
  habits (i.e. watching violent T.V.) ?? Are they
  correlated??

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Correlation and Causation

• Three possible cause-effect relations

could cause
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Experiments in Psychology

• Experiment
• a research method in which an investigator
  manipulates one or more factors (independent
  variables) to observe their effect on some
  behavior or mental process (the dependent
  variable)
• control group

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Medication vs. psychotherapy experiment
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IVs DVs

• Independent Variable
• the experimental factor that is manipulated
• the variable whose effect is being studied
• Dependent Variable
• the experimental factor that is being measured
  (e.g., a behavior or mental process)
• may change in response to manipulations of the
  independent variable

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Comparing Research Methods
Research Method Basic Purpose
How Conducted What is
Manipulated
Descriptive To observe and
Case studies, surveys, Nothing record
behavior and naturalistic
observations
Correlational To detect naturally
Computing statistical Nothing occurring
relationships association, sometimes to
assess how well among survey one variable
predicts responses
Experimental To explore cause Manipulating
one or Independent and effect more
factors and using variable(s) random
assignment to eliminate preexisting diff
erences among subjects