Psychology in English

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• Psychology in English
• Stéphanie Caillies

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Main course objectives

• Basic psychology vocabulary
• Tips to quickly understand APA papers
• Read, write, listen, and even perhaps speak

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Exams

• 50 Home/Class work
• 50 Final exam

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Planning
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Chapter 1

• Overview of APA paper structure
• Detailed APA paper structure
• Exercises

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Chapter 2

• Vocabulary Methodology
• Variables, Hypotheses, etc.
• Statistics
• Questionnaires Scales
• Exercises

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Chapter 3

• Vocabulary Experimental, Cognitive Child
  Psychology
• Exercises

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Chapter 4

• Vocabulary Clinical and Abnormal Psychology (
  Specific Methods)
• Exercises

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Chapter 5

• Vocabulary Social Psychology
• Exercises

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Chapter 1

• Structure of a paper in English?

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APA Paper Structure

• See publication Manual of the APA (5th edition)

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Overview

• Title
• Abstract
• Introduction
• Method
• Results
• Discussion
• References / Bibliography

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Title

• The title of a research report is a concise
  phrase, usually presenting the main idea of the
  paper and/or the area of research.
• Running head abbreviated title.

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Abstract

• The abstract is a kind of summary, describing the
  essential information presented in the report
  (very important).
• Its length is usually about 150-200 words.
• The abstract is like a skeleton of the essential
  features (characteristics) of the study
  Information is taken from each section of the
  article and presented very-briefly.

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Abstract (2)

• The abstract for an empirical study includes
• The aim of the study and the research hypothesis
  (or hypotheses)
• The variables tested in the study (design)
• Information about the procedure of the study and
  the participants
• An outline of the main results and a few
  interpretations of these findings (conclusion,
  interpretation)

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Abstract Exercise

• Read the following abstract and imagine a title
  for this report.
• What is the research question?
• Sandra A. Mulkens, Peter J. de Jong Harald
  Melckelbach, University of the Netherlands
• Twenty four women with spider phobia and 45 non
  phobic women completed the Disgust Questionnaire
  (DQ) and the Spider Phobia Questionnaire (SPQ).
  Participants also underwent behavioral tests
  concerning disgust sensitivity and fear of
  spiders. Spider phobic women showed stronger
  disgust sensitivity than non-phobic women, and
  spiders were found to have a disgust evoking
  status that was related to participants' fear of
  spiders. The relationship between DQ and SPQ was
  independent of neuroticism and introversion. DQ
  scores were not associated with a global measure
  of phobic complaints. Results are consistent with
  a disease-avoidance model of spider phobia, which
  emphasizes the role of disgust in spider phobia.

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Exercise

• Title Disgust spider phobia.
• Research question
• The study aimed to investigate the relationships
  between disgust sensitivity, that is being easily
  disgusted, and spider phobic symptoms.

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Introduction

• The Introduction section of a report aims to
  present the general topic and the goal of the
  study, the problematic and research questions,
  the historical background of the study with the
  review of theories and the related literature. It
  concludes with the specific research
  hypothesis(es) tested in the study, in relation
  to the existing theories and research findings.

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Introduction (2)

• The Introduction section usually takes the form
  of a funnel, in that it starts out with the
  description of a wider area of research and
  concludes with the very narrow purpose of the
  study, that is, to provide answers to a limited
  research question or to test a number of specific
  hypotheses.
• Structure
• Theoretical context of the study
• Formulation of research hypothesis(es)

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Introduction (3)

• Theoretical context of the study
• Reporting the "state of the art" of the research
  topic.
• Revealing gaps (i.e. issues that remain obscure,
  questions that remain unanswered) in the existing
  literature.
• Describing why, in view of the previous studies,
  the questions examined in the present report are
  innovative, original and necessary.

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Introduction (4)

• Research hypothesis(es)
• Purpose of the study.
• Formulation of research questions or specific
  research hypothesis(es).
• Specifies the variables and what type of effects
  are expected.

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Method

• The Method section of an article reports all the
  elements of data collection that would make it
  possible to replicate the study if so desired.

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Method (2)

• Structure
• Design
• Participants Population Sample Subjects
• Instruments Tools Measures Assessment
• Material(s)
• Apparatus
• Procedure

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Method (3)

• Design
• Describes the general plan followed to test the
  research hypothesis, and includes a definition of
  the method used for data collection.
• In experimental research, the design defines the
  assignment of participants to experimental
  conditions (I.V.) or control groups.

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Method (4)

• Participants Population Sample Subjects
• Provides a description of the individuals who
  participated in the study, including the
  population from which they were selected and how
  they were selected.
• Number of participants Socio-demographic
  characteristics (e.g. age, gender) and any other
  characteristic that is related to the study.
• Participation conditions are described (were the
  participants volunteers, did they get paid or
  receive credit for a course).

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Method (5)

• Instruments Tools Measures Tasks
• Presents the instruments or the tasks that were
  used to measure the variables under study.
• May include questionnaires, scales, interview
  guidelines, observation grids, psychometric
  tests, reaction time tasketc.
• Describes the instruments (number of items,
  rating procedure as well as the psychometric
  qualities of the instruments (reliability,
  validity).

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Method (6)

• Material(s)
• Any material used during the data collection is
  presented in this subsection.
• May include any stimulus objects used during an
  experiment or any other object necessary to carry
  out the procedure.
• Ex Language / Images / Sound

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Method (7)

• Apparatus
• An apparatus is a device that is especially used
  to run an experiment.
• Ex

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Method (8)

• Procedure
• The procedure is a chronological description of
  what takes place during the data collection.
• Includes the standardised instructions given to
  participants at the beginning of data collection,
  the activities in which individuals participate
  (e.g. filling in questionnaires, performing
  experimental tasks).

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Results

• This section describes the findings of the study
  and relies extensively on the results of
  statistical analyses.
• Statistical analyses can be
• Descriptive, that is, aiming to describe,
  organize and illustrate the data.
• Inferential, that is, aiming to verify whether
  differences, relationships and effects are
  statistically significant.
• The results are generally illustrated by tables
  or graphs.

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Discussion

• Aims to summarize the main findings and their
  interpretation
• Usually
• Reminds the reader of the initial aim of the
  study and the method that was used to answer the
  research questions or verify the hypotheses.
• Summarizes the results of the study and proposes
  an interpretation of the findings and the
  implications that they have both for the theory
  on which the research was based.
• Presents subsequent research projects.

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Discussion (2)

• Sometimes
• Presents evaluation and critique of the strengths
  and limitations of the study.
• Discusses applications and implications of their
  findings to real life situations.

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References

• Citations refer to sources (reports, books, etc.)
  of theoretical background presented in the
  introduction section.
• Citation rules are numerous and extremely
  detailed
• Example
• Caillies, S., Denhière, G., Kintsch, W.
  (2002). The effect of prior knowledge on
  understanding from text Evidence from primed
  recognition. European Journal of Cognitive
  Psychology, 14, 267- 286.

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Appendix

• Additional elements that may help the reader
  understand and evaluate the contents of the
  report.
• For instance, an instrument used for data
  collection (apparatus, questionnaire ,texts, etc.)

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Lets Work !
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Exercice 1

• Read the following abstract and imagine a title
  for this report.
• Make a French summary of this abstract.
• Curran, C.E., Kintsch, E., Hedberg N. -1996-
  Journal of educational psychology, 88, 3, 494-507
• The ability of 20 normally achieving and 20
  learned-disabled 8th- and 9th-grade readers to
  comprehend and interpret 2 fairly long and
  complex narratives, describing the emotional
  reactions of characters to realistic situations,
  was compared. The pattern of recall across story
  categories was similar for both groups. However,
  the learning-disabled readers across story
  recalled less overall than the normal readers,
  they were also less successful at differentiating
  levels of importance in the macrostructure of the
  stories. All students included less of the
  information needed to understand the characters
  interactions in the more difficult story than in
  the easier story. Although normal readers could
  supply this information when directly probed for
  it, learning-disabled students were less
  successful in this respect, suggesting serious
  weakness in their ability to construct an
  appropriate situation model. Implications for the
  instruction of learning-disabled students are
  discussed.

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Exercice 1

• Learning-disabled adolescents comprehension of
  naturalistic narratives
• La capacité, de 20 normaux lecteurs et de 20
  lecteurs en difficulté issus de 8ème et 9ème
  classes, à comprendre et interpréter 2 récits
  complexes et longs, décrivant les reactions
  émotionnelles de personnages dans des situations
  réalistes, a été appréhendée. Les patrons de
  rappel des différentes catégories de lhistoire
  étaient similaires pour les deux groupes de
  lecteurs. Toutefois, les lecteurs en difficultés
  rappellent moins dinformation que les normaux
  lecteurs et sont moins performants pour
  différencier les niveaux dimportance dans la
  macrostructure des histoires. Tous les étudiants
  ont moins bien inclus linformation indispensable
  à la compréhension des interactions entre les
  personnages de lhistoire la plus complexe
  comparée à lhistoire la plus simple. Bien que
  les normaux lecteurs réussissent à suppléer cette
  information quand on leur demandait, les
  étudiants en difficulté ny parvenaient pas, ce
  qui manifeste de sérieuses lacunes dans leur
  capacité à construire un modèle de situation
  approprié. Des implications relatives aux
  conseils à donner aux lecteurs en difficultés
  sont discutées.

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Exercice 2

• Read the following abstract and imagine a title
  for this report.
• Make a French summary of this abstract.
• Rinck, M., Glowalla, U., Schneider, K. (1992).
  Memory and Cognition, 20 (1), 29-39
• We report two experiments that investigate the
  effect of an induced mood on the incidental
  learning of emotionally toned words. Subjects
  were put in a happy or sad mood by means of a
  suggestion technique and rated the emotional
  valence of a list of words. Later on, they were
  asked to recall the words in a neutral mood. For
  words with a strong emotional valence, mood
  congruent learning was observed strongly
  unpleasant words were recalled better by sad
  subjects and strongly pleasant words were
  recalled better by happy subjects. The reverse
  was true for slightly toned words here,
  mood-incongruent learning was observed. Both
  effects are predicted by a two-component
  processing model that specifies the effect of the
  mood on the cognitive processes during learning.
  Further evidence for the model is given by rating
  times measured in Experiment 2.

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Exercice 2

• Mood-congruent and mood-incongruent learning
• Nous rapportons des expériences qui
  appréhendaient leffet dune humeur induite sur
  un apprentissage incident de mots valués
  émotionnellement. Les sujets ont été préparés à
  être dans une humeur gaie ou maussade à laide
  dune technique de suggestion en demandant aux
  sujets de juger de la valence émotionnelle de
  liste de mots. Plus tard, ces sujets devaient
  rappeler les mots dans un contexte dhumeur
  neutre. Pour les mots fortement valués, un effet
  de congruance dhumeur a été observé les mots
  fortement non plaisants ont été mieux rappelés
  par les sujets tristes et les mots fortement
  plaisants ont été mieux rappelés par les sujets
  gais. Linverse est vrai pour les mots faiblement
  valués un effet dincongruence dhumeur a été
  observé. Les deux effets peuvent être prédits par
  un modèle de traitement à deux composants qui
  spécifie leffet de lhumeur sur les processus
  cognitifs lors de lapprentissage. Dautres
  évidences pour ce modèle sont fournies par des
  mesures de temps de réaction dans lexpérience 2.

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Exercice 3

• Read the following abstract and imagine a title
  for this report.
• What is the research question?
• Ronald L. Scott Laurie A. Tetrault, Department
  of Psychology, Chapman College
• Clinical literature has had speculations
  concerning the attitudes of rapists toward women,
  but only a few studies have tested attitudinal
  hypotheses with psychometric instruments. The
  present investigation used the Attitudes toward
  Women Scale (AWS) to study and compare the
  attitudes of 20 incarcerated rapists, 20
  non-sex-related violent offenders, and 20 matched
  subjects in a contemporary control group. The
  results confirmed the general hypothesis that the
  rapist group would show different and more
  conservative attitudes toward women, especially
  in areas relating to sexual behavior. More
  specific analysis of subscale differences was
  used to further compare the groups on precise
  attitudinal variables. The findings were
  discussed in terms of the possible relationship
  between rape behaviour and stereotypic
  conservative attitudes toward women.

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Exercice 3

• Attitude of rapists and other offenders toward
  women.
• Research question
• The study compares rapists and non violent
  offenders in terms of their attitudes toward
  women. It is possible that the attitudes toward
  women plays a role in the aetiology of sexually
  violent ofenses.