The Science of

Psychology
Psychology:
A Concise Introduction
2nd Edition

Chapter 1
The Journey…

 Explain the Four Major Research

Perspectives
 Discuss the research Methods Used
by Psychologists
 How to Understand Research
Results
 Psychology
 The science of behavior and mental
processes
 Psychologists attempt to understand
1.Observable behavior: Such as speech
and physical movement
2.Mental processes: Such as remembering
and thinking, which cannot be directly
observed
 The Four Major
Research Perspectives
Perspectives Emphasizing
Internal Factors
Perspectives Emphasizing
External Factors
Four Perspectives

Biological Behavioral

Socio-
Cognitive
cultural

All four perspectives are complementary; they fit together like

the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle to give us the complete picture.
No one perspective is “better’ than another, as each one
provides information of behavior and mental processing.
Perspectives Emphasizing
Internal Factors
 Biological perspective
 Views our physiological hardware (especially
the brain and nervous system) viewed as the
major determinants of behavior and
mental processing
 Cognitive perspective
 Emphasizes how our
mental processes, such as
perception, memory, and
problem solving, work and
impact our behavior
The Biological Perspective
 Why people get depressed?
 From a biological perspective, we would focus on a
deficiency of activity for certain chemicals in our
nervous system as the cause of this disorder,
and use anti-depressant drugs to alleviate the
disorder
 A few weeks after starting to ingest the drugs, we
feel better because mood is in part a function of
brain chemistry
The Biological Perspective
 Biological psychologists also study
the involvement of the various parts
of the brain and nervous system on
our behavior and mental processing
 For instance, vision is actually
processed in the back of our heads
(hence, we really do have eyes in
the back of our heads, ” or more
precisely “the back of our brains”)
 The Cognitive Perspective
 When explaining why people become depressed, the
cognitive psychology would focus on reasons such as
how people explain their successes and failures
 If we blame ourselves for all of our setbacks (i.e., make internal
attributions), we might start to feel poorly about ourselves
 However, if we realize the situation played a role in some of our
setbacks (i.e., make external attributions), we might not feel so
badly
 Of course, it is important for students not to blame their academic
failures on their teachers, because in so doing they would fail to
take personal responsibility for their lives!
 The Cognitive Perspective
 Many people report problems remembering
other people’s names
 Often, we claim it is because we have bad memories,
but is that so?
 Or, is it that we never bothered to exert the mental
energy required in the first place to encode other
people’s names?
 Both explanations may have validity, and such
explanations would be of interest to a cognitive
psychologist
Perspectives Emphasizing
External Factors
 Behavioral perspective
 Explains that we behave as we do
because of our past history of conditioning
by our
environment
 Sociocultural perspective
 Focuses on the impact of other people and
culture on our behavior and mental
processing
Behavioral Perspective
Two types of conditioning:

Classical Operant
Conditioning Conditioning

Can explain how we Involves the

learn fear and other relationship between
emotional responses, our behavior and its
taste aversions, and environmental
certain other behaviors consequences
Classical Conditioning
 When entering a department
store, you may catch the
scent of a perfume or
cologne of an old boyfriend
or girlfriend, and instantly be
reminded of that person
because during the
relationship, you came to
associate the scent with the
person
Operant Conditioning
 If you ask a question in class, and the teacher
say “What a stupid question!” you are unlikely to
ask questions in the future to avoid such an
undesirable consequence
 But, if the teachers prefaces his or her response
to the question with “That’s an interesting
question,” you may continue to ask questions in
the future because of the desirable consequence
of being implicitly told you are smart
The Sociocultural Perspective
 In 1964, Kitty Genovese was brutally attacked and
murdered while trying to enter her apartment building
in New York City late one night. Many of the people
living in the building heard
her screams and cries for help,
but no one called the police
under after the attacker had
killed her and fled more than
30 minutes later.
 Subsequently, researchers
devised laboratory experiments
that examined how particular
variables influence people’s decision
whether or not to help each other.
Major Research Perspectives
in Psychology
Perspective Major Explanatory Focus
Biological How our physiology (especially the brain
and nervous system) produces our behavior
and mental processes and how genetics
and evolution have impacted our physiology
Cognitive How our mental processes, such as
perception, memory, and problem solving,
work and how they impact our behavior
Behavioral How external environmental events
condition our observable behavior
Sociocultural How other people and the cultural context
impact our behavior and mental processes
Concept Check
 What is the difference between biological and
cognitive research perspectives?
 What is the difference between behavioral
and sociocultural research perspectives?
Research Methods Used
by Psychologists
Descriptive Methods
Correlational Studies
Experimental Research
Research Methods

Correlational

Descriptive Experimental
Descriptive Methods
 Include
 Observational techniques
 Case studies
 Survey research
 Seek to provide objective and detailed
descriptions of behavior and mental
processes
Descriptive Methods:
Observational Techniques

 The researcher directly observes the

behavior of interest
 Naturalistic observation: The behavior being
observed occurs in its natural setting, without the
researcher intervening in the behavior being
observed.
 Participant observation: The observer becomes
part of the group being observed. This type of
research is similar to undercover police work.
Naturalistic Observation
 Researchers use naturalistic
observation when they are
interested in how humans
or other animals behave in
their natural environments
 For instance, two well-known
observational studies were
done by Dian Fossey in a
study of mountain gorillas in Africa, and Jane
Goodall’s study of chimpanzees in Africa
 This technique is also used in settings such as
schools, the workplace, and bars
Participant Observation
 In most observational studies, the observer begins the
study as a participant, whether in a laboratory or a
natural setting
 One famous example of participant observation was
conducted by Rosenhan (1973). In this study,
psychologists posing as patients with symptoms of a
major mental disorder were admitted to psychiatric
hospitals because the doctors could not tell the
psychologists from the real disordered patients. Once
admitted, these “pseudopatients” acted normally and
asked to be released. However, they were not
released until many days later!
Descriptive Methods:
Case Studies
 The researcher studies an individual in depth
over an extended period of time to attempt to
learn as much as possible about the
individual being studied
 Often used in clinical settings to gather
information that will help in the treatment of
the patient
 Results of case studies cannot be
generalized to other people
 Descriptive Methods:
Case Studies
 Case studies do allow the researcher to develop
hypotheses that can be tested using experimental
research
 For instance, the case of H. M., who had his
hippocampus removed for medical reasons at a
young age, was a case study. H. M. seemed to
have normal memory for information learned
before the surgery, but didn’t seem to be able to
form any new memories. Such a finding led to the
hypothesis that the hippocampus plays an
important role in the formation of new memories,
which was supported by subsequent experimental
research.
Descriptive Methods:
Survey Research

 Uses questionnaires and interviews to collect

information about the behavior, beliefs, and
attitudes of particular groups of people
 It is critical to note that the wording, order, and
structure of the survey questions may lead the
participants to biased answers
 For instance, some questions might evoke socially-
desirable responses in an effort to make certain
impressions on the researchers
 Descriptive Methods:
Survey Research
 Another concern for survey researchers is
defining the population, or the entire group
of people to be studied
 From that population, a representative
sample, or subset of the people in the
population, is surveyed
 The sample must be representative of the larger
relevant population so you can generalize
results of the survey from the smaller sample to
the larger population
A representative sample?
 In a study of women and love, a sample was
drawn mainly from women’s organizations and
political groups, plus some women who requested
and completed a survey following the
researcher’s talk show appearances
 Thus, the results (which said that women having
affairs and being disenchanted in their
relationships with men was typical) were not
representative of the population of American
women
Random Sampling
 Each individual in the
population has an equal
opportunity of being in the
sample
 It is much like drawing names
from a hat
 Random sampling allows the
researcher to generalize his
or her findings from the
sample to the larger
population
Correlational Methods
 Two variables are measured to
determine if they are related
 A variable is any factor that can take on
more than one value (e.g., height, age,
GPA, extraversion level)
 The Correlation Coefficient
 A statistic that tells us the
type and the strength of
the relationship between
two variables
 Range in value from -1.0
to +1.0
 The sign of the
coefficient (- or +) tells us the
type of relationship,
positive or negative
 Positive Correlation
 A positive correlation indicates a direct
relationship between two variables, with low
scores on one variable tending to be paired
with low scores on the other variable, and high
scores on one variable tending to be paired
with high scores on the other variable
 For instance, SAT scores and first-year college
GPA tend to be positively correlated
 A person ’ s height and weight also tend to be
positively correlated
 Negative Correlation
 A negative correlation is an inverse
relationship between two variables, with low
scores on one variable tending to be paired with
high scores on the other variable
 For instance, there is a negative correlation between
how much time a student watches TV and his or her
grades in school
 Mountain elevation level and temperature are also
negatively correlated
Strength of Relationship
 The second part of correlation coefficient is
its absolute value, which ranges from 0 to 1
 Zero and absolute values near zero indicate no
relationship
 As the absolute value increases toward 1.0, the
strength of the relationship increases
 It is critical to note that the sign of the
coefficient tells us nothing about the strength
of the relationship
Scatterplots
 A scatterplot is a visual depiction
of correlational data
 On the X axis are scores on one
variable; on the Y axis are scores on
the second variable
 Each data point in the scatterplot is a
person’s scores on each of the two
variables
Third-Variable problem
 Another variable maybe responsible for the
relationship observed between two variables.
 Not controlled in correlational study making it
impossible to determine the cause of the
observed relationship
 Example: study on the variables that predicts
the use of contraceptive devices.
 Findings: Use of contraceptive devices is strongly
correlated with number of electrical appliances. Third
variables: Education and Socio-economic status
Experimental Research

 The key aspect of experimental research is

that the researcher controls the
experimental setting
 It is this control that allows the researcher to
make cause-and-effect statements about
the experimental
results
Experimental Control

 First, the experimenter controls for the influence of

possible third-variables by making sure that they are
held constant across all of the experimental
groups/conditions
 Second, the experimenter controls for any possible
influence due to the individual characteristics of the
participants, such as intelligence, by using random
assignment, which is randomly assigning the
participants to groups in an experiment to equalize
participant characteristics across the various groups
in the experiment
Designing an Experiment
 When a researcher designs an experiment, the
researcher begins with a hypothesis about the
cause-and-effect relationship between two variables
 The independent variable is the
hypothesized cause, and the
experimenter manipulates it
 The dependent variable is the
variable that is hypothesized to
be affected by the independent
variable and thus is measured by
the experimenter
Designing an Experiment
 The simplest of experiments is one with two groups,
in which participants are randomly assigned to one of
the groups
 One of the groups will be exposed to the independent
variable, and the other group will not be
 The group exposed to the
independent variable is
called the experimental
group
 The group not exposed to
the independent variable is
called the control group
For example…
 Hypothesis is that aerobic exercise reduces anxiety. Which is
the IV and DV? Which is the experimental group? The control
group?

 The experiment must measure the anxiety levels for the

groups at the beginning of the study before
the independent variable is manipulated
and then again after the manipulation
 If the two groups are truly equivalent, the
average anxiety level for each group at
the start of the study should be the same
 If aerobic exercise does reduce anxiety,
then we should see this difference in the
second measurement at the end of the
experiment
The Placebo Group
 A placebo group is a group of participants that
believes they are receiving treatment but are not
 They receive a placebo, a
harmless pill that has no
active ingredients
 For example, this group
would be told they are
getting an anti-anxiety
drug, but they would only
get a placebo
The Placebo Group

 The placebo effect is improvement due to the

expectation of improving because of receiving
treatment
 The reduction of anxiety in the experimental group
participants may, in fact, be partially or completely
due to a placebo effect
 To conclude that the reduction of anxiety in the
experimental group was not due to a placebo
effect, it would have to be significantly greater
than that observed for the placebo group
Inferential Statistical Analyses

 Indicate the probability that the results of a

study are due to random variation (chance)
 Of course, the researchers would
want this probability to be low
 In statistics, a “significant”
finding is one that has a
probability of 0.05 (1/20) or less
that it is due to chance
 Thus, a significant finding is one
that is probably not due to
chance
The Double-Blind Procedure

 A control measure in which neither the

experimenter nor the participants know
which participants actually got the treatment
and or got the placebo
 Why participants should not know their group
assignment?
 Why experimenters should not know the
participants group assignment?
Summary of Research Methods
Concept Check
 Explain why the result of case study cannot
be generalized to a population.
 Explain why double-blind procedure is
necessary?
How to Understand
Research Results
Descriptive Statistics
Frequency Distributions
Types of Statistics

Descriptive Inferential
Statistics Statistics

Used to describe the Indicate the probability

data of a research that the results of the
study in a concise study are due to
fashion random variation
Descriptive Statistics
 Two types of descriptive statistics
 Measures of central tendency
 Measures of variability
 A researcher will also often examine a
frequency distribution, which
depicts in a table or graph,
the number of participants
receiving each score for
a variable
Measures of Central Tendency
 Designed to summarize a set of data with a single number
 Three measures of central tendency
1. The mean is the numerical average for a distribution of score
2. The median is the score that is positioned in the middle of the
distribution of scores when scores are listed from lowest to highest
 If there is an odd number of scores,
the median is the middle score
 If there is an even number of scores, the
median is the average of the two center scores
3. The mode is the most frequently-occurring
score in a distribution of scores
 If two scores occur with equal
frequency, both can be the mode
About the Mean…
 The mean is the most commonly
used measure of central tendency
because it is used to analyze data
in many inferential statistical tests
 However, the mean,
because it uses all
scores in its
computation, can
be distorted by
extremely high or
extremely low scores
Measures of Variability
 Designed to provide an idea of how scattered a set
of scores tends to be
 Two measures of variability
1. The range is the difference between the highest and
lowest scores in a distribution of scores
 Like the mean, the range can be greatly distorted by
extremely high or extremely low scores
2. The standard deviation is the average extent to which
the scores vary from the mean of the distribution
 A small standard deviation means that scores do not
vary very much from the mean
 A larger standard deviation means that scores tend to
vary greatly from the mean
Summary of
Descriptive Statistics
Frequency Distributions
 Organizes the data in a score distribution so
that we know the frequency of each score
 Types of distributions

Normal Skewed
Distributions Distributions
Normal Distributions
 The mean, the median, and the mode are all
equal because the normal distribution is
symmetric about its center
 The percentage of scores falling within a certain
number of standard deviations of the mean is set
 About 68% of the scores fall within 1 standard deviation
of the mean
 About 95% fall within 2 standard deviations of the mean
 More than 99% fall within 3 standard deviations of the
mean
 It is these percentages that give the normal
distribution its bell shape
The Normal Distribution
Normal Distributions with
Different Standard Deviations
Percentile Rank
 The percentage of
scores below a
specific score in a
distribution of scores
 For instance, the percentile rank of a score that is 1
standard deviation above the mean is roughly 84%
 Note that you can never have a percentile rank
of 100% because it is impossible to outscore
yourself
 You can, however, have a percentile rank of 0% if
you have the lowest score in the distribution
Skewed Distributions

 Are asymmetrical in shape

 A right-skewed (also called positively
skewed) distribution is a frequency distribution
in which there are some unusually high
scores, but most scores tend to be low
 A left-skewed (also called negatively skewed)
distribution is a frequency distribution
in which there are some unusually low score,
but most scores tend to be high
Sample Skewed Distributions
Skewed Distributions

 Because unusually high or low scores distort a mean,

such distortion occurs for the means of skewed
distributions
 The mean for a right-skewed distribution is distorted
toward the tail created by the few high scores and so
is greater than the median
 The mean for a left-skewed distribution is distorted
toward the tail created by the few low scores and so is
less than the median
 Consequently, when you have a skewed distribution, you
should use the median because atypical scores in the
distribution do not distort the median
Concept Check
 Explain the relationship between the mean
and median in a right-skewed distribution and
in a left skewed distribution