PSYCH 202 Lecture Notes - Lecture 2: J. Robert Oppenheimer, Extrapolation, List Of Fables Characters
3 May 2018
School
Department
Course
Professor
Research Methods
The sietist is fee, ad ust e fee, to ask ay uestio, to dout ay assetio, to seek
fo ay eidee, to oet ay eos.-J. Robert Oppenheimer
A noble statement, what we aspire to. Constantly wondering, questioning, not just accepting
ideas at face value but looking for an explanation
Oe of the eautiful thigs aout siee is that it allos us to ule alog, gettig it
wrong time after time, and feel perfectly fine as long as we learn something each time. No
doubt, this can be difficult for students who are accustomed to getting the answers right. No
doubt, reasonable levels of confidence and emotional resilience help, but I think scientific
education might do more to ease what is a very big transition: from learning what other
people once discovered to making your own discoveries. The more comfortable we become
with being stupid, the deeper we will wade into the unknown and the more likely we are to
ake ig disoeies.-Martin Schwartz (2008)
There's nothing wrong with making mistakes in the scientific process as long as you learn
something, always progress within failures
Scientific Methods-a procedure for finding truth by using empirical evidence.
The goal of psychological research and practice
Description-describe the phenomenon we're interested in studying
Explanation-why is it that this behavior occurs
Prediction-predict what will happen in the future, more or less of behavior
Control-can we modify or change the behavior in some way
Our Research Topic: Smartphones in the classroom
We know that students use smartphones in the classroom and that number continues to
increase, most students have smartphones. 10th anniversary of iPhone.
"To do two things at once is to do neither.."
Checking phone 150x a day
128 texts a day
Dogmatism-the tendency for people to cling to their assumptions
Empiricism-the belief that accurate knowledge can be acquired through
Empirical method-a set of rules and techniques for observation
Complexity-the brain is a complex organ and scientists can barely begin to say how the
500 million interconnected neurons that constitute the brain give rise to the thoughts,
feelings, and actions that are psychology's core concerns
Variability-No tow individuals every do, say, think, or feel exactly the same thing under
eactl the sae circustaces, hich eas that he ou’e see oe, ou’e ost
definitely not seen them all
Reactivity-People often think, feel, and act one way when they are being observed and a
different way when they are not.
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
What is science?
How do we begin to ask questions?
How do we collect information?
How do we make sense out of what we collect?
What can we say when we are all done?
Misconceptions about Science
Science is always correct
Science is always conducted via an idealized method
Science is always conducted with perfect objectivity
Science is simply a collection of facts
The Scientific Method How do we begin to understand brain and behavior?
People start to go through withdraw from their phones and is that a problem with classroom
performance
Identify the problem-formulate theory and generate hypothesis
Collect information-collect data, raises questions, who are we studying, what measures are we
studying with and what technique are we using
Draw conclusions
Revise theory
The Scientific Method
Identify the problem (ANALYZE)
Account for paradoxical incidents
Extrapolate from similar problems
Introspect on your own experiences
Reverse the direction of a commonsense hypothesis
Analyze a problem into component pieces
Theories and Hypotheses
Theories - frameworks for explaining various events or processes
Our understanding of how the world works, what we think we will observe. A hypothetical
explanation of a natural phenomenon.
Hypotheses - a testable prediction derived from theories
We have a theory about the use of cell phones in class: Phones will serve as a distraction from
listening to professor.
Hypotheses: Students who use phones in class will do worse in the class. Hypotheses has to be
able to be proven wrong(falsifiable). A falsifiable prediction made by a theory.
A hypothesis must be falsifiable, i.e., able to be disproved
Freud's theorized are unable to be proven wrong because they talk about things happening in
the unconscious, where we don't know that it's happening
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
Document Summary
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