PSYB01H3 Chapter Notes - Chapter 1: John Stuart Mill, Pseudoscience, Socalled
Document Summary
Methods of acquiring knowledge: people have always observed the world around them and sought explanations for what they see and experience. Instead of using a scientific approach, many people rely on intuition and authority as ways of knowing. It"s okay to have opinions and beliefs as long as they"re presented as opinions. Goals of scientific research in psychology: goals of scientific research, to describe behaviour, to predict behaviour, to determine the causes of behaviour, to understand or explain behaviour. Description of behaviour: describing events involves careful observation and measurement, descriptive research can provide a foundation for future work. Determining the causes of behaviour: although we might accurately predict the occurrence of a behaviour, we might not have correctly identified its cause, experiments help us to identify cause-and-effect relas. Basic and applied research: there are differences in the extent to which research is readily applicable to everyday contexts.
