PSY 302 Lecture : PSY302_ClassNotes_L2_2014.docx

• School: Ryerson University
• Department: Psychology
• Course: PSY 302
• Professor: Alba Agostino

Document Summary

Class notes lecture 2 chapter 1 continued & chapter 2. Methods for studying child development: the scientific method, contexts for gathering. Data about children: correlation and causation, designs for examining development. The scientific method: choosing a question, formulating a hypothesis (i. e. , an educated guess, testing the hypothesis, drawing a conclusion. Importance of appropriate measurement: relevance to hypotheses, reliability, validity. Is a particular test a good measure of development: must be both reliable and valid. Reliability and validity: measurement (cont"d, validity, extent to which a test accurately reflects what it is intended to measure, validity = reliability, reliability validity. Reliability: the degree to which independent measurements of a given behavior are consistent. Interrater reliability: the amount of agreement in the observations of different raters who witness the same behavior: test-retest reliability: attained when measures of performance are similar on two or more occasions.