PSY 402 Lecture Notes - Lecture 3: Confounding, Blind Experiment, Content Validity
27 Oct 2016
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Document Summary
The study of adult development and aging: research methods: experimental design. Dependent variable - what the experimenter measures; changes as a result of the independent variable. Double blind- neither the experimenter nor the subjects know if they are in the experimental or control groups. Disadvantages: can you generalize to real life, many topics cant be investigated: effects of divorce, daycare, ca(cid:374)"t study de(cid:448)elop(cid:373)e(cid:374)tal issues a(cid:272)(cid:396)oss ti(cid:373)e. Cant manipulate the independent variable or randomly assign participants to groups. Time of measurement effects influences at work at the time the study took place: cross-sectional studies. 2 or more cohorts tested at one time (20-30-40 year old on anxiety at one period of time) Advantages: easier, less time-consuming, no problems of dropping out of study, no practice effects of being repeatedly tested, can use up to date methods and tests. Corrective steps: control for cohort differences by careful attention to selection of samples, validate procedures on different age groups before comparing them.
