PSYCO104 Lecture Notes - Lecture 1: Falsifiability, Operational Definition, Process Variable
22 Jun 2018
School
Department
Course
Professor
PSYCO 104 - Lecture 1 Notes
●Hindsight
○“Life is lived forwards, but understood backwards” (Kierkegaard)
○One (non-scientific) approach to understanding behaviour relies on hindsight, or
trying to understand why something happened by speculating about it ‘after the
fact’
○Hindsight bias:
thinking you would have predicted an outcome you already know
○Relying on hindsight reasoning can be problematic
○Tends to result in many contradictions because there are often many possible
explanations for any given behaviour/situation
■e.g. will a long distance relationship be successful? If it is, can say
‘absence makes the heart grow fonder’… if it isn’t ‘out of sight out of
mind’
○Not clear how to evaluate accuracy of hindsight reasoning
●Science As An Alternative
○An alternative to hindsight for understanding behaviour is to rely on the
scientific method
○The scientific method places a great emphasis on prediction, control and theory
building
●The Scientific Method
○Principles
■Curiosity (why does something happen?)
■Skepticism (what is the evidence for a claim?)
■Open-mindedness (are there other explanations?)
○It could be argued that psychology has been historically slow to adopt the
scientific method, which may in part relate to the intangible nature of mental
processes
■e.g. it is much less clear how to measure something like intelligence, as
compared to how fast a ball is thrown
○Steps in the Scientific Method
■Identify question of interest (ex. What makes someone help less?)
■Gather information and formulate hypothesis (specific prediction)
■Test hypothesis by conducting research
■Analyze data, draw tentative conclusions, report findings (Not really
prove things; getting closer to the truth)
■Build a body of knowledge, build theory (formal statement)
●Theory Building
○General characteristics of theories (Draws on various kinds of experiments;
there's a lot of stuff, a lot of integrated studies that have a variation with the
testing of the hypothesis)
■Broader than any one single prediction
■Dynamic (new knowledge/theories are constantly replacing older ones)
■Change is generally incremental but paradigm shifts do occur (e.g.
believing the earth revolves around the sun, and not the other way
around, i.e . heliocentric vs. geocentric model)
○Characteristics of good theories:
■Incorporates existing facts and observations within a single broader
framework (organizes information in a meaningful way)
■Are testable (falsifiable)
■Have prediction supported by research
■Conform to the law of parsimony (also known as Occam’s razor
)
■Generate principles that can be applied to new situations
●Peer Review Process
42
PSYCO104 Full Course Notes
Verified Note
42 documents
Document Summary
Life is lived forwards, but understood backwards (kierkegaard) One (non-scientific) approach to understanding behaviour relies on hindsight, or trying to understand why something happened by speculating about it after the fact" thinking you would have predicted an outcome you already know. Relying on hindsight reasoning can be problematic. Tends to result in many contradictions because there are often many possible explanations for any given behaviour/situation. Absence makes the heart grow fonder" if it isn"t out of sight out of mind". Not clear how to evaluate accuracy of hindsight reasoning. An alternative to hindsight for understanding behaviour is to rely on the scientific method. The scientific method places a great emphasis on prediction, control and theory building. Skepticism (what is the evidence for a claim?) It could be argued that psychology has been historically slow to adopt the scientific method, which may in part relate to the intangible nature of mental processes.
