PSY 1101 Lecture Notes - Lecture 4: Falsifiability, Dependent And Independent Variables, Null Hypothesis

• School: University of Ottawa
• Department: Psychology
• Course: PSY 1101
• Professor: Najwa Haddad

Document Summary

Measures of central tendency: the mode is the score that occurs most often, the mean is the average of all scores, the median is the score at which half the individuals score above and half score below. Problems with the mean: at times, our measures are not normally distributed. Extremely high or low scores might distort the average ( or mean ) In this case, the median might be a better measure of central tendency. Positive and negative correlations: the larger the correlation, the stronger the association. (ability to predict, correlation is not causality. True experiments: manipulation of one variables causes another variable to change. Logical positivism: every scientific theory must be potentially falsifiable, we cannot prove something does not exist, we can prove something exists, based on theory, scientists form a hypothesis or prediction.