PSYC 100 Lecture Notes - Lecture 2: Scientific Method, Confirmation Bias, Naturalistic Observation
3 Feb 2018
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Document Summary
Psychologists use the scientific method to conduct their research. The scientific method is a standardized way of making observations, gathering data, forming theories, testing predictions, and interpreting results. Researchers make observations in order to describe and measure behavior. After observing certain events repeatedly, researchers come up with a theory that explains these observations. A theory is an explanation that organizes separate pieces of information in a coherent way. Researchers generally develop a theory only after they have collected a lot of evidence and made sure their research results can be reproduced by others. Example: a psychologist observes that some college sophomores date a lot, while others do not. He observes that some sophomores have blond hair, while others have brown hair. He also observes that in most sophomore couples at least one person has brown hair. In addition, he notices that most of his brown-haired friends date regularly, but his blond friends don"t date much at all.
