PSYC 100 Chapter Notes - Chapter 2: Naturalistic Observation, Scientific Method, Empiricism

• School: Queen's University
• Department: Psychology
• Course: PSYC 100
• Professor: Jordan Poppenk

Document Summary

Objective: explain the five principle steps of the scientific method. Example : if psychologists want to study how the time of day effects social interactions they may stand in the mall. Correlation designs: correlations measure the relationships between two variables. Example: if psychologists want to study sleep patterns they may attach electrodes to the patients head to study brain waves. Experimental methods: experiments determine cause and effect. Example: giving patients different drugs and determining the cause and effect. Scientific observations are sometimes organized into theories: theory is defined as an idea or a conceptual mode, that is designed to explain existing facts and make predictions about new facts that might be discovered. Newton"s theory of gravity: the theory of gravity originated and observed by the fall of an apple, the theory gives weight to objects with mass and causes them to fall to the ground when dropped.