PSYB01H3 Chapter Notes - Chapter 2: Operational Definition, Longitudinal Study, Dependent And Independent Variables
Document Summary
A good research question should carry enough intrigue that you find yourself thinking about possible answers, debating the best answer with yourself or others, and then thinking about how you might test your ideas. Good research questions are empirical: enable you to use direct and indirect observations or experiences to test the research question. The ability to empirically test a research question differentiates scientific questions from non-scientific questions. Need to determine whether others have already answered our initial question. Even if other researchers have addressed aspects of our research question, it is highly unlikely that they have exhausted all possible avenues of inquiry. Conducting literature searchers allows us to learn what answers others have found and the methods they used to find them. Hypothesis: an educated prediction that provides a testable explanation of a phenomenon: test each hypothesis by designing a study for each that provides a fair test of our proposed answer.
