PS101 Chapter Notes - Chapter 2: Operational Definition, Descriptive Statistics, Swedish Grammar
Document Summary
Research methods matter so much to psychologists because they allow researchers to separate reliable information from unfounded beliefs, sort out conflicting views, and correct false ideas that may cause people harm. (autistic children and facilitated communication) Research methods are the tools of the psychological scientist"s trade, and understanding them is crucial for everyone who reads or hears about a new program or an exciting finding that is said to be based on psychological research. Theory: an organized system of assumptions and principles that propose to explain a specified set of phenomena and their interrelations. Hypothesis: a statement that attempts to predict or to account for a set of phenomena; scientific hypotheses specify relations among events or variables and are empirically tested. Theory leads to hypothesis which leads to predictions. Operational definition: a precise definition of a term in a hypothesis, which specifies the operations for observing and measuring the process or phenomenon being defined (separately defines each term used)
