PSYC 1010 Chapter Notes - Chapter 2: Scientific Theory, Descriptive Statistics, Scientific Progress

• School: York University
• Department: Psychology
• Course: PSYC 1010
• Professor: C Douglas McCann, Hilda Ho, Jala Rizeq, Ronda Lo, Iris Yusupov, Rotem Petranker

Document Summary

Psychologists & scientists share 3 sets of goals: 1. Investigator figures out a way to meaure phenomenon under study: first goal is to measure tecniques that make it possible to describe behaviour clearly & precisely, 2. Understanding & prediction: higher-level goal: understanding, they believe they understand events when they can explain reason for occurrence of events, make and test predictions called hypothesis, hypothesis: tentative statement about relationship between. 2/more variables: variables: measurable conditions, events, characteristics/behaviours that are controlled/observed in a study, 3. Application & control: they hope info they gather will help solve problems, once a phenomenon is understood, more control can be exert over it. Psychologists don"t set out just to collect isolated facts about relationships between variables, they construct theories. Peer review: evaluation by experts in the field. Scientific investigations are systematic, they follow an orderly pattern. Translate a theory or intuitive idea into a testable hypothesis. Colours can have automatic, unconscious effects on behaviour.