02/05/14 Research Methods

• Psychology is a science, thus, it is based on research.
• Hindsight Bias- The tendency to believe, after learning the outcome, that you knew it all along.
• Overconfidence- We tend to think we know more than we do.
• The Barnum Effect- It is the tendency for people to accept very general or vague characterizations of themselves and take them to be accurate. 

• Hypothesis
• Expresses a relationship between two variables.
• A variable is anything that can vary among participants in a study.
• Independent Variable
• Whatever is being manipulated in the experiment.
• Hopefully that independent variable brings about change.
• Dependent Variable
• Whatever is being measured  in the experiment.
• It is dependent on the independent variable.
• Operational Research
• Explain what you mean in your hypothesis.
• How will the variables be measured in "real-life" terms.