PSYCH 56: Experimental Psychology
Chapter 1 explain relationships, and
communicate this information to
EXPERIMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY AND THE
others are known as the scientific
SCIENTIFIC METHOD
method
THE NEED FOR SCIENTIFIC METHODOLOGY
THE CHARACTERISTICS OF MODERN SCIENCE
• to understand the behavior of others
1. The Scientific Mentality
and to guide our own behavior
a. Alfred North Whitehead -
o commonsense psychology -
philosopher of science who
nonscientific data gathering
traced the development of
that shapes our expectations
science
and beliefs and directs our
• postulated that faith in an
behavior toward other
organized universe is essential to
Two very important factors: science
• the sources of psychological determinism - research psychologists
information share the belief that there are
• our inferential strategies specifiable causes for the way people
behave and that these causes can be
Nonscientific sources of data discovered through research
• psychological information, particularly 2. Gathering Empirical Data
when it is offered by people we like, a. Aristotle - assumed that order
respect, or admire, is typically exists in the universe, and he
accepted without question set about describing that
• confirmation bias - once we believe order in a systematic way by
we know something, we tend to collecting empirical data—
overlook instances that might that is, data that are
disconfirm our beliefs, and we seek, observable or experienced.
instead, confirmatory instances of • empirical data can be verified or
behavior disproved through investigation
• The inferential strategies we use 3. Seeking General Principles
when we process data are sometimes
too simple to be completely General principles to structure data:
accurate. • Laws - these principles have the
Nonscientific Inference generality to apply to all
situations
• one of the first and most important • Theory - we do not have enough
kinds of data we collect about others information to state a general
comes in the form of traits we assign law, but we advance
to them understanding by devising and
o fundamental attribution testing an interim explanation
error 4. Good Thinking
• The process of stereotyping illustrates - A central feature of the scientific
a related problem of nonscientific method
inference. - our approach to the collection
• The steps scientists take to gather and and interpretation of data should
verify information, answer questions,
PSYCH 56: Experimental Psychology
be systematic, objective, and
rational.
THE SCIENTIFIC METHOD: TOOLS OF
- being open to new ideas
PSYCHOLOGICAL SCIENCE
- avoid letting private beliefs or
expectations influence 1. Observation - is the systematic noting
observations or conclusions and recording of events
- follows the rule of logic 2. Measurement - is the assignment of
- parsimony - stick to a basic numerical values to objects or events
premise or their characteristics according to
5. Self-correction conventional rules.
- accept the uncertainty of their 3. Experimentation - to do an
own conclusions experiment, our predictions must be
6. Publicizing results testable.
- exchange of information between
scientists Three minimum requirements must be met:
7. Replication • we must have procedures for
- We should be able to repeat our manipulating the setting
procedures and get the same • the predicted outcome must be
results again if we have gathered observable.
data objectively and if we have • we must be able to measure the
followed good thinking. outcome
THE OBJECTIVES OF PSYCHOLOGICAL SCIENTIFIC EXPLANATION IN
SCIENCE PSYCHOLOGICAL SCIENCE
1. Description - systematic and unbiased 1. Identifying Antecedent Conditions -
account of the observed When XYZ is the set of antecedent
characteristics of behaviors. conditions, the outcome is a
a. Case studies particular behavior. If the XYZ set of
b. Field studies antecedents occurs again, we expect
2. Prediction - the capacity for knowing the same outcome.
in advance when certain behaviors 2. Comparing Treatment Conditions -
would be expected to occur—to be although we cannot identify all the
able to predict them ahead of time— antecedent conditions, we can focus
because we have identified other on particular antecedents that we
conditions with which the behaviors believe have an effect on behavior.
are linked or associated. - we create specific sets of
a. Correlational antecedent conditions that we
b. Quasi-experimental designs call treatments
3. Explanation - when we have 3. The Psychology Experiment - a
explained a behavior, we also controlled procedure in which at least
understand what causes it to occur two different treatment conditions
a. Experimental research design are applied to subjects.
4. Control - once a behavior has been - The subjects’ behaviors are then
explained through experimentation, it measured and compared to test a
may be possible to use that hypothesis about the effects of
knowledge to effect change or those treatments on behavior.
improve behavior.
PSYCH 56: Experimental Psychology
-Successful experimentation relies
heavily on the principle of
control.
4. Establishing Cause and Effect - If the
XYZ set of antecedents always leads
to a particular behavior, whereas
other treatments do not, we can infer
that XYZ causes the behavior.
5. Necessary versus Sufficient
Conditions - as we seek cause-and-
effect relationships in science and
psychology, we try to identify the
conditions under which events will
occur
PSEUDOSCIENCE TO PSYCHOLOGICAL
SCIENCE
Europe
• Wilhelm Wundt (1832–1926), is
generally credited with being the first
experimental psychologist
America
• Early academic psychology in the
United States found its home in
departments of philosophy under the
rubric of mental philosophy
