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Practice – Descriptive Methods

Learning Targets:

• Differentiate between types of research (e.g., experiments, quasi-experiments, survey research, naturalistic observations, lab observations, case studies, longitudinal studies, and cross-sectional studies) with regard to purpose, strengths, and weaknesses.

PART II

Individual Case Study Group Case Study Survey Meta-Analysis

Naturalistic Observation Laboratory Observation Psychological Test

Directions: Choose the answer that fits best for each scenario. Some questions may have more than one answer if they are longitudinal or cross-sectional.

1. A disadvantage most associated with the ___________________________ of research method is that people who know they are being studied and watched by experimenters may act differently because they are being watched. They realize they are being watched because the study is taking place in an artificial setting created at a university.

2. Researchers investigating whether or not individuals with business majors or English majors did better in law school combined data from 15 separate studies and found that no significant difference existed. Which type of descriptive research was used in this example? ___________________________

3. Dr. Panchal is a neuropsychologist studying the behavioral deficits experienced by one patient with an extremely rare and severe form of brain damage. She does many tests on this person and has long conversations, which she documents and describes. ___________________________

4. Justin is interested in how alcohol affects social behavior. He goes to a bar and watches patrons’ interactions as they consume alcoholic beverages throughout the evening. What research method is Justin using? ___________________________

5. Nina wants to know whether there is a market for a brand new product, the Freeze-wave, which freezes all types of food in seconds. Nina needs to gather a great deal of information very quickly and inexpensively. To find out what percentage of people and what types of people might be interested in such a product, Nina needs to use ___________________________ as her method of research.

6. Dr. Belen is interested in studying how preschoolers interact in group activities and sets up a day care center at his university which allows him to watch the children through 2 way glass. Parents will drop kids off knowing that the kids will be involved in research. Dr. Belen will most likely use which research method? ___________________________

7. N.A. had a damaged hippocampus (brain structure) and psychiatrists visited him weekly for two years. During these visits, they tested his memory, his IQ, and closely observed his behavior as well as recording notes from conversations. This method of research is best described as ___________________________

8. The United States Census, which attempts to contact every person in the nation and ask him or her questions, is an example of which research method? ___________________________

9. You believe elephants have intelligence and that this intelligence increases, as elephants get older. You test your hypothesis by observing the behaviors of the same group of elephants in the wild at birth and at five-year intervals. You do not interfere with the animal’s behavior. What type of study is this? ___________________________ AND what type of design is this __________________________ (Cross Sectional or Longitudinal)

10. Jocelyn is interested in a rare form of phobia. She is particularly interested in factors associated with the development of this phobia. She only has one patient with the phobia to work with. The research method that would be most useful for her is ___________________________

11. Yasou calls people on the phone and asks them a specified list of questions concerning their opinions about how irritating telemarketers can be. What kind of research is Yasou conducting? _________________________

12. In order to evaluate whether or not a particular teaching method was effective investigators combined the results of ten small studies (each including fewer than 10 participants) to create a larger sample upon which to base a hypothesis. Which research method was used? ___________________________

13. Dr. Finkelstein measured five intellectual capacities in the same group of 100 people when they were two, ten, twenty, thirty, and fifty years of age. To do this she used a set of questions with a set answer key. She also gave them a variety of tests and interviewed them individually. She used ___________________________ research. Her design for her research was ___________________________ (cross sectional or longitudinal).

14. Dr. Zoe wants to discover whether professional tennis players do better when they make eye contact with their opponent just before serving the ball in actual matches. What method would she most likely use to study this as it occurs in the real world? What would be the best way to get this data most accurately? ___________________________

15. The principals at 3 local middle schools have put in place a code of conduct for their students. An educational psychologist collects data through interviews, tests, and observations of students and teachers at each of the schools to see if the new code has an impact on student behavior. The results show that these schools made a huge improvement in school climate. The educational psychologist writes up all of his information in a large report for other schools to learn from. Which research method is being used in this example? ___________________________

16. In a language-learner study researchers set up a controlled environment at a university and observed and compared the language skills of 12 months-olds, 14 month-olds, and 15 month-olds to make generalizations about how children learn language over time. What type of research method was used? ___________________________

What was the design of this study _______________________ (cross sectional or longitudinal)?

17. Hilary wants to know whether women are getting paid the same amount of money as men for equal work. She asks men and women in several business firms for information about their salaries. What research method is Hilary using? ___________________________

18. Dr. John gave his patient a personality inventory to diagnose if she had anxiety or depression. The inventory was a list of 100 true or false questions regarding anxiety and depression symptoms resulting in an overall score between 1 and 37. Dr. John only used the list of questions and did no other investigation of his patients. What type of research method is he using? ___________________________

If the patient is not honest and gives only the answers that she thinks are correct this is called_______________________ bias.

19. Dr. Redford has long been interested in dissociative identity disorder (DID). For the past three years she has had only one participant in research, his client, Sybil. Dr. Redford has studied this patiently intensively with interviews, tests, and medical evaluations. What research method is Dr. Redford using? ___________________________

20. Language, adaptive behavior, and personal-social development. They studied large numbers of children in each age group to determine the approximate age at which each step in the growth process naturally occurs. Gesell and his co-workers studied different groups of children in age groups ranging from birth to adolescence. What kind of study did they undertake? ___________________________

What was the design of this study ___________________________ (cross sectional or longitudinal)?

21. The psychology department at New York University was interested in understanding test anxiety and gave 500 students a series of questions about their experiences with high stakes exams. Which research method is being used? ___________________________

22. Researchers analyze data from hidden cameras and devices, which track how often a person brakes and takes their eyes off the road that have been placed in the cars of individuals for a year. (The owners have received informed consent and know about the cameras). Which research method is being used? ___________________________

Practice – Descriptive Methods

Learning Targets:

• Differentiate between types of research (e.g., experiments, quasi-experiments, survey research, naturalistic observations, lab observations, case studies, longitudinal studies, and cross-sectional studies) with regard to purpose, strengths, and weaknesses.

PART I Indicate which of the following research methods is most closely being described. (Use your notes and/or your textbook)

Experiment Naturalistic Observation Case Study Survey

Quasi – Experiment

1. A downfall to this method is working very closely with one or very few subjects doing interviews and testing and generalizing from this to the larger population. It is also susceptible to experimenter, social desirability, and participant bias.

2. Although there are both control and experimental groups, the participants are not randomly assigned which means that cause and effect cannot be determined.

3. Data collected on a large amount of people via questionnaires may be inaccurate because participants may intentionally give incorrect answers or are influenced by the social desirability bias.

4. The only method, which enables researchers to determine cause and effect relationships between variables.

5. It is often difficult for researchers to go unnoticed by the participants. However, the researcher must not be caught so that participants will continue to act the way they normally do.

6. It is difficult to use this method because of the many possible ethical constraints and the fact that the research is done in an artificial setting.

7. Researchers use this method for very rare behaviors such as studying serial killers or presidential assassins to learn about their behavior because there are very few individuals like this.

8. In order to use this method there must be random selection of participants and random assignment to either control or experimental conditions.

9. This method is the quickest way to gather large amounts of data from a large sample.

10. A researcher wants to determine if having a parent in prison has an effect on the ability to learn how to spell. Children are placed into one of two groups those with a parent in prison and those that do not have a parent in prison.

11. This method minimizes the artificial nature of research and provides the most realistic setting for watching behavior as it happens in the real world. An example would be watching what college students in a cafeteria choose to eat.

12. This method requires attention to detail and compiling information from a variety of sources.  It reveals more about a particular subject than any other research method. 

13. Clinical psychologists who diagnose and treat mental illness use this type of research when compiling information about a client. They do interviews, psychological tests and evaluate information provided by doctors.

14. This method is excellent for obtaining information about behaviors that are hard to observe or that people might have a hard time talking about with another person. These can even be done online.

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