28/01/2025

PSY102- Social
Psychology
Week 2.1 - Research Methods

Dr. Christopher Bryan

Spring 2025

Recap
❖Forming a good Hypothesis?

❖Basic and Applied Research

❖Types of Research Design

->Observation
-> Ethnography
-> Archival
-> Case Study
-> Self-report
-> Correlational Research

Correlation (r)
r = -.75, p < .001
r = .15, p = .13
r = .42, p = .01
r = -.25, p = .04

DIRECTION: +/-/0
STRENGTH: │r│
STATISTICAL SIGNIFICANCE: p < .05

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Statistical Significance: Probability Level

(p-value)
A number calculated with statistical techniques
Indicates likelihood results of experiment occurred by chance instead
of the IV(s)
The convention in science is to consider
results significant when
-> Probability is less than 5 in 100 that the
results might be due to chance factors and
not the IV
• p< .05

Advantages and Disadvantages of

Correlational Research
❖ Advantages
➢ Can study the associations of naturally occurring variables that cannot be
manipulated or induced
➢ Can examine phenomena that would be difficult or unethical to create for research
purposes
➢ Offers a great deal of freedom in where variables are measured
❖ One very serious disadvantage
➢ Correlation is not causation.

Limits of Correlational Methods

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Research Strategy Summary

➢ Descriptive: Strategies that examine individual variables.

➢ Correlational: Strategies that examine relationships between variables

by measuring two (or more) variables for each participant.

➢ The Experimental Methods: strategies that examine relationships

between variables by comparing two (or more) groups of scores.
▪ Experimental
▪ Quasi-experimental
▪ Non-experimental.

The Experimental Methods

Researcher randomly assigns participants to different conditions
Conditions are identical except for the independent variable
(the one thought to have a causal effect on people’s responses).

❖The independent variable (IV) is what researchers manipulate

to see if it has a causal effect (e.g., type of TV show children watch)
❖The dependent variable (DV) is what researchers measure to
see if it is affected (e.g., measure children’s aggression (DV) after they
watch television (IV) that is either violent on nonviolent

IV and DV Example Using Latané

and Darley (1970)
IV= Number of bystanders
DV= Helping behavior
Researchers vary the independent
variable (e.g., the number of
bystanders people think are
present) and observe what effect
that has on the dependent
variable (e.g., whether people
help).

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Random Sampling
SAMPLING
ERROR

“Landon for President”

Failure to Use Random Selection = Misleading Results

Random Assignment
➢ Ensure all participants have equal
chance of being in any experimental
condition
➢ Ensures that differences in
participants’ personalities or
backgrounds are distributed evenly
across conditions
➢ This powerful technique is the
most important part of the
experimental method.

Limits of Experimental Method

Experimental situations can be Artificial and/or Distant from real life
->Tradeoff with increasing control over the situation to make it similar for all
participants

Laboratory AND Field experiments

❖Laboratory experiments: high control level
❖Field experiments: real-world settings
➢ Quasi-Experiments: almost experiments
…all effects certain levels of validity

Drivers took their sweet time leaving a parking spot when an

intruder was waiting to get it. (Ruback & Juieng, 1997).

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Lab Experiments:
Latané & Darley (1968)
➢ Smokey Room Experiment
->Diffusion of Responsibility

Psychological Realism
• We want to maximize Psychological Realism (experiment vs. real life)

• Social Psychology associated with GENERALIZABILITY across PEOPLE.

• How can too much experimental control decrease external validity and
psychological realism?

❖Internal Validity: confidence that a cause- ❖External validity: confidence that

and-effect relationship established in a findings generalize to other people,
study cannot be explained by other factors. other settings, and other time periods

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External Validity: Do the Results

Generalize?
Results obtained under one set of circumstances would also occur
in a different set of circumstances.
Generalizability across
1. Situations
-> the extent to which we can generalize from the experimental situation to real-life
situations
2. People
-> the extent to which we can generalize from the people who participated in the
experiment to people in general

❖ Mundane realism: Extent to which the research setting resembles the real-
world setting of interest

Internal Validity in Experiments:

Making sure that nothing besides the
independent variable can affect the dependent
variable

Control extraneous variables

-> Randomly assign people to experimental
conditions

❖ Experimental realism: Experimental situation

is compelling and real to the participants.

Threat to Internal or External?

1. A research study finds that a group of participants who received relaxation
training had lower exam anxiety scores than a group who did not receive training.
However, the researcher suspects that the difference between groups may be
caused by the fact that the participants in one group are generally smarter than
those in the other. This study has a problem with ____.

2. Results from a research study suggest that a stop-smoking programme is very

successful. However, the participants who volunteered for the study were all
highly motivated to quit smoking and the researcher is concerned that the same
results may not be obtained for smokers who are not as motivated. What kind of
validity is being questioned?

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Descriptive
A research design that focuses on observing and
Observing Basketball: The Ball Don’t Lie
describing the characteristics of a phenomenon or
subject without manipulating variables.
- Weakness of approach: does not prove
causation
- Strength of approach: nothing needs to be
disturbed or manipulated

Nonexperimental
Similar to correlational approach: researcher does
not try to control variables or randomly assign
participants to groups but creates a grouping
variable.
- Weakness of approach: does not prove
causation
- Strength of approach: nothing needs to be
disturbed or manipulated From Haynes & Gilovich, 2010.

Correlations Versus Experiments

Correlational Research Experimental Research Non-Experimental
What does it involve? Measuring variables and Random assignment to Measuring variables
the degree of association conditions and control without manipulation and
between them over the events that creating observed groups
occur; determining the for comparison
effects of manipulations
of the independent
variable(s) on changes in
the dependent variable(s)
What is the biggest Enables researchers to Enables researchers to Enables researchers to
advantage of using this study naturally occurring determine cause-and- study naturally occurring
method? variables, including effect relationships---that groups, including
variables that would be is, whether the variables that would be
too difficult or unethical independent variable can too difficult or unethical
to manipulate cause a change in the to manipulate
dependent variable

Using Technology in research

Various types of technology are used to measure cognitive and physiological
responses.
➢ Eye-tracking technology is used to measure exactly where and for how long
participants look at particular parts of a stimulus.

➢ Social Neuroscience (EEG/fMRI): Brain-imaging technology shows researchers what

parts of the brain seem to “light up”— or shows increased activity—in response to
a particular stimulus or situation.

➢ Electrocardiogram (ECG): Variation from heart beat to beat to assess the bodies
ability to maintain emotional flexibility and avoid “fright or flight” responses.

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Ethical
Considerations
in Research

Ethics, Values, and New Research

Standards and Practices
➢ Researchers in all fields have a moral and legal responsibility to abide by ethical
principles.
➢ The use of deception is a concern about ethics in social psychology.
➢ Social psychology study is evaluated for its ethics by other people before the study
can be conducted.

❖Short History of Research Ethics

•1947: Nuremberg Code - Established principles for ethical research, emphasizing
informed consent (response to unethical Nazi experiments).

•1964: Declaration of Helsinki - Expanded ethical guidelines, introducing

independent review boards and prioritizing participant welfare (built on Nuremberg
Code principles).

•1974: National Research Act (USA) - Mandated Institutional Review Boards

(IRBs) for human research after the Tuskegee Syphilis Study scandal (formalized
ethical oversight in research).

•1979: Belmont Report - Defined ethical principles of respect, beneficence, and

justice for research involving humans (shaped ethical decision-making frameworks).

•2013: Revised Declaration of Helsinki - Reinforced transparency, publication of

results, and participant protections in modern contexts (updated for global and
technological advancements).

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Institutional Review Boards and

Informed Consent
➢ In 1974, U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare
established regulations designed to protect human participants in
research.
➢ Created institutional review boards (IRBs) to ensure that the
welfare of participants is adequately protected
➢ Researchers must abide by profession’s code of ethics.
➢Must obtain informed consent
- Agreement to participate in research, granted in full awareness of
the nature of the experiment which has been explained in advance.

Deception in Experiments
Deception: Misleading participants about the true purpose of a study or the events
that will actually transpire
– Strengthens experimental realism
– Research has shown that participants are rarely bothered by deception.
– The use of deception creates some serious ethical concerns.
– Passive and Active Decption

❖ Confederates: People who act as though they are participants in the

experiment but are really working for experimenter.

Debriefing
➢At the end of their participation, participants are informed of:
- The nature of the research
- All procedures, including an explanation of exactly what happened and why
- The purpose of the research
- Any deceptions that were used
➢ Especially important and necessary when deception is used.

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Ethics and Consent Online

➢Loss of privacy has opened the window for
corporations, marketers, and researchers to peek
in to record actions in ways that raise new
questions about ethics
- “To Facebook, we are all lab rats” (Goel, 2014)
- Consent given when they agree to its terms of
service

Summary
Social psychologists
- Study the way humans affect and are affected by others
- Use the scientific method to design experiments to study the affect,
behavior, and cognition of people

➢ Be aware of the limitations and challenges of experimental design, and

explore how to address these issues

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