py7015 psychology research exercises pdf

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Running head: PY7015 PSYCHOLOGY RESEARCH EXERCISES
PY7015 PSYCHOLOGY RESEARCH EXERCISES
STUDENT ID:
[Pick the date]

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PY7015 PSYCHOLOGY RESEARCH EXERCISES
Contents
Week 1: Quantitative methods.........................................................................................................................3
Week 2 - Data description with SPSS..............................................................................................................5
Exercise 1: Data Description........................................................................................................................5
Week 3: Reporting Quantitative Research........................................................................................................9
Week 4: Research Design 2............................................................................................................................16
Methods and Tools.....................................................................................................................................16
Multiple Choice Questions – Methods and ToolsPlease.................................................................................16
References......................................................................................................................................................23

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PY7015 PSYCHOLOGY RESEARCH EXERCISES
Week 1: Quantitative methods
Using one sentence per goal, briefly describe the four goals of science.
The description of phenomena of interest, of observable behaviour methodically and the records of
the results. The explanation of what causes these phenomena, this behaviour, and sometimes the
suggestion of a theory. Making prediction for our results, which often are built from theories.
Controlling or affecting the phenomenon of interest, attitudes and behaviour. (Heath, 2017).
Word count: 55
State three ways in which you could modify previously published research to create a 'new' research
idea.
You can vary an independent variable or measure the variable of interest in a different way than
previous researchers. Extend the external validity, the ability of generalising results of a research to
other situations and to other people. (Heath, 2017)
Word Count: 40 words
Name the four levels (scales) of measurement and give an example of each (make sure that your
example is described in sufficient detail to demonstrate that it belongs to the level of measurement
that you have used it to illustrate (for example, age could be measured in a variety of different
ways, so giving age as your example would be insufficient).
Nominal, Ordinal, Interval, Ratio.
An example of nominal scale is gender, which has two or more labeled categories: Male, Female,
Transgender. These categories are just named, without having any kind of natural order or numeric
value.
An example of ordinal scale is satisfaction, which is a non-numeric concept and has named and
ordered variables. The distance between variables is not necessarily equal, it can’t be calculated and
known and the zero point is chosen arbitrarily.
An example of interval scale is temperature, because the difference between each value is equal.
The interval between 10 and 20 degrees is the same as the interval between 40 and 50 degrees, but a
temperature of 100 degrees is not twice as hot as 50 degrees.
An example of ratio scale is weight. A ratio scale has all the qualities of an interval scale but has an
absolute zero. The useful point about having an absolute zero is that we can form ratios using such
scales, so a weight of 10 grams is twice a weight of 5 grams.
Word count: 175 words
Describe or create a table or graphic to show the difference between reliability and validity in terms
of measurement of constructs in psychology. You may use note form rather than full sentences.
(max 80 words)
Reliability Validity
It is the extend to which a research yields a
consistent outcome when the researcher does
measurements many times according to
Refers to the degree to which the instrument
the researcher uses in establishing measures
measures what the researcher intends it to

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PY7015 PSYCHOLOGY RESEARCH EXERCISES
LoBiondo-Wood & Haber, (2014) measure.
It does not require a valid instrument to
measure.
The researcher always considers the
reliability
of the instrument.
It is mainly used in ontology which refers to
the study of nature of human beings.
It is mainly applied in epistemology which
refers to the part of philosophy that aims at
acquiring knowledge.

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PY7015 PSYCHOLOGY RESEARCH EXERCISES
Week 2 - Data description with SPSS
Exercise 1: Data Description
(Taken from Dancey and Reidy (2017) Chapter 3):
1) The Independent Variable (IV) in the given study is the type of lighting that is used in the
office which is altered by the researcher.
2) The Dependent Variable (DV) in the given study is the number of daily errors made by the
inputters.
3) For the given data, the box plot obtained using SPSS is indicated as follows.
a) The given data is clearly not normally distributed which is apparent from the box plot is
not symmetric. It is evident from the box plot that the difference between Q2-Q1 is not equal

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to Q3 –Q2. Also, the maximum value is significantly greater owing to which there is
presence of positive skew as indicated from the box plot (Flick, 2015).
b) From the box plot above, it is evident that there are five outliers in the given data as
indicated by circles and asterisk, so the outliers are from scores 3, 4, 5, 13 and 14.
c) The mean and standard deviation of the given data is indicated as follows:
Descriptive Statistics
N Mean
Error 20 21.40
Valid N
(listwise)
20
Descriptive Statistics
N Std.
Deviation
Error 20 6.61
Valid N
(listwise)
20
Exercise 2: Data Description
(Taken from Dancey and Reidy (2017) Chapter 3)
1) The IV in this study is if the students took or not hallucinogenic drugs while they were
attending Dr Boering’s lectures.

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PY7015 PSYCHOLOGY RESEARCH EXERCISES
2) The DV in this study is the marks obtained by students in the exam at the end of the term
since the marks are supposed to be dependent on the decision taken by the students to
consume or avoid consumption of hallucinogenic drug.
3) The histogram for the marks of those students who took hallucinogenic drugs in Dr.
Boering’s lectures has been derived using SPSS as shown below:
The histogram for the marks of those students who did not take hallucinogenic drugs in Dr.
Boering’s lectures has been derived using SPSS as shown below:

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PY7015 PSYCHOLOGY RESEARCH EXERCISES
a) Based on the histograms of the scores for two sets of students shown above, it is apparent
that they can be assumed to be roughly normally distributed. This is on account of the
middle value in the distribution having the highest frequency and lower frequencies are to
the left and right (Ericsson & Kovalainen, 2015).
b) The corresponding outputs indicating the mean and standard deviation of marks of those
students who took hallucinogenic drugs in Dr. Boering’s lectures has been derived using
SPSS as shown below:

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PY7015 PSYCHOLOGY RESEARCH EXERCISES
The corresponding outputs indicating the mean and standard deviation of marks of those
students who did not take hallucinogenic drugs in Dr. Boering’s lectures has been derived
using SPSS as shown below:
On the basis of the above outputs, it can be concluded that highest mean is exhibited by the
group of students who did not take hallucinogenic drugs in Dr. Boering’s lectures. Variability
is captured by standard deviation which is higher for the group of students who did take
hallucinogenic drugs in Dr. Boering’s lectures (Hastie, Tibshirani & Friedman, 2016).
Week 3: Reporting Quantitative Research
Multiple Choice Questions
1. The introduction of a report
a. discusses the importance of the problem and why it needs research
b. describes in detail how the study was conducted
c. describes the sample adequately
d. includes information essential to comprehend and replicate the study
2. A reference list
a. cites all works supportive of or contradictory to the text.
b. Is a synonym for bibliography
c. should include only the references cited in the article

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d. should never be used in short articles.
3. A good title should
a. include terms such as A Study of or An Experimental Investigation of
b. includes abbreviations to keep it concise
c. be fully explanatory when standing alone
d. b and c
4. When quoting
a. provide the author’s name in the text
b. provide the year in the text
c. provide the page citation in the text, or another locator such as paragraph
number
d. include a complete reference in the reference list
a. do all of the above
5. The abstract of a report should be
a. a brief, comprehensive summary of the contents of the report.
b. about75to100wordslong/
c. an evaluation of the research report.
d. All of the above.
6. The introduction section of a research report should
a. include a thorough historical review of the literature

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b. define all of the terms that would be unintelligible to a reader with no
previous exposure to the field.
c. present the importance of the problem to be explored and specific
hypotheses and objectives. d. Be clearly labelled.
7. Results are sometimes difficult to read and understand; therefore, it is useful to
a. summarise the collected data and the analysis performed on those data relevant to
the discourse that is to follow.
b. introduce the reader to statistical theory before you report he results of even
basic statistical analyses.
c. let the statistics drive the logic of your Results section, not the logic you
developed in your introduction (i.e., your hypotheses).
d. report raw data, descriptive statistics, and the results of inferential analyses.
8. Speculation is permitted in the Discussion section if it is
a. faithful to the intuition of the authors.
b. related closely and logically to empirical data or theory.
c. expressed verbosely and eloquently.
d. None of the above.
9. In a research report, past tense is usually appropriate for describing
a. previous experiments
b. the literature review
c. a procedure if the discussion is of past events
d. all of the above
10.Tables should be

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a. integral to the text but understandable in isolation
b. referred to but not duplicated in the text
c. referred to in the text by their numbers
d. all of the above
11.Identify tabular presentation errors in the following:
a. Table 3 should be T able III.
b. CI, LL,and UL need to be defined in a table note.
c. Centimetres should be spelled out in the table title.
d. b and c
12.Which part of a research report should not always begin on a new page?
a. abstract
b. references
c. method
d. a and b
13.When describing participants in your research, you should
a. give specific demographic characteristics such as age; sex; ethnic and / or
racial group; level of education; ad socioeconomic, generation, or immigrant
status. b. describe the procedures for selecting participants, including
sampling method.

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PY7015 PSYCHOLOGY RESEARCH EXERCISES
a. report whether the participants were provided incentives used to increase
compliance.
d. Do all of the above.
14.The Discussion section is a part of the report in which you can
a. discuss theory independent of your results.
b. interpret your results and discuss their implications.
c. discuss relevant related literature.
d. Reformulate and repeat pints already made.
15.Figure captions (titles)
a. serve as the explanation of the figure.
b. should describe the contents of the figure in a brief sentence or phrase.
c. should include explanations of units of measurement, symbols, and
abbreviations not included in the legend. d. All of the above
16.The Method section should be described in enough detail to
a. permit a reader to evaluate the plausibility of your hypotheses.
b. permit an experienced investigator to replicate your study.
c. allow a perfect duplication of your investigation.
d. Allow an editor to judge the external validity of your study.
17.In the Results section, you should
a. summarise collected data.
b. Discuss the analytic treatment of data.
c. discuss the implications of the findings.

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d. Do all of the above.
e. a and b.
18.The Discussion section generally includes
a. a statement of support or non-support of all original hypotheses.
b. a discussion of similarities and differences between your results and the results
of others.
c. an interpretation of the results that takes into account sources of potential bias.
d. Does all of the above.
e. b and c.
19.Which of the following must identify the variables or theoretical issues under
investigation and the relationship between them?
a. The first sentence of the introduction section.
b. The conclusion of the Discussion section.
c. the title of the report.
d. the first table that is cited.
20.A good abstract
a. needs to be dense with information.
b. should include information that does not appear in the body of the manuscript.
c. should be written in the present tense.
d. All of the above.
21.Before writing the introduction, questions to bear in mind include the following:

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PY7015 PSYCHOLOGY RESEARCH EXERCISES
a. Why is this problem important?
b. How does the study relate to previous work in the area?
c. What are the theoretical and practical implications of the study?
d. How do the study’s hypotheses and research design relate to one another?
e. All of the above.
22.In the Method section, the procedure section often includes descriptions of
a. sampling procedures and sample size.
b. experimental manipulations or interventions used and how they were
delivered.
c. a summary of the collected data and analysis performed on that data.
d. all of the above
e. a and b.
23.In the Discussion section, an interpretation of the results would take into account
a. sources of potential bias and other threats to internal validity.
b. theimprecisionofmeasures.
c. the overall number of tests or overlap among tests.
d. other limitations or weaknesses of the study.
e. All of the above.
24. Edit the following for the punctuation of a reference citation in text:Basu and
Jones, 2007, considered several models of legal regulation in cyberspace. a.
leave as is
b. Basu and Jones, in 2007, considered several models of legal regulation in
cyberspace.

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PY7015 PSYCHOLOGY RESEARCH EXERCISES
c. Basu and Jones [2007], considered several models of legal regulation in
cyberspace.
d. Basu and Jones (2007), considered several models of legal regulation in
cyberspace.
25.Order the citations of two or more works within the same parentheses in order of their
a. appearance in the reference list.
b. importance.
c. dates of publication.
d. status as printed or electronically published works.
Week 4: Research Design 2
Methods and Tools
Multiple Choice Questions – Methods and ToolsPlease
All types of descriptive research methods have something in common: we are observing and
describing what we see. They have something else in common too. What is it?
all of these research methods are carried out in university laboratories.
In each case we must observe from a great distance.
c. they are all experimental methods.
d. we cannot establish cause and effect.
It is important to having clear definitions of the behaviors of interest when you are observing
study participants. Having clear definitions can help you avoid ______________________,
which can occur when the observer has a preconceived notion of how the person being
observed is likely to act.
a. observer bias
participatory predisposition
preconception bias
predetermination partiality

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3. Why were university students in Young, Mizzau, Mai, Sirisegaram, and Wilson’s (2009)
cafeteria study observed from at least 32 feet away?
a. to avoid familiarization
b. to avoid reactivity
to encourage familiarization
to encourage reactivity
Festinger and his colleagues decided to join a group that believed the world was going to end.
“Marian Keech,” the leader of this group, said she was relaying these messages from planet
Clarion. Keech and her followers believed they would be safe from this disaster because
flying saucers would be arriving to rescue them. Festinger and his colleagues joined the
group to see what Keech and her followers would do when the world didn’t end. What form
of research method were Festinger and his colleagues using and why?
They used reactivity because this allowed them to summarize the content of what they saw.
They used habituation because this allowed the study participants to get used to the presence
of Festinger and his colleagues.
They used naturalistic observation because being undercover was the only way to be privy to
the thoughts and actions of this group.
They used participant observation because being undercover was the only way to be privy to
the thoughts and actions of this group.
To identify whether a particular study is an experiment or a correlational study, look at the
steps the researchers completed when conducting their research. Which of the following steps
indicates that the researchers conducted a correlational study?
The researchers varied what was presented to the participants.
The researchers used random assignment.
The variables are only measured.
The variables are both manipulated and measured.
Ballard, Gray, Reilly, and Noggle (2009) found that those who spent more time playing video
games exercised less frequently. What kind of correlation is this?
experimental
b. negative
partial
positive
7. Ickes, Park and Robinson (2012) were interested in “predicting the propensity to verbally
abuse strangers” (p. 75). They conducted an online survey asking people to respond to
personality measures and indicate on a Rudeness Scale how they would respond to a series of

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situations. They found, for example, that the tendency to be verbally rude was positively
correlated with impulsivity. Which of the following is a description of this finding?
Those who were more verbally rude tended to be less impulsive.
Those who were less verbally rude tended to be less impulsive.
Those who were less verbally rude tended to be more aggressive.
Those who were more verbally rude tended to be more aggressive.
8. When deciding whether to admit an applicant to graduate school, many schools consider
scores on the Graduate Record Exam (GRE). Researchers have questioned how well GRE
scores predict success in graduate school. Some researchers have suggested that the obtained
correlation is reduced because researchers are only using the GRE scores of those who had
been accepted into graduate school and these people likely have mostly high GRE scores. In
other words, the strength of this correlation is likely reduced due to a. curvilinearity.
linearity.
range restriction.
the zero-order nature of the relationship.
Klein Murdock (2013) found that the number of daily texts that students sent was positively
correlated with sleep problems. What can we conclude from this?
The excess texting was causing the students to miss out on sleep
The inability to sleep was causing the students to spend a lot of time texting.
The more students texted, the more problems they had sleeping.
One of these variables is causing the other, but we can’t know which variable is the cause and
which is the effect.
Take a look at the following question. What type of question is this?
Binge Drinking
Unenjoyable _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ Enjoyable
closed-ended
Likert scale
open-ended
d. semantic differential
11. Sharon is answering a questionnaire on binge drinking. When asked how many alcoholic
drinks she had the previous Saturday night, she answered that she had had only one drink—
she was afraid to tell the truth because she was worried what the researcher would think if he
found out she had really had 5 drinks. What is the term that refers to what is occurring here?
acquiescence

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fence sitting
c. the social desirability effect
d. nay saying
12. Let’s say you divide your population of interest into segments. Each of the segments
represents a group of people who have one or more characteristics of interest. Once you
divide the population, then you choose a random sample from each of the segments. What is
this type of sampling called?
cluster sampling
convenience sampling
quota sampling
d. stratified sampling
13. To establish cause and effect, your experiment needs to
have at least two groups.
have at least two theoretically equivalent groups.
have at least three theoretically equivalent groups.
have at least four theoretically equivalent groups.
14. Randomly assigning your study participants to groups yields a
_____________________ design, while testing the same people in all groups yields a
______________________ design.
a. between-subjects; within-subjects
different group design; same group design
random design; non-random design
within-subjects; between-subjects
15. Guéguen, Jacob and Lamy (2010) found that participants randomly assigned to hear
romantic versus neutral music were almost twice as likely to provide their phone number
when requested. Now pretend for a moment that the confederate who asked for phone
numbers sometimes dressed nicely when romantic music was playing and sometimes not. He
also sometimes dressed nicely when neutral music was playing and sometimes not. This was
not deliberate. The confederate’s clothing in this case would be considered a(n)
a. confound
b. extraneous variable
matched variable
superfluous variable

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16. Sometimes researchers will match participants to each other on some variable and then
randomly assign the matched participants to groups. When you use this “matched-groups
design,” you should match on variables you think might affect your
dependent variable.
extraneous variable.
independent variable.
random variable.
17. The practice effect and the fatigue effect are examples of
__________________________________ and they can be controlled with
___________________________________________.
carryover effects; counterbalancing
counterbalancing; randomization
c. order effects; counterbalancing
d. sensitization effects; randomization
18. Let’s say you are planning on conducting an experiment. You’ve determined that you
need 30 participants per group and you’re planning on having three groups. If you run the
study as a within-subjects design, you’ll need a total of ___________ participants. If you run
the study as a between-subjects design, you’ll need a total of ___________ participants.
a. 30; 60
30; 90
60; 30
90; 30
19 Mukherjee and Dubé (2012) showed participants an ad promoting the importance of
sunscreen. The ads varied the level of fear arousal and the presence of humor. After viewing
the ad, participants answered questions regarding their views of the ad. How many
independent variables did Mukherjee and Dubé have and what were they?
a. 1 independent variable: level of fear arousal
b. 2 independent variables: level of fear arousal and presence of humor
3 independent variables: level of fear arousal, presence of humor, and sunscreen ad
4 independent variables: level of fear arousal, presence of humor, sunscreen ad and views of
the ad
20. The design for Heath and Bjorklund’s tipping experiment is shown below. Please use
this design to answer the following question. Which means do you consider to determine
whether drawing a smiley face on the check had an impact on tip percentage?
cell means

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column marginal means
row marginal means
d. row and column marginal means
21. How many independent variables does a 2 x 2 x 2 design have and how many cells does
it have?
a. 3; 6
b. 3; 8
6; 6
9; 2
22. There are two main categories of quasi-experimental designs. What are they?
a. those without a control group and those with nonequivalent groups
those without a control group and those without independent variables
those with nonequivalent groups and those without independent variables
those with posttests only and those with pretests only
23. Rahman and Zeglin (2014) were interested in whether students would benefit from
using comic book characters when diagnosing psychological disorders. They tested
undergraduates enrolled in two sections of an abnormal psychology course. Both sections
received the standard lecture on how to diagnose psychological disorders. Students in only
one of the sections were told to diagnose a comic book character. Rahman and Zeglin found
that those who had diagnosed the comic book character performed significantly better on the
quiz than those who had not. Could Rahman and Zeglin conclude that the comic book activity
caused the better quiz outcome?
a. no, because the researchers had no control over who was in each section of the course
no, because diagnosing a comic book character can’t likely have that sort of impact
yes, because there was an adequate control group
yes, because the diagnosis of a comic book character (present, absent) was the independent
variable
24. When researchers use a _________________________, they study a single group of
participants over a long period of time. When researchers use a
___________________________, they test people of different ages, and they test each age
group only once.
enduring design; concise design
extended design; condensed design

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long-term design; short-term design
d. longitudinal design; cross-sectional design
25. Following study participants over the course of many years can often become difficult.
People sometimes cannot be tracked down and thus, they do not end up finishing the study.
What is a term to describe this?
a. attrition
instrumentation
history
regression toward the mean
Qualitative Methods Short Answer Question – Methods and Tools
Qualitative research involves getting knowledge about a social phenomenon when they are in
their natural settings. As opposed to quantitative analysis, qualitative research aims at
knowing why the situation is the way it is rather than what is happening in the case according
to Kendall, (2014). When conducting qualitative research, the questions that the researcher
ask are crucial. Designing the items needs the researcher to consider some critical aspects to
get precisely what he or she needs in the research. The first factor in devising the interview
question in qualitative analysis is that the issues need to be specific rather than being general.
The research involves many interviewees and to gain the best information from all of them,
the researcher needs to be precise. Secondly, the interview questions should not be biased on
a particular matter such as gender, political class or specific class of people. However, the
problems should cut across everybody. When the questions are biased, the interviewee may
not be in a position to give the accurate result thus the researcher may end up making
decisions from a wrong conclusion. Apart from the above issues, the research questions
should be of a different variety. For example, there are general questions, there are yes or no
problem and there are others that the interviewee can pick the answers from the list. Mixing
the issues is a critical methodology to promote user involvement. Lastly, the researcher
should evaluate his or her question to ensure it is researchable question.
Word count: 249

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References
Eriksson, P. & Kovalainen, A. (2015). Quantitative methods in business research (3rd Ed.).
London: Sage Publications.
Heath, W. (2018). Psychology Research Methods: Connecting Research to Students' Lives.
Cambridge University
Hastie, T., Tibshirani, R. & Friedman, J. (2016) The Elements of Statistical Learning (4th
ed.). New York: Springer Publications.
Kendall, L. (2014). The conduct of qualitative interviews: Research
questions, methodological issues, and researching online. In Handbook of research on
new literacies (pp. 151-168). Routledge.
LoBiondo-Wood, G., & Haber, J. (2014). Reliability and validity. Nursing research-ebook:
Methods and critical appraisal for evidencebased practice. Missouri: Elsevier Mosby,
289-309.