Back to Basics
This process assigns participants by chance to groups to control for extraneous variables.
What is random assignment?
This type of validity concerns whether research findings apply beyond the lab to real life.
What is external validity?
Unlike experiments, surveys often lack this feature that limits their ability to show causality.
What is random assignment?
A major ethical concern in covert field research is missing this participant right.
What is informed consent?
This famous psychologist conditioned a dog to salivate at the sound of a bell.
Who is Pavlov?
Experiments have this hallmark that allows researchers to determine cause and effect.
What is causality?
This type of validity refers to how well a study shows that X causes Y without third variable interference.
What is internal validity?
Pager’s study found this group received fewer callbacks for jobs, even when controlling for criminal record.
What are Black applicants?
Field research excels at capturing this kind of behavior, unlike lab experiments.
What is natural behavior?
These small rodents were famously used by Harlow to study maternal attachment.
What are monkeys?
When neither participants nor experimenters know who receives the treatment or placebo, this experiment design is used.
What is double-blind experiment?
Solomon Asch used this kind of visual test to study conformity in his famous experiment.
What is line length judgments?
Surveys can suffer from this when participants give answers they think the researcher wants or that are socially acceptable.
What is social desirability?
Covert observation allows researchers to avoid this effect that changes participant behavior.
The “Little Albert” experiment famously conditioned fear in a baby of this species
What is a human?
Researchers use this type of control to prevent environmental differences from affecting results.
What is procedural control?
The common overuse of this participant group limits generalizability in many psychological experiments.
What are college students?
This type of survey study uses matched resumes to test for discrimination in hiring.
What is a correspondence audit study?
Goffman studied this kind of “hidden” reality in mental institutions by covert observation.
What is unofficial reality?
This large mammal was trained by Skinner using operant conditioning chambers known as “Skinner Boxes.”
What is a pigeon?
This is the term for groups that are identical in every way except for the independent variable in an experiment.
What is statistical equivalence?
This kind of realism asks whether the experimental situation resembles everyday life.
What is mundane realism?
This 1930s study revealed a large gap between attitudes and behaviors related to racial discrimination in hotels.
What is LaPiere’s study
Venkatesh, guided by advisor William Julius Wilson, joined this type of organization for a day.
What is a gang?
This animal “escaped” a lab in 1957 and sparked a city-wide search in Boston.
What is a rat?