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Block 1 Unit 3  Methods of Social Psychology

1. What are the three operations that social psychology embraces? 

The three operations are:

1. Careful collection of observation or data.
2. Ordered integration of observations into hypotheses and theories.
3. Tests of adequacy of hypotheses and theories in terms of predicting future observations.

2. What are the social psychology methods through which one gains understanding of human behaviour? 

Methods include observing people, reading literature and philosophy, and participating in situations of interest. However, social psychology emphasizes formal methods of observation and experimentation as primary tools.

3. What are social psychology methods for formulating investigations? 

Social psychology employs both formal and non-formal observation methods. Formal methods use predetermined category systems to score social behaviours, like Bales’ Interaction Process Analysis (IPA). Correlational and experimental methods are also used.

4. What are the two divisions into which methods are subdivided? 

1. Data collection methods (observations, documents, questionnaires, interviews, etc.) and 
2. Analysis methods (statistical, logical, and theoretical).

5. Define each of the terminologies used in experimental method. 

The experimental method involves:

2. Independent variable: The variable manipulated by the researcher.
3. Dependent variable: The variable being measured and expected to change in response to manipulation of the independent variable.
4. Control group: A group that does not receive the experimental treatment, used as a baseline for comparison.
5. Experimental group: A group that receives the experimental treatment.

6. What are the various ways to minimize the threats to validity in experimental research? 

Threats to validity can be minimised by:

• Post-experimental enquiry: Interviewing participants to see if they understood the purpose of the study and if it affected their behaviour.
• Keeping the experimenter blind: The experimenter should be unaware of the hypothesis being tested or the condition to which the participant is assigned.
• Minimising interaction between the experimenter and participants: Automating as much of the experiment as possible.

7. Define and discuss ethnography as a method of social psychology research. 

Ethnography is a research method where the researcher participates in people's daily lives to understand their culture, collecting data through observations, interviews, and documents. Ethnography tries to avoid theoretical preconceptions and induce theory from the perspectives of the members of the culture and from observation.

8. What is evaluation? Why is it important? 

Evaluation is the process of assessing the reliability and validity of information, and it is crucial in research to ensure the findings are objective and not subjective. Evaluation helps researchers understand the social context and their own social position, and that values may inescapably influence results.

9. What are the methods used in evaluation of a social psychology research? 

Evaluation methods include ensuring the reliability of data-collecting instruments, verifying the reliability of information through validity, stability, and precision. It involves critical analysis of the research process to include considerations of logic and content theory in the interpretation of data.

10. What do you mean by an empirical science? Is social psychology an empirical science? Give two reasons. 

An empirical science is one that relies on observation and experimentation to gather data. Social psychology is an empirical science because it uses careful collection of data and experimentation and tests of hypotheses. It is guided by induction from observations rather than by deduction from theoretical constructs.

11. What do you understand by observation method? Give its advantages and disadvantages. The observation method involves watching phenomena as they naturally occur.

• Advantages: It allows for the study of behaviour in natural settings.
• Disadvantages: It can be difficult to record behaviours without disturbing them. It can also be subjective if the researcher's point of view is important.

12. Write an essay on correlational method (500 words). 

The correlational method examines the relationship between two or more variables. It seeks to determine how changes in one variable correspond to changes in another. It is often used to explore relationships between variables. Correlation does not imply causation. While this method is useful for identifying relationships, it doesn't establish that one variable causes a change in another. The main limitation of this method is that correlation does not equal causation.

13. What is an experiment? Differentiate between laboratory experiment and quasi experiment. 

An experiment is a research method where one or more variables are manipulated to see their effect on another variable. A laboratory experiment is conducted in a controlled environment, while a quasi-experiment lacks the random assignment of participants to different conditions. Quasi-experiments are used when random assignment isn't feasible or ethical.

14. Differentiate between correlational and experimental method.

• Correlational method: Examines the relationship between variables without manipulating them, used often for exploratory purposes.
• Experimental method: Manipulates variables to determine cause-and-effect relationships, using random assignment to conditions.

15. What is meta-analysis? What is the importance of meta-analysis in social psychological research? 

Meta-analysis is a statistical technique used to synthesize findings from multiple studies on a single topic. It allows researchers to pool data and arrive at an overall estimate of the size of a finding. It is important for managing large quantities of research and for testing consistency of findings across different studies.

16. What do you mean by main effect and interactional effect in experimental method? 

The sources do not define main effect and interactional effect explicitly. (Note that if you want to know more about main effect and interactional effect, you may want to independently verify information on that subject from other sources.)

17. Differentiate between control group and experimental group.

• Control group: A group in an experiment that does not receive the treatment being tested, used as a baseline for comparison.
• Experimental group: A group that receives the treatment being tested.

18. What do you mean by ethnographic research? What is the importance of ethnographic research for social psychology? 

Ethnographic research involves the researcher participating in people's daily lives, collecting data through observations and interviews. It allows researchers to understand behaviours within their social and cultural contexts. Ethnography is important to social psychology because it gives an in-depth understanding of people in social circumstances.

19. Write the ways in which threats to the validity of an experiment could be worked out. 

Threats to validity can be reduced by post-experimental inquiry, keeping experimenters blind to the hypothesis, and minimising interaction between experimenters and participants.

20. What is common sense based on to understand human behaviour?

Common sense is usually based on widely shared experiences. However, beliefs based on common sense can be wrong.

21. How do distorted perceptions affect understanding events?

Distorted perceptions can affect the understanding of events because people often look at complex and ambiguous situations with preconceptions. Experiences and certain expectations also affect perceptions. Assumptions define and limit what people see, and individuals tend to see things in such a way that they fit with their assumptions, even if it involves distortion or omission.

22. What are the methods of data collection?

The methods of data collection are:

• Observations
• The study of documents
• Questionnaires
• Interviews
• Testing
• Experiments

23. Discuss observational method in detail.

The observational method involves observing phenomena as they occur naturally. It is used to collect data on overt behaviour and the actions of individuals. This method proceeds in two stages:

• Describing behaviour: This involves observing behaviours in a natural setting that is relevant for the research. Questions that can be considered are what people do, how various behaviours can be classified, and how people differ in their behaviours.
• From description to causes: This method can also be used to find out what caused the observed behaviours. However, caution should be taken while inferring causes from observations because a behaviour may have many causes, and the fact that one event comes before another does not prove that the first event is the cause of the second. The observational method can be informal and unstructured, or formal and structured. In participant observation, the researcher participates in the ongoing activities of the people being observed, while in non-participant observation, observers record people’s behaviour but do not participate. The most formal type of observational method uses a predetermined category system for scoring social behaviours. Observational methods can often be made without disturbing naturally occurring behaviours. However, some behaviours are impossible or difficult to observe directly.

24. Discuss the correlational method. What are its advantages over observational method?

The correlational method is an analytical method that assesses the relationship between two or more variables. It determines the degree to which two or more variables are associated. Correlation can be either positive or negative, and the strength of a correlation is expressed by the correlation coefficient. While the correlational method can determine that a relationship exists between variables, it cannot establish cause-and-effect relationships. The correlational method allows researchers to explore many relationships, and is often used for exploratory research and theory testing, whereas observational research, as it is usually implemented, can only offer the researcher descriptive data from which to generate a theory but not to test it.

25. Define experimental method.

An experiment is a well-controlled test of a hypothesis about cause and effect. The goal is to see what happens to a phenomenon when the researcher deliberately modifies some features of the environment in which the phenomenon occurs. The experimental method is used to test theories that predict causal relationships between variables.

26. What is Quasi-experimental method? Discuss its characteristics.

A quasi-experimental method is conducted in a natural, everyday life setting, over which the researcher has less than complete control. The realism of the setting is relatively high, and the control is relatively low. Random assignment of participants to conditions is not possible in quasi-experiments. For example, researchers cannot randomly assign people to bereaved and non-bereaved conditions.

27. Compare experimental with quasi-experimental method

Here is a comparison of experiments and quasi-experiments:

• Representativeness of data: Low in both experiments and quasi-experiments
• Realism of setting: Low in experiments, high in quasi-experiments
• Control over setting: High in experiments, medium in quasi-experiments

28. Discuss experimental designs with illustrations.

Experimental designs often involve the manipulation of independent variables to observe their effect on dependent variables. A common design in social psychological experiments is the factorial experiment, in which two or more independent variables are manipulated within the same study. For example, a study might manipulate two variables, X and Y, each with two levels (X1, X2, and Y1, Y2). This allows researchers to examine not only the main effects of each variable but also the interaction effects between variables.

29. List out the threats to the validity of experimental research

Threats to the validity of experimental research include:

• Confounding: This occurs when there is a failure to separate two variables, so their effects cannot be independently ascertained.
• Social desirability: Participants may be reluctant to provide honest reports of feelings or qualities they think would be regarded negatively.
• Demand characteristics: These are cues in the experimental setting that convey the experimenter’s hypothesis to participants. Participants may then attempt to provide the expected responses.
• Experimenter expectancy effect: This refers to the experimenter’s own hypothesis or expectations about the outcome of the research, which can increase the likelihood that participants will behave in ways that confirm the hypothesis. These effects can be minimised through various methods, such as post-experimental enquiry.

30. What are the characteristic features of ethnographic method?

Ethnography is a qualitative research method, which has its roots in anthropology and sociology. The main characteristics of the ethnographic method are:

• Gathering data from a range of sources, such as interviews, observations, conversations, and documents
• Studying behaviour in everyday contexts rather than experimental conditions
• Using an unstructured approach to data gathering in the early stages, so that key issues can emerge gradually through analysis
• Comprising an in-depth study of one or two situations

31. Elucidate the steps in ethnographic method in social psychology research.

The steps in ethnographic method in social psychology research are:

1. Selection of a culture, review of the literature pertaining to the culture, and identification of variables
2. The ethnographer strives to avoid theoretical preconceptions and instead induce theory from the perspectives of the members of the culture and from observation.
3. The researcher may seek validation of induced theories by going back to members of the culture for their reaction.
4. Some ethnographers use structured observation schedules, by which one may code observed behaviours or cultural artefacts for purposes of later statistical analysis.

32. Discuss the various other methods in ethnography