Research Methods in Psychological Science
95278 LECT 0900-0950 M W 00E1 LC
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Psychology
242 Research Methods in Psychological Science 95278 LECT 0900-0950 M W 00E1 LC |
link
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Instructor
R. Chris Fraley, Ph.D.
Department of Psychology | Behavioral Sciences Building room 1050 A
Office hours: Mon and Wed 10 - 11 a.m.
E-mail: fraley@uic.edu
Teaching Assistants
Claudia Brumbaugh | cbrumbau@uic.edu
Thomas Griffin | tgriffin@uic.edu
Eric Houston | ehoust1@uic.edu
Discussion sections:
95280 DISC 1000-1050 M 0211 BSB
95243 DISC 1100-1150 M 0211 BSB
95311 DISC 1200-1250 M 0211 BSB
95300 DISC 1000-1050 W 0211 BSB
95299 DISC 1100-1150 W 0211 BSB
95357 DISC 1200-1250 W 0211 BSB
Textbooks
Leavitt, F. (2001). Evaluating scientific research: Separating fact from
fiction. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.
Stanovich, K. E. (2001). How to think straight about psychology (6th Edition).
Boston, MA: Allyn and Bacon.
link to:
schedule | updates | top
Structure and Overview
of the Course
The discipline of psychology occupies a peculiar niche in modern universities.
Modern psychologists are concerned with basic humanistic issues (e.g., the nature
of emotions, the mind, relationships, free will, and consciousness) that have
traditionally been studied by philosophers, poets, and historians. However,
unlike scholars in these other disciplines, modern psychologists employ the
methods of the natural sciences (e.g., measurement, experimentation) in order
to understand these phenomena.
The objective of this course is to introduce you to scientific methods, and
how they can be used to better understand psychological phenomena.
I will deliver lectures
on Mondays and Wednesdays. I expect you to be in class on time, and, if you
cannot make it to class for some reason, I strongly encourage you to obtain
the lecture notes from one of your classmates as soon as possible. (Do not come
to me or one of the TA’s for lecture notes.) There will also be weekly discussion
sections, led by the TA’s, in which you will design studies, collect and analyze
psychological data, and expand your critical thinking skills.
The Class Webpage
I will post lecture notes on the class web page the evening (around 9 or 10
PM) before each lecture. I plan to do this because I want you to spend your
class time listening and thinking carefully about the issues we're discussing;
I do not want you to be too busy copying notes from the board or overhead. If,
however, class attendance begins to decline, I will discontinue web notes because
I do not want people skipping lectures simply because they can download the
notes at their leisure.
You should treat the class web page as your primary syllabus. I will
be updating it on a regular basis and it will be your responsibility to keep
up-to-date on any changes that are made. For example, the lecture-topical schedule
is preliminary and will change as a function of how quickly or slowly we are
progressing though the course. Also, practice test questions, answers to exams
you've taken, exam grades to date, etc. will be updated as necessary. If you
do not have Internet access at home, please visit one of the many student computer
facilities on campus on a regular basis.
link to:
schedule | updates | top
Grading
There will be four exams over the course of the semester, plus the final exam.
Thus, there will be five exams total. The first four exams will not be
cumulative in the strict sense of the term, but the subject matter will build
on itself, so mastering material for the second exam, for example, may require
that you keep yourself refreshed on earlier material. The final exam, however,
will be cumulative in the strict sense of the term; I will ask you about anything
that has been covered in the course.
Of the five exams, only your four best grades will count. In other words, you
can drop your worst exam score. Why do I allow this? I allow this because emergencies
(e.g., death in the family, oversleeping on exam day, traffic problems) may
occur at some point during the semester, and you might have to miss an exam.
I do not give make-up exams under any circumstances; the fact that you can
drop your lowest score (which could be a 0) covers all make-up exam situations.
Please do not ask me about make up exams because I will simply refer you
to the class webpage which explains my policy on this issue (see previous sentence).
In light of this policy, your best strategy is to study hard for each exam,
hope nothing bad happens, and then skip the final if you're happy with the grade
you would receive based on the first 4 exams. Then, if something bad happens
along the way and you have to miss an exam, you'll know that you cannot miss
the others. Or, if you bomb exam 1, you'll know you can drop it, but you'll
have to do well on the remaining 4 exams. If you oversleep for exam 1 and then
a relative dies for exam 2, you will receive a sympathy card, but not a make-up
test.
The exam schedule for the semester is posted on the class webpage. It will not
be changed, so please determine as soon as possible whether your schedule will
prohibit you from making it to certain exams. It might be wise for you to drop
the class (or change to another section) if you can foresee possible problems
in scheduling from day 1.
Of your four highest exam scores, they will be averaged, and that average will
account for 60% of your grade. The remaining 40% of your grade will come from
lab activities. Attendance is required for the labs.
Grade Example: Assume Genesis P-Orridge has the following set of exam scores:
80 (exam 1), 90 (exam 2), 70 (exam 3), 90 (exam 4), and 90 (exam 5/final). Genesis's
lowest exam score is for exam 3, so we will drop that score and average his
highest four grades: (80 + 90 + 90 + 90)/4 = 87.5%. Let's also assume that Genesis
aced his lab section: 100%. Because the exams count 60% toward the course grade
and the labs count 40%, we weight his exams by 60% and his lab grade by 40%:
(.60 * 87.5) + (.40 * 100) = (52.5) + (40) = 92.5%. Thus, his course grade is
92.5%. Please do not contact me about calculating your grade unless you have
read this example, worked though it, and still have questions.
Note: If you need to know your discussion section grade at any point in the
semester, please contact your TA.
Students with disabilities who require accommodations for access and participation
in this course must be registered with the Office of Disability Services (ODS).
Please contact ODS at 312/413-2103 or 312/413-0123.
Updates
Jan 28, 2002
Exam 1 has been graded, and the scores are posted on
line. Overall, the scores were good: the average score was 79%, and five
people aced the exam. I added one point to each exam due to an ambiguous question.
Please see your TA in order to get your exam back. If you do not see your grade
listed online, either we had a problem (please see us) or you didn't give an
alias (and you'll have to wait till section to see your grade).
Jan 29, 2002
I made an error in grading the exams. The one extra point I added (see above)
was one percentage point. My intention was to add one point to the raw number
of questions you answered correctly. The new corrected grades are now listed
on this site on line. This change essentially
adds 3 percentage points to each person's grade. (But you can't go over 100%.)
Feb 13, 2002
The first major [graded] class exercise was described in class today. Here is
the link for people who didn't get a chance to copy it down:
http://p034.psch.uic.edu/class-intro.htm.
Feb 25, 2002
Exam 2 has been graded, and the scores are posted on line.
Overall, the scores were not as high as they were for the first exam. The average
was 67% correct. One person, however, did ace the exam. Some of the TA's have
indicated to me that many of the students who did poorly do not attend lecture
on a regular basis. I strongly encourage you to attend lecture if you want to
do well on the exams. If you do not see your exam score posted online, but you
know you took the exam, please contact us as soon as possible.
March 1, 2002
Some data for your data analysis exercise, collected from class members, is
presented here. You will be working with these data
in the lab exercises for the week of March 4 - March 8. Please print these data
out if you want a paper copy.
March 1, 2002
I've created some on-line programs for data analysis that may be useful for
some of your assignments. They can be found here.
April 2, 2002
Here is an update on the on-line class exercise,
first announced in class on Feb 13, 2002.
Although I originally stated that we would work on this exercise until the last
week of the semester, we should bring it to a close soon so we can begin to
play with the data in class. Thus, what you should do is continue working on
the exercise until you have completed your questionnaire on 12 different occasions.
If you've been doing this twice a week since it was first announced, then you
will have already finished 14 sessions, and you should consider yourself done.
If you are a bit behind on this exercise, you still have until the end of the
semester to catch up and complete 12 sessions. (However, please keep in mind
that you should be doing no more than 2-3 sessions a week, and the computer
will flag your file if you submit more than one submission a day.)
If you would like to check on the status of your submissions, please
click here.
Once you have finished your 12 submissions, there will be a final, wrap-up part
of the assignment in which you'll need to analyze your data. When you are ready,
click here if you have been working on the exercise about how you feel in
your relationships. If you've been working on an exercise about mood
and emotions, click here to get the final assignment.
April 22, 2002
Extra credit link (as announced in class on April 22; please see lecture overheads):
--
April 27, 2002
Here is an update on your grades-to-date. Please
check this as soon as possible and let your TA know if something seems problematic.
May 1, 2002
Here is an update on your final grades in the class.
Please check this as soon as possible and let your TA know if something seems
problematic. Some things have been updated since the last posting on April 27
(see link above).
link to:
schedule | updates | top
Schedule
and Web Notes
Note: You can access web versions of the class overheads by clicking on the
links below. This schedule is tentative, and will be revised online as we progress
through the semester.