Students should be able to identify examples of anectodal evidence and identify the major weaknesses of using anectodal evidence Anecdotal s can be defined as the casual observations around us o Example of a simple anecdote I ve observed that students who sit in the front of class tend to get better grades than students who sit in the back The problem with anecdotes is that they can be prone to fallacies o Selective observation Women are bad drivers You always notice a woman driving bad but never when they drive good When you only attend to examples that support your pre existing ideas o Inaccurate observation Misentrepretating what you are hearing Seeing someone screaming and thinking they are mad when actually they are sad When you incorrectly interpret an event you observe o Overgeneralization Making a sweeping generalization Men with beards have bad body odor When you draw broad conclusions based off very limited observations o Reisistance to change You already have this preconceived thought that all men with beards have bad body odor When you refuse to consider new evidence that challenges previously held beliefs Students should be able to identify the four major types of research question and to accurately determine what type of research question is being asked in an example study Descriptive research Research that describes the status of the given phenomenon Examples What types of social support are available to teen mothers you re not comparing one to another you re just giving the support that is available How prevalent is bullying in private elementary schools Essentially just trying to get the experience not comparing o Exploratory research novel perspectives Inductive research Trying to generate ideas based off of our descriptions Focuses on generating new explanations and seeking out Examples How do parents make sense of physically abusing their children How do teen mothers make use of social supports o Explanatory research Trying to understand the cause and effect relationships between different phenemonen Deductive research Examples Do positive peer mentors reduce teen mothers risk for future pregnancies Evaluation research o Testing a specific research Ex What are the effects of emotionally focused couples therapy on the frequency of domestic violence Are anti depressants more effective than psychotherapy for treating depression Practive based research Dissemination research Adaption research Implentation research Examples o check end of research questions slide Students should be able to differentiate between a paradigm a theory a hypothesis and a concept and provide an example of each Paradigm o Ontology Epistemology Grand Theory o Theory Propositions Paradigm o How you make sense of the world around you Example Positivism Knowledge is limited to what can be measured or observed Quantative Example Post modernism Making inferences about what you can t observe directly There is no absolute meaning to something Qualitative o Ontology o Epistemology Our assumptions of the world itself How people interpret their reality Theories o Models that are commonly used when describing or simplyfing something Example Grand theories Seek to explain a huge span of phenomenas Hard to evaluate and test Example Not so grand theories Smaller scale more focused theories that have direct application and testability o Propositions The verbs of theories A more developed child requires more participation in progressively more complex activity o Concept o Construct Characteristics of people and events The nouns of theories Ex A child s sense of security Ex Emotional attachment specifically categories to child s sense of security o Variables The measurable representation of a contrast Ex Someone has a level of 7 of depression o Hypotheses A proposed relationship between two or more variables Students should be able to identify examples of pseudoscience and identify the risks associated with these practices Sometimes claims are presented as being based in science but upon closer examination they do not meet the criteria of the scientific method o Ex Feeling the back of someone s head and being able to tell if they are a Phrenology criminal Parapsychology o Ghost hunting o We don t know if ghost hunters actually protect us because we don t know if ghosts exist Pseudoscience in FCS o Sugar causes hyperactivity o Conversion therapy o Energy therapy o Hypnotherapy Students should be able to differentiate between qualitative and quantitative research approaches and identify when each type if appropriate Quantitative approach Qualitative approach o Starts with a focused research question or hypothesis collect a small amount f data from each large number of individuals describe the resulting data using statistical tehcniques and draw general conclusions from the large amount of population o Good at drawing conclusions about general human behavior o Start with a theory and derive a hypothesis o Researchers begin with a less focused research question collect large amounts of relatively unfiltered data from a relatively small number of individuals and describe data using nonstatistical techniques o Generally less concerned with drawing general conclusions about human behavior than with understanding in detail THE EXPERIENCE of their research participants o Good at generating novel and interesting research questions o Start with a theory and derive a hypothesis Ex A researcher wanted to learn how the families of teenage suicide victims cope with their loss rather than having an already articulated question such as what percentage of family member join support groups add basic applied inductive and deductive research Students should be able to explain triangulation and its role in research Triangulation is to use both quantative and qualitative methods converge on the same general conclusion they reinforce and enrich each other If the results diverge then they suggest Why do the results diverge and how can be they reconciled Students should be able to explain the role of feasibility social importance and scientific importance in research questions Feasibility o Factors that affect feasibility time money equipment materials technical knowledge and skill and access to research participants o Taking these factors into account will ensure they do not waste time and effort Social importance o Showing why certain research is important Scientific importance o How things work and why they work Students