Psychology Statistics

PSYC4700 - Statistics for the Behavioral Sciences

PSYC4700 - Statistics for the Behavioral Sciences

Week 1: Basics of Research and Statistics

Complete the following problems within this Word document. (Do not submit other files.) Show your work for problem sets that require calculations. Ensure that your answer to each problem is clearly visible. (You may want to highlight your answer or use a different type color to set it apart.)

Submit the document to your instructor by Sunday, 11:59 p.m. central time.

Problem Set 1.1: Identifying Variables (Dependent, Independent, Quasi-Independent)

Criterion: Identify dependent and independent variables.

Instructions: For the following list of examples, identify the dependent variable and independent (or quasi-independent) variable.

1. A researcher tests whether cocaine use increases impulsive behavior in a sample of cocaine-dependent and cocaine-inexperienced mice.

Independent Variable: ________

Quasi-Independent Variable: ________

Dependent Variable: ________

2. A professor tests whether students perform better on a multiple-choice or fill-in-the-blank test format.

Independent Variable: ________

Quasi-Independent Variable: ________

Dependent Variable: ________

3. A researcher tests whether smoking by parents influences children’s attitudes toward smoking behavior.

Independent Variable: ________

Quasi-Independent Variable: ________

Dependent Variable: ________

4. A social scientist tests whether attitudes toward morality differ based on political affiliation (Democrat or Republican).

Independent Variable: ________

Quasi-Independent Variable: ________

Dependent Variable: ________

(Assignment continues on next page.)

5. A cultural researcher tests whether individuals from different cultures share or differ in the belief that dreams have meaning.

Independent Variable: ________

Quasi-Independent Variable: ________

Dependent Variable: ________

Problem Set 1.2: Understanding Descriptive and Interferential Statistics

Criterion: Explain data in a table.

Instructions: Read the following and answer the question.

Gun ownership in the United States. Data from Gallup polls over a 40-year period show how gun ownership in the United States has changed. The results are described in the table below, with the percentage of Americans who own guns given in each of 5 decades:

Year	%
1972	43
1982	42
1992	48
2002	40
2012	43

Source: Reported at http://www.gallup.com/poll/1645/Guns.aspx

1. Are the percentages reported here an example of descriptive statistics or interferential statistics? ______________________________________________________________

2. Based on the percentages given in the table, how has gun ownership in the United States changed over the past 40 years? ______________________________________

Problem Set 1.3: Understanding Sample and Population

Criterion: Describes the relationship between population and sample.

Instructions: Read the following and answer the question.

Height and educational attainment. Szklarska, Koziel, Bielicki, and Malina (2007) hypothesized that taller young men are more likely to move up the scale of educational attainment compared with shorter individuals from the same social background. They recruited 91,373 19-year-old men to participate in the study.

Do these participants most likely represent a sample or population? Explain.

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

(Assignment continues on next page.)

Problem Set 1.4: Constants and Variables

Criterion: Identify constants and variables.

Instructions: Identify whether the following are constants or variables.

1. 8: ___________________

2. −5: __________________

3. –x: __________________

4. y: ___________________

5. 0: ___________________

6. xy: __________________

Problem Set 1.5: SPSS Enter Data

Criterion: Enter and display data in SPSS.

Instructions: Use the supplied data to complete Steps 1–8 below.

Data: Five social media users spent the following number of minutes viewing Twitter: 15.21, 46.18, 12.45, 65.486, 26.852.

Steps:

1. Open SPSS.

2. Click New DataSet in the New Files area and then click Open.

3. Click the Variable View tab at the bottom.

4. In the cell under Name, type Minutes.

5. The variable of Minutes is continuous. In the Decimals column, type 2.

6. Click on the Data View tab at the bottom of the screen.

7. Enter data in the column labeled Minutes.

8. Take a screenshot of your data in SPSS and paste it below.

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