* The term ‘psychology’ originates from two Greek words: psyche, meaning soul or mind; and logos, meaning study or knowledge. Therefore, by its original definition, psychology was initially described as ‘the study of the soul or mind’. * Overt behaviour is any response that is clearly visible and therefore directly observable and more likely to be measured accurately. They rejected the study of mental experiences, as these are covert; that is, internal and hidden from view and therefore not directly observable or easily measured. * Psychologists usually distinguish mental processes from behaviour. The term mental processes generally refers to a person’s thoughts and feelings, which are personal, or subjective, and cannot be directly observed. * The term behaviour refers to any externally expressed action made by a living person that can be directly observed. Behaviour involves doing something—it is an active process. It is the means by which people can physically express their thoughts and feelings when interacting with the environment. Talking, touching, running, perspiring, hugging, flirting, text messaging, watching television, sleeping, socialising, and reflexive responses such as blinking and automatically withdrawing your hand on touching a very hot object are all examples of behaviour that can be observed as it occurs * Although the definition of psychology distinguishes between mental processes and behaviour, these do not often occur independently of one another. They are interrelated and influences; for example, similarities and differences in how people think, feel and behave across different cultures. * Steps in psychological research: --Step 1 Identification of the research problem
--Step 2 Construction of the research hypothesis
--Step 3 Design of the method
--Step 4 Collection of the data
--Step 5 Analysis of the data
--Step 6 Interpretation of the data
--Step 7 Reporting of the research findings * A research method is a particular way of conducting a research study to collect accurate and reliable information about behaviour and mental processes. For example, an experiment and a survey are different research methods. * An experiment is used to test a cause–effect relationship between variables under controlled conditions. For example, an experiment would be used to find out if the variable of anxiety (a possible cause) has an effect on the variable of exam performance. a researcher could conduct an experiment to find out if there is a cause–effect relationship between the different variables. * A variable is any factor that can change (‘vary’) in amount or type over time. * The independent variable (IV) is the variable that is systematically manipulated, changed or varied in some way by the researcher in order to assess its effect on the participants’ responses. * The dependent variable (DV) shows any effects of the independent variable; that is, it is the aspect of a participant’s behaviour or experience that is observed or measured and is expected to change as a result of the manipulation of the independent variable. It is called a dependent variable because whether or not it will change and the way it will change depend on the effects of the independent variable. * a hypothesis is a tentative and testable prediction of the relationship between two or more events or characteristics. It is an educated guess about what will happen in the research. * A confounding variable is a variable other than the IV that has had an unwanted affect on the DV, making it impossible to determine which of the variables has produced the change in the DV * An extraneous variable is any variable other than the independent variable that can cause a change in the dependent variable and therefore affects the results of the
