WRITTEN ASSIGNMENT 1 (8%)

Transcription

1 WRITTEN ASSIGNMENT 1 (8%) The purpose of this first written assignment is to give you practice at thinking scientifically about psychological issues. It s highly likely you have come across claims and ideas regarding human behavior before, but perhaps not stopped to fully analyze whether these claims and ideas are scientific, and whether they are supported by good quality evidence. As guiding principles, Lilienfeld et al. (p in the 3 rd edition, p in the 2 nd edition) have set out some principles of scientific thinking. We talked about these principles in class. The six guiding principles are: 1) Ruling out rival hypotheses - Findings consistent with several different hypotheses need additional research to decide which hypothesis is best supported. When looking at a pattern of results that has been reported, it is important to ask are there any alternative hypotheses that could explain this pattern of data? The rival hypotheses that are most important to rule out are those that could also explain the specific results that have been described. It is useful to consider how we could attempt to rule out these alternative hypotheses. 2) Correlation vs. causation - An association between two things does not imply a cause and effect relationship. If a pattern of results was produced simply by measuring two different things and comparing them, we cannot say anything definitive about whether one of these things caused the other. It s always important to ask whether the causal connection that is claimed or implied (e.g. A causes B) could be reversed (i.e. B causes A) or whether a third variable could explain the relationship (i.e. C causes A and B to go together). 3) Falsifiability - Claims must be capable of being disproved. In other words, we should be able to think of a way to test whether or not a claim is true. If the claim is made in such a way that there s no good way to test it, the claim is not really scientific. In science, we should always be open to the possibility that our ideas are wrong. If there are no data that could possibly show that our ideas are wrong, then our ideas are not properly scientific. 4) Replicability - Findings must be capable of being duplicated following the same methodology. In addition, the most reliable claims are those that have converging evidence for them. We can only really be confident in a claim if it has been tested in multiple different ways and all of them point to the same effect. 5) Extraordinary claims - Science is, for the most part, a cumulative process, where new claims represent small advances over older ones. A claim that contradicts what we already know, or that seems to promise radical new benefits, must have a lot of evidence to back it up. The bigger the claim, the more evidence must be provided.

2 6) Parsimony (a.k.a. Occam s razor) - If two hypotheses explain a phenomenon equally well, select the simpler one. The simpler one is not necessarily correct, but we shouldn t make our explanations more complicated than necessary. In addition, Lilienfeld et al. have outlined some warning signs related to pseudoscientific claims (see p in the 3 rd edition, p in the 2 nd edition). 1) Overreliance on anecdotes Testimonials from others can be hard to verify, hard to generalize and fail to inform us about cause-and-effect relationships. In general, statements that are backed up with data gathered from a study are to be preferred over statements that reflect the opinion of just a single person. Any single person s observations may be based on an unrepresentative sample and may be influenced by biases (including a social desirability bias or biases in memory). 2) Meaningless psychobabble - Technical jargon and scientific-sounding words can sound convincing but be essentially meaningless. We should be wary of claims that rely on confusing terminology. 3) Talk of proof instead of evidence - Science provides evidence that either supports or refutes certain ideas we have about the world. But proving an idea is almost impossible because future research may show us that our existing ideas are incorrect, or at least only partially true. For your assignment, I would like you to read the research description presented later in this document (entitled: Quinoa is the new weight-loss superfood! ) and a) analyze the claims being made according to 3 of the above 6 principles of scientific thinking. It may be the case that the research does a good job of following some of these 6 scientific principles, but does not do a good job of following others. If you think the research does a good job of following one of the principles that you have chosen to write about (e.g. you think it does a good job in ruling our rival hypotheses), provide a detailed response as to why you think that. If you think the research does not do a good job of following one of the principles (e.g. it fails to consider rival hypotheses), please provide a comprehensive answer and say what would need to be done to make sure the research follows the principle (e.g. what the rival hypotheses might be and how they might be ruled out). You will probably find that you have more interesting material to write about if you try to look for the ways that the research fails to follow a scientific principle, than if you look for the ways it succeeds. In other words, try to find what the researcher did wrong rather than what they did right. The research description has been specially created so that it fails to abide by some but not all of these scientific principles. b) analyze the claims according to 1 of the above 3 warning signs related to pseudoscientific claims. The research descriptions also contain one (or more) of the warning signs of pseudoscience. So pick one of the three warning signs from the list and discuss how it applies to

3 the research. You should discuss the warning sign in general (e.g. why it is not appropriate to rely on anecdotal evidence when making claims) and how it applies to the specific research that is being described (e.g. what anecdotes are mentioned in the research description and why they are problematic).

4 Quinoa is the new weight-loss superfood! Most people who start a diet do not continue and, for those that do, they tend to gain all the weight back that they lost. The American talk show called The Doctors recently discussed during one of the aired episodes that eating quinoa will, melt body fat away. Moreover, eating a grain like quinoa slow-releases energy so that you feel revved up throughout the day. Eating quinoa has been hailed by millions of women as an exceptional slim-down method. Furthermore, recent research by Dr. Waterman from the University of Slignaven suggests that eating quinoa twice per day will lead to a weight loss of about 8 pounds per week. Really, it does not matter how much you actually eat, as long as you eat this special grain! One study to date that was carried out by Dr. Kendall McCloud and her team in 2014 found that weight loss occurred amongst the 30 women evaluated. That is, 30 women ate quinoa twice per day while 30 others did not. After a one-week period, each person had their weight taken. Overall, a total of 200 pounds was lost among the women who ate quinoa (the results varied for each person). Even though and as Dr. McCloud herself noted, with this many women in the study it was too hard to control for extraneous variables like eating habits or exercise practices, The results fit perfectly with my predictions. There is a statistically significant relationship showing that eating this particular grain twice per day causes women to loss a substantial amount of weight. She further noted that the results prove that quinoa is a weight-loss superfood! How does consuming quinoa result in weight loss? Well, several researchers have suggested that quinoa is mostly made up of water and fat soluble substances that bind to lipids in the cell s membrane and as a result, we naturally expel these when we breathe, sleep, or eat! This is truly amazing! Furthermore, quinoa absorbs twice the number of fat cells as compared to exercise alone. Try this wonderful grain today and see the results for yourself!

5 WRITTEN ASSIGNMENT 1 MARKING Your written assignment should be approximately 500 words and you should allocate approximately 125 words to each of the 3 scientific principles you choose and the last 125 to the warning sign of pseudoscience. Overall, the assignment will be one-page long, single spaced. If you write more than one-page, we no longer read on (and marks may be lost for unread content that covers a point). There is no need for an introduction or conclusion in this paper. Use Times New Roman, 12 font, or Arial 11 font. Each scientific principle/warning sign you select will be marked out of 3 marks, and so the written assignment will be out of 12 marks. We will use the following criteria: ANALYSIS OF 3 SCIENTIFIC PRINCIPLES AND 1 WARNING SIGN - 12 MARKS (3 marks each) 0 mark no answer or wholly inappropriate answer 1 mark significant misunderstanding or inappropriate application of principle 2 marks fair application of principle to scenario, some omissions 3 marks comprehensive discussion of principle as applied to scenario FORMATTING AND SUBMISSION FORMAT Because you will be handing in the paper electronically through the course website, you do not need to include a cover sheet with your name, student number, etc. We do not need a paper copy of this assignment. Full sentences and paragraphs must be used, bullet form is not acceptable. It will be good practice for you to include a reference list in APA format at the end of the paper (see below) but there are no marks assigned for this. CITATIONS For this assignment, the only sources you should consult are our class lectures/notes and the course textbook. If you would like to cite the class notes in the text of your assignment in APA format, write something like the following: As defined in class (Ornstein, 2018), falsifiability refers to whether or not a claim can be tested. The reference for the class material at the end of your assignment should look something like this: Ornstein, T. (2018, January). The tactics of psychological research. Psychology 102: Introduction to Psychology I. Lecture conducted from Ryerson University, Toronto, ON. If you would like to cite the textbook in the text of your assignment in APA format, write something like the following: Lilienfeld et al. (2017) tell us that anecdotes can be misleading in the following ways. The reference for the textbook at the end of your assignment should look something like this:

6 Lilienfeld, S.O., Lynn, S.J., Namy, L.L., Woolf, N.J., Cramer, K.M. & Schmaltz, R. (2017). Psychology: From inquiry to understanding. 3 rd Canadian edition. Toronto, ON: Pearson. All that said, don t worry about citing too much for this assignment. It s good to practice citing and referencing in APA format, but there are no marks for citing and references in this assignment. Also, please write this whole assignment in your own words. Do not use any direct quotes for this assignment. Each quote used will result in a one-mark deduction. SUBMISSION Save your assignment as a.doc file Assignments are to be submitted via the course website before 11.59pm on the due date. Please see the course outline for details of late submission policy. Retain your electronic receipt of submission in case of dispute but please don t forward this to me unless I specifically ask for it.