Module 2 Faculty Resources
Table of Contents
Module 2 Faculty Resources
Table of Contents
Background Information
Summary of Waymaker Assignments and Discussions
Assignment
Discussion
In-Class Activities
Find the Flaw
Pic of the Day
Class Questions
Anticipation Guide
Background Information
Visit the Psychology course homepage and click through the module to see the content introduced to students
within Waymaker. Click here to see the full list of learning outcomes covered in this module. Click here to
access the accompanying PowerPoints.
The TeachPsychScience Website is a great tool with links to in-class activities on research and statistics.
This module covers the scientific method, ethical considerations, types of research, and statistical thinking.
● The text contains a link to the Psychological Research on the Net website, which you may want to
share with students as a place to go to participate in online research.
● A portion of this MIT lecture is included in the course and gives a good overview if you want to watch it
before class.
● The Psych in Real Life example in this module includes a walkthrough of research conducted by
McCabe and Castel, then examines concerns about replication. Students learn about the replication
crisis.
Summary of Waymaker Assignments and Discussions
Below are the assignments and discussions that come imported into your LMS with the Waymaker course.
Note that all assignments are optional and can be modified, deleted, or replaced.
In-Class Activities authored by Stacey Souther are licensed under a CC BY: Attribution license.
Reading Anticipation Guide and Class Questions by NOBA is licensed under a CC BY: Attribution license.
Additional Faculty Resources and modifications authored by Lumen Learning are licensed under a CC BY: Attribution license.
Assignment
● Students are asked to find a popular news article from within the past 10 years that reports on
the results of a psychological study. They first summarize the news article, then find the
original research and write up a response comparing the two.
Discussion
● Students are asked to do the following:
○ Visit the PLOS One website and find a research article, then describe all of the components of
the research and the research process
In-Class Activities
Find the Flaw
Teaching objectivity, reliability and validity of information using “Find the Flaw”.
After completing your lecture about objectivity, reliability and validity, you will provide your students with
scenarios that include a “flaw” – a mistake in how the study is being described. Students are responsible for
finding the flaw and indicating why it is a flaw. You can either do this activity by reading the scenarios aloud,
and ask for students to volunteer answers, or in small groups where you provide the scenarios as a worksheet
to the class. Points are not allocated for this in-class assignment/discussion. You will review/reveal answers
during class.
Study Scenarios
1. A researcher is testing how food and exercise affect a person’s weight. Each participant in the study is
asked to eat a particular diet and conduct the same exercise routine. Each day, the participant is to
weigh themselves and take their heart rate at particular times of day. They are instructed to write down
the information in a provided journal and the importance of the accuracy of the data is emphasized.
Each participant is responsible for weighing themselves with their own personal scale and to take their
heart rate by either using a fit bit type device or by manually recording their pulse. At the end of the
study period the participants turn in their completed journals.
2. A child developmental psychologist is interested in determining if a child’s personality can be predicted
by a parent’s personality type. The psychologist recruits 50 parents and asks them to complete a well-
known and studied personality inventory, the MMPI, to determine their own personality profile. After
completing the inventory, parents are then asked to describe their child by choosing the top five
attributes that best describe their child from a list of 100 possible attributes that the psychologist
developed. The psychologist then runs correlational tests to see if the chosen attributes link to their
parent’s personality profile.
3. A doctoral student completing her dissertation on language development believes that parental naming
of objects significantly affects how a young child who is just learning language interacts with the
objects. The student recruits 75 parent-child dyads with 9 to 12-month-old children. In a lab, the parent
holds their child on their lap while the doctoral student hands the child toys while either labeling the
object or remaining silent. The student records how the child interacts with each object and later
In-Class Activities authored by Stacey Souther are licensed under a CC BY: Attribution license.
Reading Anticipation Guide and Class Questions by NOBA is licensed under a CC BY: Attribution license.
Additional Faculty Resources and modifications authored by Lumen Learning are licensed under a CC BY: Attribution license.
analyzes the behavior of the children to conclude that labeling made the children interact in a
significantly different way than not labeling the item.
Answer Key for Scenario Flaws:
1. There is a flaw in this study in the reliability measure. Each participant is using a scale that has not
been tested to ensure accurate readings, as well as using different methods to rate heart rate that may
not be reliable.
2. There is a flaw in this study in the validity measure. While the validity of the MMPI has been
determined, it is unclear that the list of attributes the psychologist developed for the children is actually
reflecting the child’s personality.
3. There is a flaw in this study in objectivity. The doctoral student is the only one completing the study
and using observational techniques that can be subjective. It is unclear what specific behavior she is
looking for. As the doctoral has strong expectations for results, it is possible the results are more a
reflection of expectations rather than true results.
Pic of the Day
A pic of the day allows you to introduce a new concept – it can either be the jump start for a lecture or help to
frame a class discussion. This guide includes an openly licensed picture you can use during your lecture or as
a discussion prompt.
Image of child from Pixabay: [Link] Pixabay
License
Teaching Ethical Considerations using “pic of the day”
Research involving human participants or animals must be regulated. A photo such as this can evoke strong
feelings and be a great discussion starter. You can approach this activity as a lecture starter for the class as a
whole or as a small group discussion. After teaching about research methods, say the following:
“While research using humans and animals is vitally important to the study of psychology, we must remember
to always maintain ethical standards. What do you think we mean by ethical standards?” [Discussion ensues
with definition of ethics]. After the discussion, either continue your lecture listing the important ethical
considerations, or have students take a few minutes to look up the key ethical considerations in research.
Answers should include informed consent, safety, ability to withdraw at any time without penalty,
confidentiality, and deception.
In-Class Activities authored by Stacey Souther are licensed under a CC BY: Attribution license.
Reading Anticipation Guide and Class Questions by NOBA is licensed under a CC BY: Attribution license.
Additional Faculty Resources and modifications authored by Lumen Learning are licensed under a CC BY: Attribution license.
Class Questions
● In an experiment, there are two types of variables: independent and dependent.
● The independent variable is the one that: ________________________________
● The dependent variable is the one that:
● __________________________________
● In Dunn’s experiment, the independent variable was _______________________
__________________ and the dependent variable was ____________________.
● In your own words, describe what “random assignment” is:
● In your own words, why is random assignment important?
● What are a couple major issues that can negatively influence experiments?
● How is correlational research different from an experiment?
● Define a positive correlation:
● Define a negative correlation:
● What is a major disadvantage with using correlational research?
● Why is it important for you to understand research methods?
Anticipation Guide
Anticipation Guides can be used in a variety of ways—they may be assigned to students before reading the
text outside of class, at the beginning of class to kick off the lecture, or as in-class discussion questions for
reflection.
Statements Agree or Were you Why/why not?
Disagree? right?
If an experimenter is careful
she can simulate real-world
conditions in a lab study.
It is important for a trained
experimenter to observe
and record what happens in
a study for the data to be
valid.
Without modern technology
like smartphones, studying
real world behavior is
nearly impossible. Other
techniques are too invasive
or expensive.
Collecting physical
information, such as heart
rate, is both common and
useful in real-world
psychological experiments.
The distribution of ages on
In-Class Activities authored by Stacey Souther are licensed under a CC BY: Attribution license.
Reading Anticipation Guide and Class Questions by NOBA is licensed under a CC BY: Attribution license.
Additional Faculty Resources and modifications authored by Lumen Learning are licensed under a CC BY: Attribution license.
a school bus is likely to be
quite different than the
distribution on a public city
bus.
If the first 3 M&Ms you
pulled out of a new package
were red you could feel
confident the rest would
also likely be red.
If you collected opinions
about video games in your
campus cafeteria you could
feel confident the average
response would be similar
to the general population.
A p-value of .004 should
make us feel confident that
our test results are not
likely due to chance.
You could use playing
cards to randomly assign
study participants to
different groups.
In-Class Activities authored by Stacey Souther are licensed under a CC BY: Attribution license.
Reading Anticipation Guide and Class Questions by NOBA is licensed under a CC BY: Attribution license.
Additional Faculty Resources and modifications authored by Lumen Learning are licensed under a CC BY: Attribution license.
