Introduction
The assignment consists of choosing a psychological causal model developed by
other researchers (or developing a new psychological causal model), designing a
psychological experiment, simulating data, organising and analysing those
data, and presenting a research report, including a graph. The assignment
contains 3 elements:
- A graphical psychological causal model that shows the relationship
between variables, and how the study will measure the causal
relationship between these variables. - An organised data frame of simulated data.
- A research report of maximum 750 words that follows the guidelines of
the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association 7th
Edition.
Psychological causal model
In a separate page from the extended abstract, present a psychological
causal model. The explanation of causal models is in week 2. For this
assignment the causal model must have only two variables: one causal
variable and one consequence variable, as shown below:
Data frame
Also separated from the extended abstract, present a data frame in a table
with the following characteristic:
Column 1: Participant number or ID
Column 2: Group
Column 3: Dependent variable
The data in that table will come from a template spreadsheet with the
following content:
The values in column 1 will be pre-populated and will have the numbers 1
to 100. This indicates that your experiment will have 100 participants.
Variable X Variable Y
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The values in column 2 will be pre-populated with 0 in the first 50 rows and
1 in the following 50 rows. This indicates that your experiment will have two
groups. You will have to replace 0 with the name of your control group and 1
with the name of your experimental group.
The 100 rows in column 3 will have a formula to generate random numbers.
It will be explained to you how to use this column to generate the values.
Research report
The research report should contain the following sections:
Introduction: Explains the rationale of the study, including the
psychological causal model. It states the hypothesis tested in the study.
Method: Contains the details necessary for another researcher to
replicate the study. It includes the subsections “Participants”, “Material”
and “Procedure”.
Results: It presents descriptive statistics and inferential statistics
(Independent samples t test), including a graph. [the graph is NOT
included in the word count]
Discussion: It indicates whether the hypothesis was supported by the
data, and it relates the results of the present study with previous
research. It also discusses the limitations of the study and offers
suggestions for future research.
References: A list of the references used in the previous sections. (This
part is NOT included in the word count). You must include three
references; no more and no less than three.
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