First Steps In Research and Statistics: A Practical Workbook for Psychology Students

by Howitt; Dennis

• ISBN13: 9780415201018
• ISBN10: 0415201012
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Nonspecific Binding
• Copyright: 2000-06-20
• Publisher: Routledge

Summary

First Steps in Research and Statisticsis a new, very accessible approach to learning about quantitative methods. No previous knowledge or experience is assumed and every stage of the research process is covered. Topics include: formulating your research questions, how to choose the right statistical test for your research design, important research issues, such as questionnaire design, ethics, sampling, reliability and validity, conducting simple statistics to explore relationships and differences in your data, writing statistics to explore relationships and differences in your data, writing up your research report and presenting statistics. Simple and helpful worksheets and flow diagrams guide you through the research stages. Each chapter contains exercises with answers to check whether you've understood. First Steps in Research and Statisticsis essential reading for all psychology students who have to carry out practicals and projects in their course. DennisHowitt and Duncan Cramer both teach at Loughborough University and have written several books on research and statistics.

Table of Contents

List of boxes	vii
List of figures	ix
List of tables	xi
List of worksheets	xiv
Preface	xv
PART I The basics of research	1	(46)
Asking research questions	3	(8)
Common research methods	11	(10)
Ethics in the conduct of research	21	(11)
Measuring variables	32	(15)
PART II The statistical analysis of single variables and simple surveys	47	(52)
Two types of data analysis	49	(4)
Describing and summarising category data	53	(10)
Describing and summarising score data	63	(21)
Surveys and sampling	84	(15)
PART III Exploring correlational relationships in survey/non-experimental studies	99	(60)
Examining relationships between two variables	101	(9)
Numerical ways of describing relationships: correlation coefficients	110	(15)
Statistical significance of the correlation coefficient	125	(17)
Differences and associations among two sets of categories: chi-square	142	(11)
Conducting survey/non-experimental studies	153	(6)
PART IV Exploring differences between group means	159	(40)
Testing for differences in means: more on significance testing	161	(16)
Comparing the scores of two groups of people: Mann-Whitney U-test	177	(13)
Comparing scores from the same group of people on two occasions: Wilcoxon matched-pairs test	190	(9)
PART V The essentials of designing experiments	199	(68)
Designing and running experiments	201	(17)
Comparing the scores of a randomly assigned experimental and control group: unrelated t-test	218	(16)
Comparing the scores of a counterbalanced related subjects experiment: related t-test	234	(14)
Comparing three or more groups on a numerical score	248	(19)
PART VI The report	267	(13)
Writing a research report	269	(11)
References	280	(1)
Index	281