You must chooseONEof the following questions/topics below to answer/address. Make sure you answer/address ALL parts of the question/topic. If you quote directly from the text in your answer please indicate so by using quotation marks. When using material from the text you must list page numbers.Remember, grammar counts, this is an upper level course so I expect you to communicate your ideas clearly and to appropriately cite material. DO NOT copy and paste from websites.During the first week of class I will do my best to prompt students and give feedback so you can get a feel for exactly what is expected. Don't forget that a portion of your participation score comes from responding to posts from other students (you must have at least 2 comments/asides to student main posts in addition to your main response) for each discussion.
It is important that you provide enough detail so it is clear to me that you understand the material and provide a reference and citations for ANY information that is not your own.
See your syllabus and the rubric for more details.
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1. An important part of research is separating the good from the bad. Research shows that even the best and brightest students may hold some beliefs in pseudoscience. It also shows that if discussions about pseudoscience are not handled correctly, there can be a backfire effect where the example of pseudoscience is remembered but not that the claim is actually false (Impey, Buxner, & Antonellis, 2012; Lewandowsky et al., 2012). Describe pseudoscience and give a detailed example (PLEASE DO NOT USE ASTROLOGY AS AN EXAMPLE). Explain how you would teach about your example so that it is clear that it is pseudoscience.
2. People sometimes suggest that psychology cannot be a science because either a) human behavior cannot be predicted with perfect accuracy, or b) most of its subject matter (e.g., thoughts and feelings) cannot be observed directly. Explain how the use of the scientific method and empirical questions helps to dispute those claims. In your response, define and give an example of empirical and nonempirical questions and the scientific method. Do we need to be able to directly observe and predict human behavior with accuracy for psychology to be a science? Why or why not?
3. Define basic and applied research in terms of research in psychology. Pick a topic that is interesting to you and provide three basic research questions for that topic. Then, expand on that to include three applied questions related to your basic research questions. Identify specific variables in each example. Finally, find an article in a research journal related to your topic. Does the research question in that article fit as a basic or applied research question. Why?
4. If we look at science as a general way of understanding the natural world, there are three fundamental features to the scientific approach. Define those features and provide specific examples of each. How are these features related to one another? Include at least one published work from a research journal in your response.