Biderman’s PSY 5100 Syllabus – Revised 8/16/17
Statistics and Research Methods in Psychology I
Fall 2017
Psychology 5100 42409 Tuesdays 5:30-8:00 PM
All information on this syllabus is subject to change.
Instructor: Michael Biderman
Phone and Email: Mobile: 423-316-9504 Home: 423-267-2289 responses may be from
Office Hours and Location: CSOB 361: TBA – Call me or email me to set up a meeting
Course Meeting Days, Time, and Location: Tuesdays 5:30-8:00 Brock 205
Course Catalog Description: Review and extension of undergraduate psychological statistics and research methods. Focus on computer analysis using parametric and nonparametric techniques including analysis of variance and regression..
Course Pre/Co Requisites: Prerequisites: Background and/or experience in statistics for the social sciences required or a course equivalent to UTC PSY 2010 and admission to a psychology master’s program or department head approval
Course Student Learning Outcomes: Students should become familiar with basic concepts and methods of statistics and research methods and be able to use those methods at a level beyond the undergraduate level in the analysis of data.
Required Course Materials:
(If you order texts online, be sure to insure that the Edition numbers are correct. I’ve put what I believe to be the correct ISBN numbers below, but it’s your responsibility to get the correct edition.)
*Howell, D. C. (2014). Fundamental Statistics for the Behavioral Sciences, Eighth or latest Edition. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth. ISBN-13: Student Edition: 978-1-285-07691-1; Loose-leaf: ISBN-13: 978-1-285-08180-9.
*Weathington, B. L., Cunningham, C. J. L, & Pittenger, D. J. (2010). Research Methods for the Behavioral and Social Sciences. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc. ISBN-10: 0470458038 | ISBN-13: 978-0470458037
*Green, S.B & Salkind, N.J. (2005). Using SPSS for Windows and Macintosh: Analyzing and Understanding Data, 7th or most recent Ed. . Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice-Hall ISBN-13: 978-0-205-02040-9. A Kindle edition of this book is available.
Technology Requirements: *Email account with ability to receive and open attachments and produce documents that are Microsoft Office documents and SPSS files.
*Microsoft Office 2010 or later, including Excel. I’ll be using Office 2010.
*SPSS V24 or later. Can be downloaded a https://webapps.utk.edu/oit/softwaredistribution/
*Download SPSS V24, Amos V22, and SamplePower V3.0(Call 425-4000 w. problems.)
Technology Skills: Ability to use a personal computer and Microsoft Office.
Technology Support: If you have problems with your UTC email account or with UTC Learn, contact IT Solutions Center at 423-425-4000 or email
Course Assessments and Requirements:
TESTS About 175 points
Tests will be multiple-choice and may contain short answer essays. The final may be all multiple-choice.
HOMEWORK ASSIGNMENTS
Regular (Memo) Assignments About 30 Points total
Due: Beginning of class Late submissions: -0.5 pt/school day
There will be 8-10 regular, aka memo, assignments. Most of these will involve your analyzing data and then writing the results of that analysis in the form of a memo to a supervisor. Most are worth 4 points each. Some of these "regular" homework assignments may include end-of-chapter exercises or data from Green, et. al. These assignments will usually involve computer analyses. See the handout on memo format.
Your grade on these homework assignments will depend as much on the quality of your writing as on the correctness of the analysis. All responses to test questions, homework assignments, etc., will be graded for writing quality and presentation quality. Points will be deducted for poorly written or poorly presented (e.g., illegible, unreadable, unprofessional) submissions.
Memo assignments must be submitted on paper at the designated time.
All submissions must be in “portrait” mode, as opposed to “landscape” mode.
Submissions not conforming to the above guidelines will be penalized.
Research Proposal - 20 Points
Due: Beginning of last day of class Late submission: -1 pt/school day
Propose a research project. The proposal must include sections analogous to the Introduction, Method and abbreviated Results sections of a research paper. Your paper must be original with this program. You may not drag out an undergraduate project, dress it up, and submit it for this project. You may, however, submit a paper based on the same literature as a paper in another course (e.g., PSY 5060) in the program. These papers must have a different focus, however. See the accompanying guidelines for more information on the paper. Submit on paper.
Identification Rules for submitted work
If there is a “Name” field on a test, put your name in it.
Identify Homework assignments by PIN's only.
Specifically, put only your PIN on only the back of last page of written homework.
Put no identifying information on the front of any page of homework or other submission that will be graded “subjectively” - put only your PIN on the back so that it’s out of view when I am grading your submission. Assignments submitted with name or identifying information other than the PIN will lose points as will those with identifying information visible when grading.
Policy for Late/Missing Work:
Tests must be taken at the scheduled time. If you miss a test, a make-up exam must be scheduled as soon as possible.
Homework assignments are expected at the beginning of class and absolutely due by the end of class on the day for which they were assigned.
You get ONE 3-day pass for homework: One assignment can be submitted until noon on the Friday of the week for which it was assigned with no penalty. Only the first late assignment will get the 3-day pass.
Grading Scale:
Grades in the course are based on the percentage of required points. The points you receive in all required and extra credit projects are totaled. That total as a percentage of the total required points is computed. The percentages for each letter grade are as follows. A percentage at the division between two grades will receive the higher grade.
A: 90-100% B: 80-90% C: 65-80% D: 50-65% F: 0-50%
Extra Credit
There may be an opportunity to earn extra credit from 1) participating in research conducted by faculty or students or 2) participating in other projects approved by me or 3) completing the special potpourri homework assignment.
Limit on the number of points worth of extra credit is 10.
You must have prior approval from me for each project in which you participate. The exception to this is projects available through the Sona Research Management System.
Extra credit points are added to your point total prior to computing the percentage of required points used to determine your grade. Extra credit for participation in research will typically be earned at 1 point per 1/2 hour participation. A fraction of a 1/2 hour will be worth 1 point.
Extra credit on the Sona System is “zero’d out” at the end of the semester. It cannot be banked across semesters.
Personal Habits
Personal habits that may offend or bother other class members or me must be kept in check. Such habits include but are not limited to snapping your gum, chewing ice or food loudly in class, incessantly shuffling your notes, talking with other class members during lecture, laughing while looking at your computer screen, and wearing noisy jewelry. You must avoid these behaviors, or you will be asked to leave the classroom.
You may not use cells phones for any purpose during class and during tests. You may use a computer or tablet only to display and take notes on the class lecture. Surfing the web or other computer use during lecture is prohibited. No guns allowed in class.
Email / Web Page
Much information about the course will be distributed via Email. You must have an Email account with the capability of receiving and opening Microsoft Office 2010 or later documents as attachment and SPSS files as attachments or as downloads from my web site. Course information is be available on my web page. That web page is now www.utc.edu/michael-biderman Grades will be posted on UTC Learn.
Lecture Recordings.
I will attempt to record my lectures in mp4 format and put them on my web page. Use the recording as you wish – to get information on a lecture you were unable to attend, to review for a test, as a sleep aid. There is no guarantee that every lecture will be recorded.
Course and Institutional Policies
Late/Missing Work Policy: Desribed above
Student Conduct Policy: UTC’s Academic Integrity Policy is stated in the Student Handbook.
Honor Code Pledge: I pledge that I will neither give nor receive unauthorizedaidon any test or assignment. I understand that plagiarismconstitutes a serious instance of unauthorized aid. I further pledge that I exert every effort to ensure that the Honor Code is upheld by others and that I will actively support the establishment and continuance of a campus-wide climate of honor and integrity.
Course Attendance Policy: This is a graduate class. Attendance is strongly encouraged.
Course Participation/Contribution: Questions and constructive comments are appreciated.
Course Learning Evaluation: Course evaluations are an important part of our efforts to continuously improve the learning experience at UTC. Toward the end of the semester, you will receive a link to evaluations and are expected to complete them. We value your feedback and appreciate you taking time to complete the anonymous evaluations.
Course Calendar/Schedule: May be changed during semester if situation warrants.
Week / Howell Chapter / Weathington et al. (2010) / Green, et. al. 7th Ed. Unit/Lesson1
8/22 / Describing Data
1: Introduction
2: Basic Concepts
3: Displaying Data / Read all this to learn about SPSS.
Unit 1: Getting Started with SPSS
Unit 2: Creating and Working with Data files
2
8/29 / Summarizing Data Numerically
4: Measures of Central Tendency
5: Measures of Variability / Appendix A / Unit 5: Creating Variables and Computing Descriptive Statistics
3
9/5 / Distributions; Probability
6: The Normal Distribution
4
9/12 / Probability; Correlation
7: Basic Concepts of Probability
9. Correlation / 10: Correlational Research
5
9/19 / Correlation; Regression
9: Correlation
10: Regression / Lesson 31: The Pearson Product Moment Correlation Coefficient Lesson 33: Bivariate Regression
6
9/26 / Regression; Intro to Inference
11: Multiple Regression
8: Sampling Distributions & HT / Lesson 34: Multiple Linear Regression
7
10/3 / Test 1: About 50 points.5:30-7:00
12: Hypothesis Testing Applied to Means: One Sample / 7: Sampling / Lesson 22: One-Sample t test
8
10/10 / Hypothesis Testing; Estimation;
Comparing Two Groups;
13: Two Related Samples
14: Two Independent Samples / 11: Between-subjects Designs
14: Correlated Groups Designs
16: Research with Categorical Data / Lesson 23: Paired-Samples t Test
Lesson 24: Independent-Samples t
10/17 / Fall Break
9
10/24 / Comparing Two Groups;
19: Chi-Square
20: Nonparametric and Distribution-Free Tests / Lesson 41: Two-Way Contingency Tables Analysis Using Crosstabs
Lesson 42: Mann-Whitney U Test
10
10/31 / Research Design issues / 3: The Foundations of Research
4: An Overview of Empirical Methods
9: A Model for Research Design
11
11/7 / Test 2: About 50 points.5:30-7:00
Power and Choosing Sample size
15: Power
12
11/14 / Power; Single Factor Designs
16: One-Way Analysis of Variance / 12: Single Variable Between-Subjects Research / Lesson 25: One-Way ANOVA
Lesson 43: K Independent-Samples Tests: The Kruskal-Wallis and the Median Tests
13
11/21 / Factorial Designs;
Repeated Measures
17: Factorial Analysis of Variance
18: Repeated Measures ANOVA / 13: Between Subjects Factorial Designs / Lesson 26: Two-Way ANOVA
Lesson 29: One-Way Repeated-Measures ANOVA
14
11/28 / Meta-analysis; Ethics
21: Meta-Analysis
Paper due / 2: Ethics in Psychological Research
FINAL EXAM:: Tuesday, December 12 6 - 8 PM
75 Points, comprehensive with 30-40 points devoted to material covered since last exam.
ALL REQUIRED AND EXTRA CREDIT MATERIALS MUST BE SUBMITTED BY THE END OF THE FINAL EXAM PERIOD.
This course
REVIEW AND EXTENSION OF BASIC STATISTICS
BASIC PSYCHOLOGICAL RESEARCH METHODS CONCEPTS
COMMON RESEARCH DESIGNS AND THE STATISTICAL ANALYSES APPROPRIATE FOR THEM
INTRODUCTION TO COMPUTER ANALYSIS OF PSYCHOLOGICAL DATA USING SPSS and R and EXCEL.
Expectation
The course has a high difficulty level. It requires a lot of out of class work involving reading the textbooks, reviewing notes, and doing homework assignments.
It requires a paper submitted at the end of the semester.
The course is not a cookbook. You will be expected to discover much of the information needed for successful performance in the course with minimal guidance from your instructor. The lectures can cover only part of the required material. You will be held accountable for all reading material whether it is covered in lecture or not.
You are encouraged to form study groups and to exchange information on lecture, readings, and homework assignments. However, all documents you submit to me must have been created by you. They cannot be copied in whole or in part from the work of others.
You are expected to do your own work on tests. Alternate forms of multiple choice tests will be used.
SPSS
In the past, students without exposure to SPSS have been able to get proficient using it within a week or so.
See me about scheduling a time during which you can be shown how to get started using it.
The first chapters of Green and Salkind are a valuable resource.
R
We believe that the world of statistical computing will soon heavily involve use of the programming environment called R. We are in the process of introducing the use of R into our psychological statistics classes at UTC. I will attempt to provide examples of statistical computing using R throughout this semester. To that end, you are encouraged to download R onto your own computer. (It’s free.) Use of R may be required this semester.
EXCEL
The Excel program in Microsoft Office has some statistical and many computational capabilities. It will be used for some of the in-class examples.
PSY 510/511 Guidelines for Research Proposal
Specific Guidelines (Note: Do NOT put your name or any identifying symbol(s) on the front of any sheet.)
1. The paper should be written using the recommendations of the APA Publication Manual 6th Edition.
2. Form of the proposal should be as follows . . .
A. Main body of paper
Page 1: Title / Abstract page. Title and abstract. Abstract must be double-spaced, no longer than 100 words. 1 page maximum length. Title and abstract are on the same page.