60-207
• Assignment #2 is now posted, due Thursday
• This week: How good is the evidence: Personal
Observation, Case Studies, Research Studies, and
Analogies *and* Are There Rival Causes?
• NOTE change for test: OCTOBER 17th
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Assignment #2: Due date: October 8th in class.
Instructions:
Search the web for articles using the google search engine by
clicking on the link below.
1. In your search find web pages which deal with the following: On
July 17, 1996, TWA Flight 800, a Boeing 747 bound for Paris,
exploded shortly after taking off from New York's Kennedy Airport,
killing all 230 people on board. The National Transportation
Safety Board, as recently as last year, has not determined the
cause of the crash. (hint: simply plugging in "TWA" in the search
parameters will return too many pages of little or no relevance.)
Submit the URL from the Google search result.
2. From your search (confine yourself to the first two or three
screen results) find two articles with conflicting claims about the
cause of the crash and answer: How good is the evidence?
Remember to submit the web pages with your assignment.
Research Studies as Evidence
• systematic collection of observations by people
trained to do scientific research
• Scientific method tends to seek publicly verifiable data
• Extraneous factors are minimized by the use of controls
• Experimental design
Limitations of Scientific Research
• Research varies greatly in quality
• Research findings often contradict one another
• Research findings do not prove conclusions (at best
they support conclusions)
• Researchers are biased
• Web authors often distort or simplify research
conclusions
• Research “facts”change over time – especially claims
about human behaviour
• Research varies in how artificial it is
Questions to raise regarding research
studies
1.
2.
What is the quality of the source of the report? Usually, but not
always, the more reputable the source, the better designed the
study.
Other than the quality of the source, are there other clues
included in the communication suggesting the research was well
done? E.g., does the report detail any special strengths of the
research?
3.
4.
Do other findings support the conclusion of the the
study?
How selective has the communicator been? I.e., has
the communicator only selected studies which
support his or her point?
5. Is there evidence of a critical attitude in the
author/speaker?
6. Is there any reason for someone t have
distorted the research?
7. Are conditions in the research artificial and,
thus, distorted? (link between lab and the
world?)
8. How far can we generalize given the research
sample?
• Are there any biases or distortions in the surveys,
questionnaires, ratings, or other measurements that the
researcher uses?
Biased Surveys and Questionnaires
• Meant to measure people’s attitudes and beliefs …
• 1. Participants need to respond honestly. Why wouldn’t
they?
• 2. Wording in questions can be ambiguous or vague –
so they are open to multiple interpretations. How were
the questions worded?
• 3. Questionnaires may contain built-in biases, including
biased wording and biased context.
• 4. Placement of items relative to other items.
• 5. Length of survey
• 6…