Languages: English

Clear, step-by-step explanations on how to calculate and apply 6 types of psychological test: Spearman’s Rho, The Sign Test, Chi Square, Mann-Whitney Test, Probability tests and Wilcoxen Signed Ranks test. The calculation of each test is illustrated by an application to a contemporary psychological problem.

Might psychology have ethnocentric biases? This film begins by explaining the key concept of social construction and then illustrates three sources of potential ethnocentrism: researcher, conceptual and reporting bias. It also stresses the importance of evaluation. Is there clear evidence of ethnocentrism? Is ethnocentrism becoming less of an issue in a globalising world? And, does ethnocentrism apply in the same way to all branches of psychology?

While ethics is about the conduct of research, socially sensitive research is about the consequences. Might it harm some individuals or groups? Using the example of recent research into genetics and education, this film illustrates the questions typically asked about socially sensitive research and shows how problems may be anticipated and avoided.

Have you ever wondered why some people claim to see the face of Jesus in their toast? Well, psychologists at the University of Toronto did. But why? This film uses a number of studies to illustrate how the usefulness of psychological research is assessed and evaluated. And if you’re wondering about the toast, it was a prize-winning study for its contribution to understanding face recognition.

This film illustrates both the importance and limitations of reductionism in psychological explanation using the example of research into diet and obesity. It compares reductionism and holism and cautions students against simply using reductionism as a critique to be compared unfavourably with holism.

Is Psychology a science? This film explains the scientific method, illustrates its application in psychology, and shows how not all questions in psychology, particularly those involving peoples’ experiences and behaviour in real world situations, can be answered this way. The final part of the film advises students on techniques for answering psychology and science questions.

Is human behaviour explained primarily by what we inherit (nature) or what we experience (nurture)? This film uses the example of whether there are ‘natural born killers’ to illustrate nature, nurture and interactionist approaches.

What is the most effective time of day for students to learn new material? We begin with this research question to give practical illustrations of the strengths and possible limitations of repeated measures, independent measures and matched pairs experimental designs. We then look at three classic experimental studies in psychology, the Stroop Effect, Loftus’ eyewitness testimony experiments and Bandura’s bobo doll experiments to show why a particular experimental design was used in each case.

Some research questions in psychology involve getting out and seeing how people actually behave in real life situations. This is called naturalistic observation. Using several key studies, this film illustrates different techniques of naturalistic observation, why psychologists use this method, some of the difficulties involved, and the limitations of the method.

Self-report methods gather data directly from the participants. Here, we illustrate and compare questionnaire and interview methods, then look at some of the problems and limitations common to all self-report methods and show how they may be avoided or overcome.