Transcript of Audio Lecture
Welcome to lesson two, module one, research methods
correlation. Today we’re going to go over how correlations can be used and
interpreted in social psychology. To begin, let’s move to slide two.
Survey methodology is descriptive, that is it tells us what is going on
in the population. Results from surveys are correlational. There can be
sampling problems in using survey methodology. That is, the people that
choose to fill out a survey may have a special interest in the topic we
are surveying. Other sampling problems include only being able to survey
a certain segment of the population. There can also be questioning
problems in using survey methodology, that is how do you ask people
questions about some sort of issues, such as condom use, drug use, or
illegal activities. Given these problems, it is still a widely used
method to determine what is going on in the world prior to doing
empirical research.
Let’s move on to slide three. Correlations. Correlation is
the relationship between two things. It is not causation, that is if two
things are correlated, this does not imply that one causes the other. In
fact there are three or more possibilities. One is that A causes B. The
second option would be that B causes A. A third option would be that
some other factor that’s not measured in the survey, C, causes both A
and B to occur.
Let’s move on to slide four to further discuss correlations. Correlations
have a range from negative one to positive one. A negative correlation
is when two variables are moving in opposite directions. That is, as one
thing goes up, the other thing goes down. A positive correlation is when
two variables move in the same direction. Education and income might be
one example. A zero correlation is when two variables are not related.
Let’s move on to slide five. An example of negative
correlations include things such as inches of snow and temperature. As
the temperature goes down, the number of inches of snow increases or
goes up. Things are moving in the opposite direction. Another one would
be anxiety and experience. The more experience you have in public
speaking, the less anxiety you’ll experience. Again, as one thing goes
up, the other thing goes down. Another negative correlation often found
is between prejudice and education. That is, people who have more
education tend to exhibit less prejudice. Now let’s come up with some
examples for positive correlation.
Let’s move on to slide six. Some examples of positive correlation
include salary and domicile or square footage, that is the more money
you make, the larger your house or the more square feet you have in your
home. Another example of positive correlations would be nervousness and
the number of people in the audience. That is, you may become more
nervous as the number of people in the audience increases during a
public talk. If you are giving a speech to five people, you should be
less nervous than if you’re giving a speech to five thousand people.
Another example would be test scores and activity completion. The more
activities that you complete in this web course, the higher your test
scores are likely to be.
Let’s move on to slide seven. Here’s some examples of no or zero
correlation. Intensity of color and folder contents. That is, the more
intense the color does not imply anything about what is contained in
that folder. Education and office cleanliness. Any of you who have seen a
professor’s office might realize that a Ph.D. does not imply that you
are more or less clean than counterparts of other levels of education.
Again, another zero or no correlation would be attractiveness and
injury. There is no evidence that more attractive people have fewer
injuries or more injuries than their less attractive counterparts.
This concludes the segment on correlation. Thank you.
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