PSY 315 Week 1 Assignment Practice Worksheet

PSY 315 Statistical Reasoning in Psychology

PSY/315 Week 1 Practice Worksheet (***** 100% Correct *****)

Complete the University of Phoenix Material: Week 1 Practice Worksheet.

Week 1 Practice Worksheet

Provide a response to the following questions. Written responses should be at least 30 to 45 words each.

1.      Explain and provide an example for each of the following types of variables:

a.       Nominal:

b.      Ordinal:

c.       Interval:

d.      Ratio scale:

e.       Continuous:

f.       Discrete:

g.      Quantitative:

h.      Qualitative:

2.      The following are the speeds of 40 cars clocked by radar on a particular road in a 35 miles-per-hour zone on an afternoon:

30, 36, 42, 36, 30, 52, 36, 34, 36, 33, 30, 32, 35, 32, 37, 34, 36, 31, 35, 20

24, 46, 23, 31, 32, 45, 34, 37, 28, 40, 34, 38, 40, 52, 31, 33, 15, 27, 36, 40

Create a frequency table and a histogram. Then, describe the general shape of the distribution.

3.      Raskauskas and Stoltz (2007) asked a group of 84 adolescents about their involvement in traditional and electronic bullying. The researchers defined electronic bullying as “…a means of bullying in which peers use electronics (such as text messages, emails, and defaming Web sites) to taunt, threaten, harass, and/or intimidate a peer” (p. 565). The table below is a frequency table showing the adolescents’ reported incidence of being victims or perpetrators of traditional and electronic bullying.

a.       Using the table below as an example, explain the idea of a frequency table to a person who has never taken a course in statistics.

b.      Explain the general meaning of the pattern of results.

Incidence of Traditional and Electronic Bullying and Victimization (N = 84)

Forms of bullying                                   N                     %

Electronic victims                                  41                   48.8

Text-message victim                              27                   32.1

Internet victim (websites, chatrooms)      13                    15.5

Camera-phone victim                               8                      9.5

Traditional victims                                  60                     71.4

Physical victim                                      38                     45.2

Teasing victim                                       50                      59.5

Rumors victim                                       32                      38.6

Exclusion victim                                    30                        50

Electronic bullies                                   18                      21.4

Text-message bully                                18                      21.4

 Internet bully                                         11                      13.1

Traditional bullies                                    54                      64.3

Physical bully                                         29                      34.5

Teasing bully                                           38                      45.2

Rumor bully                                             22                      26.2

Exclusion bully                                        35                      41.7

4.      Describe whether each of the following data words best describes descriptive statistics or inferential statistics. Explain your reasoning.

1. Describe:
   
   
2. Infer:
   
   
3. Summarize:

5.      Compare the three types of research methods and statistics.

6.      Regarding gun ownership in the United States, data from Gallup polls over a 40-year period show how gun ownership in the United States has changed. The results are described below, with the percentage of Americans who own guns given in each of the 5 decades.

Year                %

1972               43

1982               42

1992               48

2002               40

2012               43

1. Are the percentages reported above an example of descriptive statistics or inferential statistics?  Why?
   
   
2. Based on the table, how would you describe the changes in gun ownership in the United States over the 40 years shown?

7.      Refer to the Simpson-Southward et al. (2016) article from this week’s electronic readings. Was this an example of inferential statistics and research or descriptive statistics and research? Justify your response.