

Random assignment, however, dictates which of the selected experimental population will go to the control group or the experimental trial. Random assignment is different than random sampling in that random sampling deals with choosing who participates in the study.

One way that this is often done is by taking every third person in a given population for the study. It is advised to choose the participants in an impartial way to retain random sampling. The random sampling also dictates that the experimenter must have little to no bias in choosing the people in the sample. We would need all races and socioeconomic groups as well as ages. To have a truly random sampling of people we must get a population of girls and boys that represent all of the different types of people.

This random sample should fairly depict the overall population, covering various ethnicities, socioeconomic classes, gender, and age.Īn example of this would be if we use Timmy’s study again. Random SampleĪ random sample is when the group of subjects in your experiment accurately depicts the population. The operational definition lets the reader of the experiment know what was deemed a positive or negative result, thereby opening the experiment up for replication and expansion by other psychologists. This experiment may operationally define a laugh as a smile with a sound.īy having this operational definition, other psychologists are able to replicate the experiment. The operation definition of this experiment would say what the experiment defines as a laugh. When thinking about the operational definition, it is beneficial to visualize what the experiment is measuring and how it is going to be measured.Īn example of this would be an experiment that is measuring if Timmy laughs more at girls or boys. The operational definition is a term that is used to describe the procedure of a study and the research variables. Being able to differentiate between the terms will benefit you on your exam and reduce confusion once you begin running experiments. The AP® Psychology research methods is one of the most term heavy topics within AP® Psychology.
