Social Psychology
Correlation is contrasting two sets of measurements also called variables and determining how they are interrelated but should already be in existence (Dimitrios, 2011). This allows researchers make prediction based on only one variable (Elisa, 2007). A good example would be the relationship between murder rates and owning guns. Research has shown that there are higher murder occurrences in areas where gun ownership rates were high. This is an example of positive correlation because as the number of gun ownership increase so does the rates of murder.
Deception in psychological research is whereby the researcher neglects to tell the participant certain aspects of his research (Barshof, 2008). The advantages of deception in research are that the participants tend to enjoy the research more and get more educated. It also allows the participants to be studied in their natural conduct. Finally, it gives opportunities to investigate aspects that might not be using non-deceptive methods. Albeit this, deception challenges the ethical principle of informed concept. Another disadvantage is the relationship between the researchers with the participant is dishonest and finally, its frequent use, if documented, makes individuals suspicious of psychological research.
An alternative of using deception would be approaching individuals directly or stimulation (Kimmel, 2007). An example of other ethics upheld by psychologist is the information of participants is to be kept entirely confidential. The importance of having such ethics is to protect the subjects from risky experiences and because some experiments constitute of very private information that needs protection
Construal is a psychological term used to describe how people interpret their environment and gives us the ability to make sense of why individuals take different causes of actions when presented with a similar situation (Cheng, 2007). The reason behind psychologists focusing on the construal individuals have on the environment than the environment itself is that different people have different reactions to a similar environment (Elliott, 2008). An example is if a person seated next to you collapses and turns blue, is the person chocking, or is it a gag and so on.
References:
Barshof, D. N. (2008). Ethical Conflicts in Psychology (4th edition).Washington, DC: American Psychology Association.
Kimmel, A J. (2007). Ethical Issues in Behavioral Research. Oxford: Blackwell.
Cheng, R. W., Lam, S., (2007). “ Self-Construal and Social Comparison Effects”. British Journal of Educational Psychology. 77(1):197-211.
Elliott, I., Coker S. (2008). “Independent self-construal, self-reflection, and self-rumination: A path model for predicting happiness”. Australian Journal of Psychology. 60(3), 127–134.
Elisa L., (2007) "Calibrating risk-neutral default correlation", Journal of Risk Finance. (Iss:5):450 – 464
Dimitrios I. V. (2011), Properties of Realized Correlation, in Jonathan A. B., Peter G. S. (ed.) The Impact of the Global Financial Crisis on Emerging Financial Markets (Contemporary Studies in Economic and Financial Analysis), Emerald Group Publishing Limited. 645-667
