This is a summary of Chapter 6 and 7 of the book Thought and Knowledge - An introduction to Critical Thinking. Moreover, I summarized the extra readings that we got. These reading were mostly about the mathematics in the chapter.
Hypothesis: a belief about a relationship between two or more variables.
- Hypothesis testing is one way of finding out about the ‘way the world works’.
- Basic need to understand events in life when we try to answer questions about events in
life, we often function as ‘intuitive scientists’: we have our own theories.
Goal of hypothesis testing: to make accurate predictions about the portion of the world we are
dealing with. Reduce uncertainty by observing sequences of events with the goal of determining
predictive relationships. We use the same process as medical researchers some of the technical
concepts in scientific methods are applicable to practical everyday thought.
Inductive and deductive methods
Inductive method (of hypothesis testing): you observe events and then devise a hypothesis
about the events you observed. Observations hypothesis ; specific general.
Deductive method: hypothesis (general) specific cases.
- We use the principles of inductive and deductive reasoning to generate and evaluate beliefs.
- Conclusions that result from inductive reasoning can never be known with absolute certainty.
Operational definitions
Operational definition: tells us how to recognize and measure a concept.
- Example: ‘Successful women are paid high salaries’ define ‘successful’ and ‘high salary’.
It is important to find suiting operational definitions. When you use operational definitions, you avoid
the problems of ambiguity and vagueness.
Independent and Dependent variables
Variable: any measurable characteristic that can take on more than one value. When we test
hypotheses, we begin by choosing the variables of interest.
Independent variable: the variable that is under your control.
Dependent variable: the one that you believe will change as a result of the independent variable.
- Example: independent variable = type of treatment, dependent variable = recover/not
recover from your addiction.
In hypotheses testing you want to know which level of the independent variable will have a
beneficial effect on the dependent variable. Next step: define the variables operationally.
Measure Sensitivity
Make sure your way of measuring variables is sensitive enough (for example to small changes).
Populations and samples
Hypothesis testing principles are used to reduce uncertainty help you make the best choice.
Population: the group we want to know about (for example heroin addicts).
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