Questions of the Universe

1. This chapter focuses on the fact that scientists do not focus on ultimate questions of the universe. To be literate in psychology one must fully understand the term operationism. It is crucial to the construction of theory science and one that is especially important for evaluating theoretical claims. Operational definitions are definitions of concepts that are described in terms of observable operations that can be measured. This is so significant because it eliminates the argument of the meaning of concepts in terms of language disagreements

2. I better learned how to distinguish psychology between my already preexisting notions. It is true that psychology is so tricky to grasp because it employs terms like “intelligence and anxiety.” To many people these are not thought of as scientific but as feelings and personal experiences. It is not recognized by the public that it is necessary to operationally define terms. I have to remember that psychology is a science that requires operational definitions. I can’t be one to demand essentialist questions that psychology cannot answer.

3. An important aspect of an operational definition is that is must display both reliability and validity. Reliability is easy to remember because it essentially means arriving at the same measurement if you assessed the same concept multiple times. But you also have to remember that reliability is only about consistency and nothing else. Consistency alone is not sufficient for an operational definition. Most importantly it must have validity. Validity basically refers to whether an operational definition is measuring what is supposed to be measuring. This is significant because it is easy to focus more on reliability but no validity. There is an example in the book that captures how not to go about defining an operational definition. The example suggests getting your intelligence assessed by sticking your foot and measuring device. This may seem