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East Carolina University
Department of Psychology
Instructor: Karl L. Wuensch
Correct Pronunciation
Office: Rawl 137;------ Office Hours: Click here to see Karl's schedule.
Syllabus: Click here to see a formal list of the topics we shall cover this semester.
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Required Reading. In addition to the required text, you are responsible for reading materials on the list at Readings for Students in Graduate Statistics. This list includes materials for PSYC 6430, 7431, and 6433.
Class Meetings: We meet from 0800 to 0915 on Tuesdays and Thursdays in Rawl 304.
Grading
There will be three components of your final grade:
Each of these three is, at semester's end, transformed to a 100 point scale, producing a P-score. The transformation is to divide each student's raw score by the mean raw score achieved by the top-scoring student. If there are fewer than 5 students in the class I may elect to compute P-scores as the percentage of the total possible points earned rather than of the top score. Each student's three P-scores will be averaged to yield a mean P-score, [M] . Grade cutoffs for mean P-scores are 90 for an A, 80 for a B, 70 for a C.
If there are at least 5 students who complete the course, I shall also compute z-scores on the M's. The mean and the standard deviation I shall use will be computed from all registered students' M-scores after deleting any M's that are outliers, as defined by Tukey. If your z-score is +1/3 or more, you have an A; -2/3 or more, a B; -4/3 or more, a C; below -4/3, an F. You receive the higher of the two grades computed by the z-system and by the 10-point M system.
Late Work. I may elect not to accept late work or accept it with penalty. I may elect to give you a predicted score (predicted from your performance on other tasks) on a missed quiz rather than administering a make-up. To be fair to those students who complete their assignments on time, assignments turned in late can earn a score no greater than the lowest score earned by those students who completed their assignments on time. I may also apply a 10% penalty for a first late assignment, a 20% penalty for a second late assignment, a 30% penalty for a third late assignment, and so on.
Posting of Grades: If you would like to have your grades posted on the web, where you can view them at any time, you need to fill out the Grade Posting Form and return it to Dr. Wuensch. To bring the form into your word processor, just click onto the link for the form. After you have filled out the form, give it to Dr. Wuensch or mail it to him at: Dr. Karl L. Wuensch, Dept. of Psychology, East Carolina University, Greenville, NC 27858-4353. Unless you complete this form, indicating that you wish to have your grades posted as described on the form, and deliver it to Dr. Wuensch, your grades will not be posted.
Quizzes and Exams
The quizzes and exams will be multiple-choice, true-false, short answer, computational, and/or essay. You may use calculators that do not have the capacity to store text.
Make-up exams for those with acceptable and documented excuses may be orally administered. I may elect not to accept late work or to accept it with penalty. I may elect to give you a predicted score (predicted from your past performance) on missed work rather than administering a make-up. The penalty for any detected plagiarism or other cheating is failure in the course and a note to the chair of our department for further action.
Class Participation
Points may be earned by class participation. Students who do not wish to be evaluated on class participation can notify me in writing and I shall not call upon them in class. In lieu of class participation these students will prepare an APA-style manuscript reviewing the literature on some topic (approved in advance by me) in quantitative methods. The typed manuscript is due on the 1st of April.
I expect each of you to develop a journal reading list of American Psychologist, APA Monitor, Psychological Bulletin, and at least three other journals which publish research reports in your area of interest. Students not in Psychology may develop a list more appropriate to their major. A Standing Assignment is to have available, for each major statistical technique we cover, a summary of published research that employs that technique. These will be graded as class participation or homework.
The Major Project
Each of you will complete a major project, which will involve your conducting a complete data analysis of a multivariate data set. You may obtain data from some archival or other source, or you may simulate data from a theoretical model. Obtain my approval of your proposed major project prior to investing a lot of time in it. Acceptable analytic techniques include: Factorial ANOVA (3-way or higher order), multiple regression, logistic regression, path analysis, least squares analysis of variance/covariance, log-linear analysis, canonical correlation analysis, discriminant function analysis, multiple analysis of variance, multiple analysis of covariance, the multivariate approach to repeated measures ANOVA, and principle components and factor analysis.
Each student will prepare in Microsoft Word an APA-style research paper. Read the document Required Research Paper in PSYC 7431 and PSYC 6433 on Karl's web pages for additional details on the paper. By Friday the 4th of April you will deliver your paper to me electronically (Word document and other supporting files attached to email). Papers received after that date may result in the student receiving an Incomplete. The maximum number of points possible for the paper will be not more than 50% nor less than 25% of the total points possible for component C.
Course Objectives
The major objectives of this course are: 1. to review univariate and bivariate statistics as simplifications of the general linear model, 2. to introduce you to multivariate statistics, 3. to advance your understanding of principles of research design, 4. to make you critical consumers of research, and 5. to strengthen your technical writing skills (APA-style).
My Plans for the Semester
We shall start out 7431 by completing our coverage of one-way and factorial ANOVA. Next we shall cover the boring but essential task of screening one's data prior to analysis. I shall give you a general introduction to multivariate statistics, followed by a detailed introduction to multiple regression. With whatever time remains after that, I shall give you more detailed instruction on one or more other multivariate techniques and on nonparametric and resampling analysis. I may solicit your input regarding which of these techniques we should cover.
Beyond PSYC 7431
The third and final course in our graduate statistics sequence is PSYC 6433 (due to be renumbered 7433). This course offers advanced instruction in the use of high-powered statistical software packages such as SAS and SPSS. It is highly recommended for those who are or hope to be pursuing a doctoral degree. It does require prior completion of PSYC 7431. I expect to offer this course in the Fall of 2008. It is not required of our masters students, but those who have completed our three semester sequence have frequently written back to tell how much easier that made their lives in the doctoral programs they entered after obtaining their masters degree from ECU. You can read some of their comments on my Testimonials Page
ADA
East Carolina University seeks to comply fully with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). Students requesting accommodations based on a disability must be registered with the Department for Disability Support Services located in Slay 138 (252) 737-1016 (Voice/TTY).
Sending E-Mail to Dr. Wuensch
You can send me email through Blackboard, but it will not put your name on the e-mail. Accordingly, you must remember to type your name in the email or I will not easily know from whom it came.
Contact Information for the Webmaster,
Dr. Karl L. Wuensch
This page most recently revised on
10. January 2008.