Psychology Class Learns about Research Studies and Operational Definitions

Students in Lori Kretten’s Fundamentals of Psychology class learned about research studies and operational definitions this week — with an activity using Legos. 

The students learned that, when designing a research study, researchers need to use clear and concise operational definitions so that other researchers can replicate their study and get the same results. 

On Friday, the students paired up and had 15 minutes to create a structure of their choice using Legos. They had to write down the exact steps and instructions (similar to operational definitions) to make their creation, take picture of it, and then take it apart for another group to recreate. The next group had to put it together based on the instructions.

“The key was having explicit and exact definitions of how to put the structure together so that the next group could replicate that exact structure,” said Ms. Kretten.