Spring 2009
01:830:200 – Quantitative Methods in Psychology

Section 10: Tuesdays, 8:10 – 9:30 PM, SEC 209
Section 11: Wednesdays, 5:00 – 6:20, SEC 209
Section 12: Thursdays, 3:20 – 4:40, LCB 109
Section 13: Thursdays, 5:00 – 6:20, SEC 210

Web Page:

Textbook:

About Quantitative Methods:

Grading:

• Exams:  There will be three exams based on the text and other materials presented in class. You are responsible for bringing pencils with erasers to each exam. Exam scores will be posted in the SAS Gradebook; a link will be available on the course web page. If you have questions about your score on an exam, you must discuss it with your Teaching Assistant before the next exam.
  
  Each exam is given in two parts: a conceptual part, consisting of multiple choice and/or essay questions, and a computational part. You may use your book, notes, and calculator for the computational part, but not for the conceptual part. You may not use any electronic device other than your calculator. You may not use your cell phone calculator.
  
  The first two exams are given in two parts: the conceptual part is given during one regular class meeting, and the computational part will be given during the following class meeting.
  
  The conceptual and computational parts of the final are given during the regularly scheduled final exam, shown on the schedule below.
  
  For the computational part of the exam, you must show your work. If you write down the correct answer, but don't show how you arrived at it, you will receive no points. If you set up the problem correctly and make a minor computational error, you will receive most of the credit for the problem. Each error reduces your score. If you answer is obviously incorrect (for example, you compute the mean of 3, 5, and 7 to be 86), you will receive less credit.
  
  The midterm exam is worth 250 points, the ANOVA exam is worth 200, and the final, which is cumulative, is worth 440 points. So 890 points in the course are available through the exams.
  
  If you have a schedule conflict with an exam, you may be allowed to take the exam before the scheduled date at the discretion of the instructor. If you miss an exam, you will be allowed to take a make-up exam only if you provide documentation for a valid reason for missing the exam. For absences due to colds, etc., a note from your Health Center or doctor will be acceptable. For more serious issues such as a death in the family or serious health or personal issues, you may present a note from your Dean's office verifying that you missed the exam due to an excused absence. This note should also indicate a reasonable time frame in which you will be able to make up the exam. You should give this note to the instructor within 1 week of your return to class.
  
  Exams are often given in a different location in order to allow for more room between students. Room changes will be posted on the class web page. If an exam is cancelled or postponed on the day of the exam, there will be a member of the Psychology Department in the room at the scheduled time to make the announcement. Notices posted on doors or the blackboard are likely to be hoaxes.
  
  
• Computational Practice Exercises:   Each chapter contains several sets of Computational Practice Exercises (CPE). The questions are in each chapter, set off from the text by rows of asterisks. The answers are in the back of the book.
  
  CPE are due in at the beginning of each lecture immediately following the material covered in the CPE. The course schedule (on the class web page and reprinted below) shows which CPE are due when. CPE must be turned in at the beginning of lecture; they cannot be placed in mailboxes or turned in late. Having said that, it is recognized that buses sometimes run late, you may be ill, etc., so you will receive credit for up to 3 unexcused late CPE. If your TA sees a pattern of lateness, you will not receive any credit for late CPE. If a situation arises in which you know you will not be able to turn in your CPE on time, send an email to your TA with a copy to Dr. Ackroff explaining the situation. If we believe you have a legitimate reason to turn in the CPE late, we will reply and grant you an extension to the next lecture. Print out the reply, and attach a copy of it to the CPE involved.
  
  Each set of CPE is worth 8 points. The purpose of the CPE is to help you understand the material, so you receive the full 8 points for completing the CPE and turning it in (on time). Since the answers are in the book, it would not make sense to correct and grade them based on how well you did them. If you take the time to do them, and rework the ones you get wrong, it should be reflected in your exam scores.
  
  The point of the CPE is to give you a chance to use what you should be learning to solve problems. The answers are in the book so you can tell whether or not you understand the concepts involved. However, we don't expect people to spend hours and hours on them. If you can't seem to figure out how to solve one of the problems, put down as much of the solution as you have, and then write a note that says "This is as far as I can get with this problem." If your TA feels you have made an honest effort at solving the problem, you will get credit for it.
  
  Make sure you make a copy of your CPE before handing them in. These can be helpful to you as you review material and study for the exams. They will also be useful if your TA's records do not reflect that you turned in a particular set. Since they are graded on an "all or none" basis, we do not keep CPE. Check the SAS Gradebook weekly to be sure you have received credit, and contact your TA promptly if there is a discrepancy. Don't wait until May to tell us that you really did turn in the CPE that was due on February 23; we are unlikely to do anything about it at that point.
  
  There are 14 sets of CPE, each worth 8 points, for a total of 112 points. You will receive 18 bonus points for completing all 14 CPE, bringing the total CPE points for the course to 130. If you have more than 3 unexcused late CPE, you are not eligible for this bonus. Note that these bonus points are counted when we determine grade cutoff points (see below), they are not considered to be Extra Credit points.
  
  
• Online Exams:  Online Exams are available via eCompanion at www.rutgersonline.net  -- note that it's a .net, not a .edu address. You will be enrolled in the course automatically in early September; your login is your NetID, and your password is your date of birth in YYYYMMDD format (unless you changed it in a previous course). You may also access them at ecollege.rutgers.edu using your NetID and regular password. The exams consist of conceptual and computational questions, like the class exams. They are different in that they are entirely multiple choice. You can get credit for guessing the right answer to a computational question; this will not work for the exams in class. However, you will be better off actually trying to solve the problems.
  
  There are 12 online exams, each worth 20 points, for a total of 240 points. The schedule for the online exams appears below and is on the eCompanion Home Page. Note that the availability dates are fixed; extensions cannot be granted for individual students. In the unlikely event that your are incapacitated for the entire time the exam is available, we will make alternate arrangements.
  
  Taking the Online Exams:  You are allowed 2 hours for each exam. Make sure you will have an uninterrupted 2 hours before you start the exam. Also, be sure to save your answers after you answer each question. Click on "Submit for Grade" only when you are sure you are through with the exam. Once you submit your exam, you cannot work on it any more. You will be able to see your score, which questions you answered correctly, and the correct answers to each question, in the eCompanion Gradebook after you submit your exam. If there is a problem while you are taking the exam (e.g., you lose your internet connection), email your TA and explain the situation. Your TA can reset the exam so that you can take it again. Your TA also has a life, so if you wait until 11:30 on the last night an exam is available and you run into a problem, you will probably be out of luck.
  
  The exams are available for several weeks each. You should take each exam shortly after the corresponding chapter is covered in lecture. Waiting until the end of the availability period is not a good idea, since the availability dates are fixed.
  
  Correcting Online Exams:   You may submit corrected copies of the first 10 online exams according to the schedule below. If you believe there is a discrepancy, please notify your TA immediately. As with CPE, if you wait until the end of the semester to try to correct records from early in the semester, you may not be successful.
  
  If you scored 8 or more points, you can earn all 20 points; if you scored 4 - 7 points, you may raise your score to 10 points. To receive the points, you must make a hard copy of the online exam, and attach your corrections. For computational questions, re-work the problem to get the right answer. For conceptual questions, give a reference to the page number in the text that has the answer and copy the relevant part of the text. You must hand in your corrected exams in recitation or at the beginning of the Tuesday night class exam according to the schedule below. The exams for Chapters 13 and 14 cannot be corrected because there is not enough time at the end of the semester to grade them.
  
  
• Clickers:  We will be using CPS RF clickers in class. During each lecture, there will be a few questions related to the reading assignment for the class. A correct answer is worth 2 points; an incorrect answer is worth 1 point. There will also be some "data gathering" questions used to get data whose analysis will be discussed in the next lecture. Responses to these questions are worth 1 point each. In each lecture, either the first or last Clicker question will be chosen at randon to be worth one additional point, just for answering.
  
  Clicker points will be posted to the SAS Gradebook before lecture each Tuesday. If you believe there is a discrepancy, please notify Dr. Ackroff by email as soon as possible. As with CPE, if you wait until the end of the semester to try to address a problem from early in the course, there may not be enough time to investigate the problem and resolve it.
  
  Clicker questions from the first three weeks of class will be used to allow students time to make sure their clickers are registered correctly. Any points earned will not count toward your grade directly; one-third of these points will count as Extra Credit points. There will be at least an additional 120 possible Clicker points during the remainder of the semester. A maximum of 100 of these Clicker points will count toward your grade. This being the case, there are no "make ups" for Clicker points. Since there are more points available than can count toward your grade, if you forget your clicker, miss class once or twice because you are ill, or your batteries die during class, you will still have ample opportunity to achieve the maximum number of points for your grade.
  
  Since these points count toward your grade, clicker questions are considered to be the same as an academic exercise like an exam in class, and the standard rules governing academic integrity apply. Clicking for a friend who is not in class, for whatever reason, will be considered the same as cheating on an exam. At a minimum, you will each lose all your Clicker points for the entire course. Other disciplinary actions may be taken.
  
  
• Final grades:  Grading in this course works differently from most other courses. Your grade will be determined by the total number of points achieved on exams, CPE, Online Exams, and Clicker Points. However, do not think that achieving 90% of the total possible points guarantees you an A. In most courses, you are exposed to an overview of various aspects of a discipline; there is no way you can learn everything about the topic. In this course, we cover completely everything you are expected to know. The course is designed to present the material several times in different ways, so it is entirely possible for you to know everything we have presented.
  
  As you can see, there are numerous opportunities to earn large numbers of points, and some of them are "gimmes" -- there is no good reason not to earn the maximum number of CPE and Online Exam points, and you should also score highly on the Clicker points. So earning 90% does not necessarily represent the comprehension associated with an A grade.
  
  At the end of the semester, points for all assignments are totaled for each student. An absolute frequency distribution (see Chapter 2 in your text) is made for each TA's students. (Since there is a certain amount of subjectivity in grading the essay and computational exam questions, we may use different cutoff points for each TA. The same cutoff points will be used for both sections for each TA.) Typically, scores cluster, and there are natural "cut points" in the distribution. The top 20% or so of each TA's students usually do very well on everything, and receive an A in the course. The next 25% or so do pretty well on everything (or very well on some things and not so well on others), and receive B or B+ for their grade. The next 40% or so do OK, and earn C or C+ grades. The bottom 10 or 15% receive D or F grades.
  
  There are two factors that influence where we draw the cutoff points. As stated above, there are usually natural breaks in the distribution, and we use those as the initial cut points. The second factor is your TA's impression of how well you learned the material. Since your TA is looking at your CPE, reading your essay answers, and grading your computational exam questions, your TA may have a better understanding of how well you grasp the material than your numerical point total reflects. The reason for the "or so" in the description of the grade distribution is that if your TA thinks that more students than usual have a really good grasp of the material, there will be more A grades than usual; if your TA thinks that half the class "phoned in" their work, the distribution is not likely to be as generous.
  
  Extra credit points (see below) are added to the total number of points you score after we determine the cutoffs.

Extra Credit:

• One-third of the clicker points earned during the first three weeks of class count as Extra Credit points.
  
  
• You may submit a paper providing feedback on the text and the course; both have been improved by such papers from previous classes. Feedback can be a list of misprints (other than those we already know about and have informed you of) to a chapter-by-chapter or lecture-by-lecture review of what was clear and what wasn't. Feedback on the recitation sections is also welcome. You can earn up to 40 extra credit points for this exercise.
  
  You must turn in two copies of your paper, one at the beginning of lecture on April 20, and one at your recitation section that week.
  
  
• We have spent a fair amount of time "cleaning up" the Online Exams. There may, however, still be some errors lurking about. The first student to report a factual or computational error in an Online Exam to his or her TA will receive 5 extra credit points. "Errors" related to round-off will not qualify for this, as we do not consider them to be errors in the first place.

Attendance and Correspondence Policies:

• Attendance:  You should attend all meetings of all of your classes. My lectures are based on the material in the assigned readings, but may also cover material not discussed in the readings. You are responsible for all of this material.
  
  If you arrive late or must leave before class is over, please sit near a door and try to be as inconspicuous as possible. It is distracting to everyone to have people walking in and out of the classroom during class.
  
  Classes are held according to the schedule below as long as the University is open. If the weather appears to be threatening, you can check the Campus Operating Status here.
  
  
• Classroom Etiquette: Please turn off all cell phones, etc., before class begins.
  
  If you wish to use a laptop computer to take notes, that is fine. Note, however, that you will not be able to use these notes during the open book computational exams; make sure to print out copies before the exam and bring them with you. If you wish to use a laptop computer to surf the web, play games, IM your friends, etc., I would suggest you go to the nearest Student Center. This advice also applies to having side discussions with your classmates, reading newspapers, doing puzzles, etc.
  
  
• Questions:  I encourage you to ask questions during class. If something is unclear, or if you have a question related to the material being discussed, please ask your question then. Chances are that some of your classmates would also like some additional discussion of the topic.
  
  Because of schedule-related issues, I prefer not to answer questions before or after class.
  
  
• Email:  I try to answer email promptly. Having said that,
  
  
  • Please use a Subject that gives me some idea what you are writing about. This is especially important if you send mail from an account other than eden. Mail from sexgoddess@aol.com with a subject of "hello" is likely to be considered spam and deleted unread.
    
    
  • If you ask me a question whose answer is on the course web page or Syllabus, my reply is likely to say that.
    
    
  • If you ask me a question about your standing in the course, please include your name and which course and section you are enrolled in.
    
    
  • Please re-read the section on "Questions" above. I realize that there are times when you are reviewing notes after class and/or before an exam when you will discover that you have a question. But it is in everyone's best interest for you to ask your questions in class, rather than after the fact, if you have a question while class is in session.
    
    
  • As stated on the course web page, you are responsible for any announcements, etc., I send to the class via email. Emails are sent to the address that appears when your name is entered into "Search People" on the "Search Rutgers" page. There is a link on the course web page that allows you to update this address.

Schedule

Recitation Schedule

Online Exam Schedule