सSaral Shiksha Yojna
Courses/Behavioral Research: Statistical Methods

Behavioral Research: Statistical Methods

CG3.402
Vinoo Alluri•Monsoon 2025-26•4 credits
Sample Papers/100-mark mock paper · Paper 1

100-mark mock paper · Paper 1

Duration: 120 min • Max marks: 100

Section A — MCQs (20 × 1 = 20 marks)

20 marks
  1. 1.A reaction time of 400 ms is twice as fast as 800 ms. This statement is valid because RT is on which scale? (a) Nominal (b) Ordinal (c) Interval (d) Ratio1 m
  2. 2.Which of the following is the correct frequentist interpretation of a 95% confidence interval? (a) There is a 95% probability the parameter lies in this interval (b) 95% of the data lie within this interval (c) If we repeated the procedure many times, 95% of such intervals would contain the parameter (d) The parameter is within this interval 95% of the time1 m
  3. 3.A researcher reports p = 0.03. Which statement is correct? (a) The probability that H₀ is true is 3% (b) Assuming H₀ is true, there is a 3% chance of data this extreme or more (c) The probability the finding is a fluke is 3% (d) There is a 97% chance the alternative is true1 m
  4. 4.Which test is appropriate for comparing the means of three independent groups when the assumption of normality is severely violated? (a) One-way ANOVA (b) Repeated-measures ANOVA (c) Kruskal-Wallis (d) Friedman1 m
  5. 5.The Central Limit Theorem tells us that: (a) Any large sample is normally distributed (b) The sampling distribution of the sample mean approaches Normal as n grows (c) The population must be Normal for inference to work (d) Outliers always cancel out in large samples1 m
  6. 6.Mauchly's test of sphericity is most relevant for: (a) Chi-square goodness-of-fit (b) Repeated-measures ANOVA (c) Independent t-test (d) Pearson correlation1 m
  7. 7.A scale that consistently reads 5 kg above the true weight is: (a) Reliable but not valid (b) Valid but not reliable (c) Both reliable and valid (d) Neither1 m
  8. 8.The Bonferroni correction with m = 10 tests at family-wise α = 0.05 sets each test's α to: (a) 0.05 (b) 0.05 / 10 = 0.005 (c) 0.05 × 10 = 0.5 (d) 1 − (1 − 0.05)¹⁰1 m
  9. 9.Which R command gives the probability of obtaining 6 or fewer heads in 10 tosses of a fair coin? (a) `dbinom(6, 10, 0.5)` (b) `pbinom(6, 10, 0.5)` (c) `qbinom(6, 10, 0.5)` (d) `rbinom(6, 10, 0.5)`1 m
  10. 10.In Bayesian analysis, the **posterior** is proportional to: (a) prior × evidence (b) prior × likelihood (c) likelihood ÷ prior (d) evidence ÷ prior1 m
  11. 11.The Pearson correlation between two variables is 0. Which conclusion is correct? (a) The variables are independent (b) There is no linear association, but there may be a nonlinear one (c) The variables have identical means (d) One variable causes the other inversely1 m
  12. 12.In a 2×3 contingency table, the degrees of freedom for the chi-square test of independence are: (a) 5 (b) 6 (c) 2 (d) 11 m
  13. 13.A study with a tiny effect size finds p < 0.001 with n = 50,000. The most appropriate conclusion is: (a) The effect is very important (b) The effect is real but may be practically meaningless (c) The p-value is wrong (d) The null hypothesis is definitely false1 m
  14. 14.Which of the following is NOT a measure of central tendency? (a) Mean (b) Median (c) Standard deviation (d) Mode1 m
  15. 15.A regression model has R² = 0.4. This means: (a) 40% of the predictions are correct (b) The correlation is 0.4 (c) 40% of the variance in Y is explained by the model (d) The slope is 0.41 m
  16. 16.Sphericity violation in RM-ANOVA is corrected using: (a) Welch's correction (b) Greenhouse-Geisser (c) Bonferroni (d) Tukey HSD1 m
  17. 17.In a Bayesian t-test, a Bayes Factor BF₁₀ = 8 indicates: (a) Strong evidence for H₀ (b) Anecdotal evidence for H₁ (c) Moderate evidence for H₁ (d) No evidence1 m
  18. 18.Which sampling method is best to ensure rare subgroups are well-represented? (a) Simple random sampling (b) Convenience sampling (c) Stratified sampling (d) Snowball sampling1 m
  19. 19.A scree plot is used in: (a) Hypothesis testing (b) Factor analysis / PCA to choose number of factors (c) Chi-square tests (d) Regression diagnostics1 m
  20. 20.If you fail to reject H₀ when H₀ is false, you have committed: (a) Type I error (b) Type II error (c) Sampling error (d) Measurement error1 m

Section B — MSQs (10 × 2 = 20 marks)

20 marks
  1. 1.Which of the following are valid forms of reliability? (a) Test-retest (b) Construct (c) Inter-rater (d) Parallel forms (e) Ecological2 m
  2. 2.A ratio scale supports which operations? (a) Ordering (b) Addition/subtraction (c) Multiplication/division (d) Computing a meaningful mean (e) All of the above2 m
  3. 3.Which are threats to internal validity? (a) History effects (b) Selection bias (c) Practice/testing effects (d) Sampling from one university (e) Experimenter bias2 m
  4. 4.Which apply to the t-distribution? (a) Heavier tails than Normal (b) Used when σ is unknown (c) Shape depends on degrees of freedom (d) Always symmetric around zero (e) Approaches Normal as df → ∞2 m
  5. 5.Which statements about p-hacking are correct? (a) Optional stopping inflates Type I error (b) Trying multiple analyses and reporting the favorable one is p-hacking (c) Pre-registration helps prevent it (d) Reporting only one of many outcomes is fine if it's the most interesting (e) Selectively dropping participants until p < .05 is p-hacking2 m
  6. 6.Which are assumptions of ordinary least squares (OLS) linear regression? (a) Linearity (b) Independence of errors (c) Homoscedasticity (d) Predictors must be normally distributed (e) Normality of residuals2 m
  7. 7.Which would inflate the family-wise Type I error rate? (a) Running many independent t-tests on the same dataset (b) Pre-specifying a single hypothesis (c) Testing each of 50 outcome variables (d) Looking at many subgroups (e) Using Bonferroni correction2 m
  8. 8.Which of the following are correct interpretations of Bayes' rule terms? (a) P(H) is the prior (b) P(D|H) is the posterior (c) P(D|H) is the likelihood (d) P(H|D) is the posterior (e) P(D) is the marginal probability of the data2 m
  9. 9.Which of these are nonparametric tests? (a) Mann-Whitney U (b) Independent t-test (c) Kruskal-Wallis (d) Friedman (e) One-way ANOVA2 m
  10. 10.Which can increase statistical power? (a) Increasing sample size (b) Increasing α from .01 to .05 (c) Using a within-subjects design (d) Reducing measurement noise (e) Decreasing the true effect size2 m

Section C — Short Descriptive (6 × 5 = 30 marks)

30 marks

    Section D — Long Descriptive (3 × 10 = 30 marks)

    30 marks

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