Leary – Introduction to behavioural research studies – chapter 1
3 primary types of research:
Basic research = to understand psychological processes without wanting to apply the
knowledge. The primary goal is to increase our knowledge.
Applied research = to find solutions for certain problems rather than to enhance general
knowledge about psychological processes.
Evaluation research = to use behavioural research methods to assess the effects of social or
institutional programs on behaviour.
The difference between these types of research is found in the goal of the research.
Goals of behavioural research:
Describing patterns of behaviour, thought or emotion.
Predicting the behaviour of people.
Mostly seen as the most important goal: explaining behaviour.
Scientists must be careful with relying on their common sense. It could blind them to alternative ways
of thinking. Scientists must question common sense.
Four benefits of a background in research:
It allows people to understand research that is relevant to their professions.
It makes a person more intelligent and effective in consuming research in their every day life.
This is important because a lot of choices we have to make, are on the basis of scientific
research.
It develops a person’s critical thinking.
It helps people to become an authority.
Three criteria for a scientific investigation:
Empiricism: observations which help people to draw conclusions about the world. Scientific
observation is systematic → observations are systematically structured so that a person can
use the observations to draw valid conclusions.
Public verification: the findings of one researcher must be able to be observed, replicated and
verified by others.
Solvable problems: the problems that scientists investigate must be solvable.
Pseudoscience → refers to claims of evidence that are sevred as science but in fact violate the basic
criteria of scientific investigation.
The scientist’s 2 jobs:
Detecting phenomena → discovering and documenting new phenomena, patterns and
relationships.
Explaining phenomena → to develop and evaluate explanations of phenomena.
A theory → a set of propositions that attempts to explain the relationships among a set of concepts. It
tries to explain relationships between variables
A model → tries to describe a relationship between variables.
Criteria for a good theory in psychology:
To propose causal relationships, explaining how one or more variables cause or lead to
particular cognitive, emotional, behavioural or physiological responses.
To be coherent in the sense of being clear, straight-forward, logical and consistent.
To be parsimonious, using as few concepts and processes as possible to explain the
phenomenon.
To generate testable hypotheses that are able to be disconfirmed through research.
To solve an existing theoretical question.
To stimulate other researchers to conduct research to test the theory.
Post hoc explanations → explanations that are made after the fact. More informative than post hoc
explanations is the degree to which a theory can successfully predict what will happen.
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