Psychology Student Survival Guide by David Webb - HTML preview

Setting The Scene

Hugh Coolican notes that the key points in relation to psychology research are that:

 

· Psychological researchers generally follow a scientific approach.

· A scientific approach to research advocates careful definition and measurement, and the logic of testing hypotheses (predictions) elicited from falsifiable theories.
· Hypotheses need to be precisely stated before testing.
· Scientific research involves the promotion & checking of ideas among colleagues.
· Researchers employ probability statistics to decide whether effects are 'significant' or not.
· Research must be carefully planned, and attention given to design, variables, samples & subsequent data analysis.
· If there is a lack of planning in these areas results may be ambiguous, even useless.
· Some psychological researchers reject the scientific methods outlined above.
· In order to study people they advocate qualitative methods which deal with meaningful verbal data rather than exact measurement and statistical summaries.

Don't worry if you are confused by some this terminology. I promise it will become a lot clearer as you read on.