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3: Psychological Research

  • Page ID
    200291
    • Rose M. Spielman, William J. Jenkins, Marilyn D. Lovett, et al.
    • OpenStax

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    Psychological research refers to research that psychologists conduct to research and analyze the experiences' and behaviors of individuals or groups. Their research can have educational, occupational, and clinical applications.

    • 3.1: Introduction
      How can we go about finding answers that are supported not by mere opinion, but by evidence that we can all agree on? The findings of psychological research can help us navigate issues like this.
    • 3.2: Why Is Research Important?
      Scientific research is a critical tool for successfully navigating our complex world. Without it, we would be forced to rely solely on intuition, other people’s authority, and blind luck. While many of us feel confident in our abilities to decipher and interact with the world around us, history is filled with examples of how very wrong we can be when we fail to recognize the need for evidence in supporting claims.
    • 3.3: Approaches to Research
      There are many research methods available to psychologists in their efforts to understand, describe, and explain behavior and the cognitive and biological processes that underlie it. Some methods rely on observational techniques. Other approaches involve interactions between the researcher and the individuals who are being studied—ranging from a series of simple questions to extensive, in-depth interviews—to well-controlled experiments.
    • 3.4: Analyzing Findings
      How do we determine if there is indeed a relationship between two things? And when there is a relationship, how can we discern whether it is attributable to coincidence or causation? Correlation means that there is a relationship between two or more variables (such as ice cream consumption and crime), but this relationship does not necessarily imply cause and effect. When two variables are correlated, it simply means that as one variable changes, so does the other.
    • 3.5: Ethics
      Today, scientists agree that good research is ethical in nature and is guided by a basic respect for human dignity and safety. However, as you will read in the feature box, this has not always been the case. Modern researchers must demonstrate that the research they perform is ethically sound. This section presents how ethical considerations affect the design and implementation of research conducted today.
    • 3.6: Critical Thinking Questions
    • 3.7: Key Terms
    • 3.8: Personal Application Questions
    • 3.9: Review Questions
    • 3.10: Summary


    This page titled 3: Psychological Research is shared under a CC BY 4.0 license and was authored, remixed, and/or curated by Rose M. Spielman, William J. Jenkins, Marilyn D. Lovett, et al. (OpenStax) via source content that was edited to the style and standards of the LibreTexts platform.