Various research methods play a crucial role in understanding human and social behaviors. Naturalistic observation allows researchers to study behaviors in their natural environments without the artificial constraints of a laboratory setup, although it can be time-consuming and challenging to conduct without influencing the behavior being observed.
-Example: Extreme Social Isolation of a Child;This is the classic case study of Anna, a young child raised in extreme isolation and the effect of this isolation on her psych-social development.
-Limitation: 1. non-experimental- conclusions about cause-and-effect relationships cannot be drawn 2. involve only a single individual or just a few and therefore may not be representative of the general group or population. 3. rely on descriptive information provided by different people- important details to be left out 4. information collected is retrospective data, recollections of past events- subject to the problems inherent to memory.
-Strength: 1. useful when researchers want to get a detailed contextual view of an individual's life or of a particular phenomena 2. help understand the social and familial factors that might be part of the development of some form of deviant behavior in an individual 3. researchers cannot, for practical or ethical reasons, do experimental studies
-Description: nonexperimental,in-depth descriptive record kept by an outside observer, of an individual or group of individuals. collecting and examining various observations and records of an individual's experiences and/or behaviors
Survey
-Example: Frequence of Sexual Dysfunction in "Normal" Couples; What kinds of sexual problems are experienced by "normal" couples?
-Strengths: 1. collecting data on aspects of behavior that are difficult to observe directly and when it is desirable to sample a large number of subjects. 2. used to to assess attitudes and opinions on a variety of subjects
-Limitation:1. relies on a self-report method of data collection- Intentional deception, poor memory, or misunderstanding of the question can all contribute to inaccuracies in the data. 2. descriptive, not explanatory- offer no insights into cause-and-effect relationships.
-Description: non experimental, descriptive approach. inferences about behavior are made from data collected via interviews or questionnaires.
Naturalistic Observation
- Example: Bumper Sticker and the Cops. Did Los Angeles Police give tickets more often to cars bearing Black Panther bumper stickers?
- Limitation: 1. descriptive method- , without the controlled conditions of the laboratory, conclusions about cause-and-effect relationships cannot be drawn. 2. it can also take a lot of time. 3. the difficulty of observing behavior without disrupting it 4. the difficulty of coding results in a manner appropriate for statistical analysis.
- Strengths: allows researchers to observe behavior in the setting in which it normally occurs rather than the artificial and limited setting of the laborator
-Description: non-experimental approaches used in the field or in real-life settings. Research observes and records some behavior over a prolonged period.
Correlation
- Example: Parents/Violent Behavior. If parents have an attitude that violent behavior toward children, violent behavior such as shoving or spanking, is sometimes necessary, are they more likely to behave toward their children in that manner?
- Limitation: does not prove causation and it does not prove nor disprove that the relationship is a cause-and-effect relationship
- Strengths: determine if there is a relationship between two variables without having to directly manipulate those variables
- Description: non experimental, descriptive method, statistical tool and variables are not manipulated.
Experimental
-Example: Women's prejudice against women. Do women tend to perceive other women as less or more competent than men at writing professional articles?
-Strengths: allows researchers to determine cause-and-effect relationships
-Limitation: 1. can only be used when it is practical and ethical for the researcher to manipulate the antecedent 2. conditions experimental studies are done in the highly controlled setting of laboratory. These conditions are artificial and may not reflect what really happens in the less controlled and infinitely more complex real world.
-Description: Researcher manipulates the independent variable (constant) to see if this produced any changes in the dependent variable (changes)
