Introduction

Have you ever noticed that when your little brother eats a lot of candy he starts acting hyper and really gets on your nerves? A scientist would not take your word for that, she would do a study to get the facts.

To study behavior, psychology has employed the use of the scientific method, a logical and orderly process that is universal in all areas of scientific research.

The scientific method has logical steps that include:

  • making observations
  • forming a hypothesis (which is an educated guess)
  • testing the hypothesis
  • forming conclusions

There are several ways to apply the scientific method to the study of behavior and you will explore several of these.

In many studies about human behavior, humans are not used. Why? Because some experiments would put people in danger or could possibly hurt them mentally or physically.

The American Psychological Association (APA) is a governing body in psychology and it initiates and monitors experiments that are done in psychology. They oversee the experiments so that people and/or animals are in no way injured (mentally or physically).

 scientist

 

Following successful completion of this lesson, students will be able to:

  • Describe the type of methodology and strategies used by researchers in different psychological studies.
  • Identify systematic procedures necessary for conducting an experiment and improving the validity of results.
  • Describe the use of statistics in evaluating research, including calculating the mean, median and mode from a set of data.

The above objectives correspond with the Alabama Course of Study: Psychology: Objective: 2

 

 

    Next Page