Methods of research in psychology. Methods of psychological research What are the methods of organizing psychological research

Psychology, like any other science, has its own categorical apparatus, and its own research methods, that is, techniques and means that allow it to obtain objective information of interest, assess the state of a person’s mental processes, and, if necessary, plan further psychological correctional or advisory work.

The psychological processes of a person are of a complex nature, they require attentiveness and patience in the study. Still, their manifestations are very diverse and depend on specific circumstances, external and internal factors, each of which must be taken into account.

Each method has its own tasks and goals, object, subject and situation, during which the study will take place. An important detail is the method of recording the results (video filming, note-taking).

The simplest and most accessible to everyone is the method of observation. In terms of time, it can be short, called a slice, and long, covered by a time frame of several years - lungitudinal. Observation, the object of which is certain individuals or individual indicators, is called selective, and there is, accordingly, such a view as continuous. The researcher can be a member of the research team, in which case the observation will be included.
The next method is conversation. The main requirement is ease and trusting atmosphere. In the process of communication, the psychotherapist receives interesting information about the life, activities and views of the subject. In a conversation, questions, answers, and reasoning come from both sides. Varieties of conversation - interviews and questionnaires, here, unlike a simple conversation, the structure is as follows: question - answer.
Experiment - requires the creation of a certain situation and conditions. Its purpose is to reveal or refute a psychological fact. It can be carried out in natural conditions for the subjects, the person should not know that he is a participant in the experiment. Some prefer the laboratory, then the auxiliary means will be: equipment, instructions, prepared space. In this case, a person understands the purpose of his stay in the created "laboratory", but the meaning of the experiment should remain unknown.
Testing is a popular and rewarding method. For diagnostics, methods and tests are used, the purpose of which is to identify the state of specific indicators (memory, attention, thinking, intelligence, emotional-volitional sphere) and personality traits. They have a task that the subject performs, and the psychologist interprets and draws conclusions. For this method, tests should be selected that have been tested and recognized in the scientific world, as they say "classic". Tests for assessing the level of intelligence and all kinds of personality aspects are very popular.
The study of products of activity is perhaps the fastest and most informative method, especially when working with children. Holding crafts, drawings, workbooks, diaries in your hands, you can find out the level of human development, his life preferences, character traits and other important characteristics.
Psychological modeling is not so simple, and not one hundred percent method. Helps to construct habitual patterns of human behavior.
Biographical method - involves compiling the life path of the subject and marking on it the factors that influenced the formation of his personality, crisis moments and important changes, especially his behavioral reactions in different periods. They make a life schedule, according to which it is possible to predict the future of a person, as well as to find out which periods of life have become formative or vice versa, destructive, for the formation of certain criteria.

Psychological science has come a long way, using its research methods, they are accurate and effective, accessible to every psychologist.

Psychology uses a whole complex for the accumulation of scientific data. For this science, it is extremely important in what way knowledge is obtained. L. Vygotsky believed that the facts obtained with the help of different cognitive principles are completely different facts.

These are ways of researching and studying the mental characteristics of different people, analyzing and processing the collected psychological information, as well as obtaining scientific conclusions based on research facts. Methods are used to solve specific research problems in the field of psychology.

Basic methods of psychological research It's an experiment and an observation. Each of these methods appears in specific forms and is characterized by various subspecies and features.

Methods of psychological research aimed at revealing the features, patterns, mechanisms of the psyche of individuals and social groups, as well as for a similar study of mental processes and phenomena. Each method has its own capabilities, but also has certain limitations. These features must be taken into account in practice, professional and other activities.

Research in the field of psychology is aimed at obtaining an objective result, about certain possibilities of the psyche. For this, it is necessary to master individual methods of psychology and methods of professional psychological research and study of a person.

Methods of psychological research can be classified. There are different approaches to this issue. For example, B. Ananiev distinguishes the following groups of research methods in psychology.

Organizational - include (comparison of subjects according to a certain criterion: occupation, age, etc.), longitudinal method (long-term study of one phenomenon), complex (representatives of different sciences, different means of study are involved in the study).

Empirical is the collection of primary information. They distinguish observational methods (by which they understand observation and self-observation.

Experiments - methods that include field, laboratory, natural, formative and ascertaining research.

Psychodiagnostic - test methods, which are divided into projective, standardized tests, conversation, interviews, questionnaires, sociometry, surveys, etc.

Praximetric - methods for analyzing phenomena, products of the activity of the psyche, such as chronometry, the biographical method; professiogram, cyclography, evaluation of activity products; modeling.

Data processing methods, which include quantitative (statistical) and qualitative (analysis and differentiation of materials into groups), they allow you to establish patterns that are hidden from direct perception.

Interpretation methods involve separate methods of explaining the dependencies and patterns that are revealed during statistical processing of data and comparing them with already known facts. This includes typological classification, genetic method, structural, psychography, psychological profile.

Principles of psychological research: no harm to the subject, competence, impartiality, confidentiality, informed consent.

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The methods of psychology are a set of techniques and methods by which researchers can obtain information and expand the knowledge necessary to create scientific theories in psychology and form practical recommendations. Together with the definition of the concept of "method", the terms "methodology" and "methodology" are used. The method is implemented in a methodology, which is a set of rules necessary for research, describes a set of applied tools and objects that are used in certain circumstances and are regulated by the sequence of influences of the researcher. Each psychological technique is based on information about age, gender, ethnicity, professional and religious affiliation.

Methodology is a system of principles and methods for organizing scientific research, which determines the ways to achieve theoretical scientific knowledge, and methods for organizing practical activities. The research is based on the methodology, which reflects the worldview of the researcher, his views and philosophical position.

The phenomena studied by psychology are very complex and diverse, they are very difficult for scientific knowledge, because the success of this science depended on the improvement of research methods.

The subject, tasks and methods of psychology have changed throughout the development of science. To use your psychological knowledge correctly, you need to know the basic methods of psychology. The receipt of reliable information depends on the observance of special principles and the application of specific techniques.

The methods of psychology are briefly understood as ways of studying the real facts of the surrounding reality. Each method is accompanied by only the appropriate type of techniques that meet the goals and objectives of the study. Based on any one method, you can create several methods.

Subject, tasks and methods of psychology These are the three important aspects on which all science rests. At different times, the subject of psychology was defined in different ways, now it is the psyche, the study of its laws and mechanisms for the formation of personal characteristics. The tasks of psychology follow from its subject.

The methods of psychology can be briefly described as ways of studying the psyche and its activities.

Research methods in psychology

The exploratory methods of psychology are briefly described as techniques by which reliable knowledge is obtained that is necessary to create concepts and test theories. Through certain norms and techniques, the most effective way for the practical application of knowledge in the field of psychology is provided.

The general characteristic of the methods of psychology used in the study lies in their distribution into four groups: organizational, empirical, methods of correction and data processing.

Organizational basic methods of psychology:

Comparative genetic: comparison of different types of groups according to certain psychological criteria. He received the greatest popularity in zoopsychology and child psychology. The evolutionary method, which was formed in line with the comparative one, consists in comparing the mental development of an animal with the developmental features of individuals that are at the previous and subsequent levels of animal evolution;

The cross-sectional method is a comparison of the characteristics of interest from different groups (for example, the study of the psychological characteristics of children of different ages, with different levels of development, different personality traits and clinical reactions);

Longitudinal - repetition of the study of the same subjects for a long time;

Complex - representatives of different sciences who study the same object in different ways participate in the study. In a complex method, one can find connections and dependencies between different phenomena (mental and physiological phenomena, social and psychological).

The cross-sectional method in psychology has both advantages and disadvantages. The advantage of transverse sections is the speed of the study, that is, the possibility of acquiring results within a fairly short time. Despite the great advantage of this type of research methods in psychology, it is impossible to demonstrate the dynamics of the development process with its help. Most of the results on the laws of development are very approximate. Regarding the method of transverse sections, the longitudinal one has a large number of advantages.

Longitudinal methods of research in psychology help to process data in certain age periods. With their help, you can establish the dynamics of the individual development of the child. Thanks to longitudinal methods of psychology research, it is possible to identify and resolve the issue of age-related crises in human development. A significant disadvantage in a longitudinal study is that it requires a large amount of time required to organize and conduct it.

Empirical methods are the main methods of psychology in research, since it separated into a separate science:

Objective observation (external) and self-observation (internal);

Analysis of activity products;

Experimental (natural, formative, laboratory) and psychodiagnostic (questionnaires, tests, questionnaires, interviews, sociometry, conversation) methods.

Psychology of the introspective direction considered self-observation to be the main way of cognition in psychology.

In the process of objective observation, the researcher inquires about the individual motives, experiences and sensations of the subject, the researcher directs him to perform appropriate actions, deeds, so that he observes the patterns of mental processes.

The method of observation is used when it is necessary to have the least interference in the natural behavior, interpersonal relationships of people, in the case of striving to obtain a holistic picture of everything that happens. The observation must be carried out using objective methods.

Scientific observation is directly related to ordinary life observation. That is why, in the first place, it is desirable to create the basic conditions that satisfy observation, so that it becomes a scientific method.

One of the requirements is the presence of a clear goal of the study. According to the goal, you need to define a plan. In observation, as in the scientific method, the most essential features are planned and systematic. If observation proceeds from a well-conscious goal, then it must acquire a selective and partial character.

Praximetric methods have been developed mainly in line with the psychology of work in the study of various mental aspects, human actions, operations and professional behavior. These methods are chronometry, cyclography, professiograms and psychograms.

The method of analyzing the products of activity is used in many areas of science: from general psychology to age psychology, and is a comprehensive study of the results of labor as the materialization of mental activity. This method is applied equally to a child's drawing, as well as a school essay or a writer's work or a painted picture.

The biographical method in psychology consists in the life path of a person, a description of his biography. When a personality develops, it changes, rebuilds life orientations, views, experiencing certain personal transformations during this.

Modeling in psychology has a variety of options. Models can be structural or functional, symbolic, physical, mathematical or informational.

The third group of methods of psychology is represented by methods of processing the obtained results. These include - a more organic unity of qualitative and quantitative meaningful analysis. The process of processing the results is always creative, exploratory and involves the selection of the most adequate and sensitive tools.

The fourth group of methods of psychology is interpretive, which theoretically explain the property or phenomenon being studied. Here are complex and systemic sets of different variants of structural, genetic and functional methods, which close the general cycle of the process of psychological research.

Speaker of the Medical and Psychological Center "PsychoMed"

Research methods in psychology are those techniques and means by which psychologists obtain reliable information used to build scientific theories and develop practical recommendations. The strength of science largely depends on the perfection of research methods, on how valid and reliable they are, how quickly a given branch of knowledge is able to absorb and use all the newest, most advanced that appears in the methods of other sciences. Where this can be done, there is usually a noticeable breakthrough in the knowledge of the world.

All of the above applies to psychology. Thanks to the application of the methods of natural and exact sciences, psychology, starting from the second half of the last century, stood out as an independent science and began to develop actively. Up to this point, psychological knowledge was obtained mainly through self-observation (introspection), speculative reasoning, and observation of the behavior of other people. The analysis of the facts obtained by such methods served as the basis for the construction of the first scientific theories explaining the essence of psychological phenomena and human behavior. However, the subjectivity of these methods, their lack of reliability were the reason that psychology for a long time remained a non-experimental science, divorced from practice, capable of assuming, but not proving, causal relationships that exist between mental and other phenomena.

In science, there are general requirements for the objectivity of scientific psychological research. The principle of objective psychological research is implemented by a variety of methodological means.

, consciousness are studied in the unity of internal and external manifestations. However, the relationship between the external flow of the process and its internal nature is not always adequate. The general task of all methods of objective psychological research is to adequately reveal this relationship - to determine its internal psychological nature from the external course of an act.
Our psychology affirms the unity of the mental and the physical, so psychological research often includes a physiological analysis of psychological processes. For example, it is hardly possible to study emotional processes without analyzing their physiological components. Psychological research cannot study mental phenomena in isolation from their psychophysiological mechanisms.
The material foundations of the psyche are not reduced to its organic foundations, the way of thinking of people is determined by the way of their life, the consciousness of people is determined by social practice. Therefore, the methodology of psychological research should be based on the analysis of human activity.
Psychological patterns are revealed in the process. The study of development is not only a special field, but also a specific method of psychological research. The point is not to fix the various levels of development, but to study the driving forces of this process.

Psychology, like any science, uses a whole system of different methods. In domestic psychology, the following four groups of methods are distinguished:
1. include:
a) comparative genetic method (comparison of different species groups according to psychological indicators);

cross-sectional method (comparison of selected same psychological indicators in different groups of subjects);
longitudinal method - the method of longitudinal sections (multiple examinations of the same persons for a long time);
an integrated method (representatives of various sciences participate in the study, while, as a rule, one object is studied by different means). Research of this kind makes it possible to establish connections and dependencies between phenomena of various types, for example, between the physiological, psychological and social development of an individual.

auto-training;
group training;
methods of psychotherapeutic influence;
education.

Features of the experimental research method:

The researcher himself causes the phenomenon he is studying and actively influences it.
The experimenter can vary, change the conditions under which the phenomenon occurs.
In the experiment, it is possible to repeatedly reproduce the results.
The experiment makes it possible to establish quantitative regularities allowing mathematical formulation.

The main task of a psychological experiment is to make mental regularities accessible to objective observation. In the structure of the experiment, it is possible to designate a system of research stages and tasks:
I- theoretical stage of research (problem statement). At this stage, the following tasks are solved:

the formulation of the problem and the topic of the study, the title of the topic should include the basic concepts of the subject of the study,
definition of the object and subject of research,
determination of experimental tasks and research hypotheses.

At this stage, the known facts on the topic of research obtained by other scientists are clarified, which makes it possible to determine the range of solved problems and unsolved problems and formulate hypotheses and problems of a particular experiment. This stage can be considered as a relatively independent research activity of a theoretical nature.

II - methodical stage of research. At this stage, the experimental methodology and experimental plan are developed. There are two sets of variables in an experiment: independent and dependent. The factor that the experimenter changes is called the independent variable; The factor that the independent variable causes to change is called the dependent variable.

The development of an experimental plan involves two points:

drawing up a work plan and a sequence of experimental procedures,
mathematical model of experimental data processing.

III - pilot stage. At this stage, direct experiments are carried out. The main problem of this stage is to create in the subjects an identical understanding of the task of their activity in the experiment. This problem is solved through the reproduction of the same conditions for all subjects and instructions, which aims to bring all subjects to a common understanding of the task, acting as a kind of psychological attitude.

IV- analytical stage. At this stage, a quantitative analysis of the results (mathematical processing), scientific interpretation of the facts obtained is carried out; formulation of new scientific hypotheses and practical recommendations. Regarding the mathematical coefficients of statistics, it should be remembered that they are external in relation to the essence of the studied mental phenomena, describing the probability of their manifestation and the relationship between the frequencies of the compared events, and not between their essences. The essence of phenomena is revealed through the subsequent scientific interpretation of empirical facts.

The expansion of the use of the experiment moved from the elementary processes of sensation to the higher mental processes. The modern experimental method exists in three forms: laboratory, natural and formative experiment.

Three considerations are put forward against the laboratory experiment. The artificiality of the experiment, the analyticity and abstractness of the experiment, the complicating role of the experimenter's influence are pointed out.

A peculiar version of the experiment, representing, as it were, an intermediate form between observation and experiment, is the method of the so-called natural experiment proposed by the Russian scientist A.F. Lazursky (1910). His main tendency is to combine the experimental nature of the study with the naturalness of the conditions. Instead of translating the phenomena under study into laboratory conditions, researchers try to find natural conditions that suit their goals. A natural experiment that solves the problems of psychological and pedagogical research is called a psychological and pedagogical experiment. Its role is exceptionally great in the study of the cognitive abilities of students at various age stages.

Another variation of the experimental method is called formative experimentation. In this case, the experiment acts as a means of influencing, changing the psychology of people. Its originality lies in the fact that it simultaneously serves as a means of research and a means of forming the phenomenon under study. The formative experiment is characterized by the active intervention of the researcher in the mental processes he is studying. As an example of a formative experiment, one can consider the modeling of psychological and pedagogical situations. This method is based on the design of new education and training programs and ways to implement them.

all methods of group training are focused on teaching group interaction;
these methods are based on the student's activity (through the inclusion of research elements in the training).

If traditional methods are focused mainly on conveying ready-made knowledge, then here the research participants themselves must come to them.

All the many forms of socio-psychological training can be divided into two large classes:

games focused on the development of social skills (for example, the ability to conduct a discussion, resolve interpersonal conflicts). Among game methods, the method of role-playing games is the most widely used;
group discussions aimed at the skills of analyzing communication situations - analyzing oneself, a communication partner, a group situation as a whole. The group discussion method is most often used in the form of case studies.

Forms of group training are very diverse. Classes can be recorded on tape or videotaped. The last form of training is called "video training". This audio and video recording is used by the training leader for review by the group members and subsequent group discussion.

Currently, the practice of group training is a booming branch of applied psychology. Socio-psychological training is used to train specialists of various profiles: managers, teachers, doctors, psychologists, etc. It is used to correct the dynamics of marital conflicts, improve relations between parents and children, correct socio-psychological maladjustment of adolescents, etc.

Like any other independent science, psychology has its own research methods. With their help, information is collected and analyzed, which is later used as a basis for creating scientific theories or drawing up practical recommendations. The development of science depends primarily on the quality and reliability of research methods, so this issue will always remain relevant.

The main methods of psychology can be divided into two groups:

Subjective methods of psychology (observation, survey)- these research methods are based on personal feelings, in relation to the object under study. After the separation of psychology into a separate science, subjective research methods received priority development. Currently, these methods continue to be used, and some are even improved. Subjective methods have a number of disadvantages, which lie in the complexity of an unbiased assessment of the object under study.

Objective methods of psychology (tests, experiment)- these research methods differ from subjective ones in that the object under study is evaluated by outside observers, which allows you to get the most reliable information.

The main research methods used in psychology:

Observation It is one of the earliest and simplest methods of psychological research. Its essence lies in the fact that human activities are observed from the outside, without any interference. Everything seen is documented and interpreted. There are the following types of this method: introspection, external, free, standard, included.

Poll (conversation)- a psychological method of research in which questions are asked to the participants in the study. The answers received are recorded, with special attention paid to reactions to certain questions. The advantage of this method is that the survey is conducted in a free style, which allows the researcher to ask additional questions. There are the following types of survey: oral, written, free, standard.

Test- a method of psychological research that allows you to quickly interview a large number of people. Unlike other methods of psychology, tests have a clear procedure for collecting and processing data, and also have a ready-made description of the results obtained. There are the following types of tests: objective, projective.

Experiment- a method of psychological research, with which you can create artificial situations and observe human reactions. The advantage of this method is that it is here that the cause-and-effect relationships of the phenomenon under study are traced, which makes it possible to scientifically explain what is happening. There are the following types of experiment: laboratory, natural.

In psychological research, several psychological methods are most often used, which allows you to achieve the most accurate results. However, there are situations when the use of several methods is difficult or impossible at all, then the most appropriate method of psychological research is used for this situation.