Research in the scientific sense means conducting a methodical study to answer a certain question or to support a hypothesis. The central goal of this process is discovery of a definite answer to the given issue/problem. The process of scientific research should always be systematic, following certain steps along a protocol, which varies in different fields of knowledge. To conduct properly research, it is necessary to successfully organize the process, plan it consistently and identify the questions that have to be answered. Research does not stop at the stage of discovery of some data or making some observations, as it also requires certain opinion or interpretation from the researcher.
The scientific method is one of the most important concepts in any research. It represents a systematic process, upon completing which researcher can hypothesize about some given issue and come to some conclusion. It is possible to define several main stages lying behind any scientific method usage: 1) understanding what a researcher wants to study, to find out, 2) finding and analyzing data appropriate for the research, 3) coming to some specific conclusions based on the discovered information, and 4) sharing the discovered conclusions with the scientific community (Baltes, Reese & Nesselroade, 2014). For scientific method, two concepts are of major importance - hypothesis and theory. The first is a certain prediction that can be tested from some theory. The latter is used to make some predictions on the future observations. Scientific method has a goal of proving or disproving a hypothesis.
In conducting any kind of research, it is possible to use primary and secondary data. Secondary information is the data that already exists, i.e. was already collected for other purposes. Primary information is data collected for the first time for a particular purpose of a research. Data specially collected for analysis and not subjected to pre-treatment constitute the primary information, the use of which is a prerequisite for specific analytical procedures.
Methods of collecting primary data are observations (monitoring, testing, technical observation methods), experiments (field and laboratory), and surveys (personal interviews, questionnaires by mail, telephone interviews). Primary sources of information are creative works, original documents, autobiographies, letters, reports, interviews, etc. Its advantages are the novelty of information, its reliability, complete correlation between the research objectives and the data (Smith, 2007). Disadvantages involve generally higher cost, complexity of conducting, time needed to collect and process information.
Secondary information sources involve documentaries, magazines articles, analytical works, radio, books, critical essays, bibliographies, reference books, textbooks. Disadvantages of this kind of data involve its incompleteness, the lack of reliability guarantees, delay in the necessary information, which reduces its value. However, in situations where there is required preliminary (qualifying) analysis, secondary information is indispensable, since it does not require significant financial costs and time. Furthermore, it is supplied from different sources, which improves objectiveness of the results. Secondary data is cheaper and easier than the original data, but may be outdated, incomplete or unreliable.
Statistical methods are used for the treatment of psychological research materials to extract quantitative data obtained in experiments and observations, surveys. Their role in research is very important, as they allow for seeing certain tendencies, trends and regularities and drawing conclusions, proving or disproving the given hypothesis. In particular, in the processing of data obtained during the tests on psychological diagnosis, it will be information about the individual psychological characteristics of the subjects. Psychological studies are usually built with reliance on quantitative data.
Modern mathematical statistics is a large and complex system of knowledge. We cannot expect that every psychologist possess this knowledge. Meanwhile, any psychologist needs statistics constantly in his daily work. Statisticians have developed a set of simple techniques that are completely available to anyone who has not forgotten what he had learned in high school.
Application of these or other statistical techniques is defined by the statistical scale, to which the resulting material applies. There are proposed four statistical scales: scale of items (or nominal); scale of the order; scale of intervals; and scale of relationships (Coolican, 2009). Knowing the typical features of each scale, it is easy to determine to which of them there should be attributed the statistical processing of the material. The scale of items unites materials, in which the objects under study differ from each other in terms of quality. During processing of such materials, there is no need to arrange these objects in a manner according to their characteristics. The objects can be arranged in any sequence.
If in the scale of items, the order of the names of the objects being studied plays virtually no role, in the scale of the order - which is evident from its name - this sequence has all the attention. This scale in statistics includes such research materials, which are subject to belonging to one or more classes, being different when comparing them with one another - "more-less", "above-below" - etc. The scale of intervals includes such materials, in which the quantitative estimation of the object being studied is in fixed units. The scale of relationships includes materials that take into account not only the number of fixed units, as in the scale of intervals, but also the relationship between the obtained results of a summary. To work with such a relationship, you need to have some absolute point, from which to start counting. In the study of psychological objects, this scale is practically inapplicable.
References
Baltes, P. B., Reese, H. W., & Nesselroade, J. R. (2014). Life-span developmental psychology: Introduction to research methods. Psychology Press.
Coolican, H. (2009). Research methods and statistics in psychology. Routledge.
Smith, J. A. (Ed.). (2007). Qualitative psychology: A practical guide to research methods. Sage.
