Review Essay: Introducing Students to the Tools of Psychological Research

Abstract

Teaching and learning the methods of gathering psychological data and analyzing those data can be a daunting task at best for many instructors and students. Nicky HAYES' book Doing Psychological Research: Gathering and Analyzing Data (2000) represents an important instructional contribution. The text is aimed at beginning psychology students and covers both qualitative and quantitative approaches to doing psychological research. The book is divided into two parts: Part I is concerned with the methods of gathering data; Part II is concerned with data analyses. Each chapter has exercises, worked examples and self-assessment questions. In this review essay I discuss HAYES' approach to this material and whether this approach is beneficial to students' learning and understanding. I also go beyond this to discuss how HAYES' book reflects changing attitudes in psychology and social science concerning research methodology. URN: urn:nbn:de:0114-fqs020475

Keywords

• psychological research
• data collection
• data analyses
• qualitative analysis
• quantitative analysis