Methods of personality and group study /part 3/

It is important to know that: - the attitudes, interests, psychological state, observer's personality may influence the results of the observation; distortion in perception of phenomena; the method takes a lot of time and its duration leads to fatigue; the observer may drop under the influence of the observed people; it may be very difficult to establish the motives of the behavior of those surveyed; the researcher is passive. It should also be borne in mind that the reliability of monitoring also depends on whether mistakes are made in the monitoring process.

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Typical errors in the assertion are: - halo-effect - the researcher's strive to summarize what he is observing; - the effect of indulgence - the tendency to give only a very positive assessment of the observed; - effect of the central trend - the observer's ambition to avert his / her assessments of observed phenomena; - the effect of the logical error - it is assumed on the basis of the assumption of a close connection between certain qualities of the personality; - contrast effect - the tendency of the observer to highlight and compare his personality traits with those of the observed person; - effect of the first impression - the observer 's first impression on the person under study determines the further perception and evaluation of his / her behavior; - the effect of prejudice, ethnic, religious, professional and other stereotypes, which lead to the replacement of the fact with the observer's view of it. To avoid these and other errors, it is necessary to use the observation method: the professional professional preparedness and the lack of attention of the observer; very precise organization of monitoring; choice of justifications, signs of monitoring and assessment criteria; availability of a unified recording system for monitoring data.

Experiment method - experiment is a specific method aimed at conducting research in specially designed, managed living conditions and human activity, in order to verify the research hypothesis about causal relationships between mental phenomena. Experimental method uses special measuring equipment and other measuring instruments. It is also important for the experiment that it involves the use of all other methods - observation, talk, poll, etc. But in the experiment, they have a subordinate position. The experimental experiment is carried out in two versions: laboratory and natural. The laboratory is in special premises. It is a very valuable method in psychology, as it allows to discover and study such peculiarities of the psyche of people and their determinants, which very often can not be revealed in any other way. In summary, two types of laboratory experiment can be distinguished: - Classical / Applied / - carried out in three varieties - which seek to reveal the essence and characterization of retarded mental phenomena; we seek to establish the dependence of the phenomenon studied; we seek to establish the dependence of the phenomenon studied; to establish functional links. The psychological laboratory experiment aims to diagnose the state of development of the person or group of people.

For the purpose of diagnosis and prognosis, certain norms are used to assess the extent of mental phenomena development; - psychodiagnostic. Psychodiagnostics is a variation of the psychological experiment and is a system of techniques and tools for psychological research specifically geared to studying individual psychic phenomena as well as their interrelations and influences in the composition of the more complex psychic education - the properties of the personality. The aim of psychodiagnostics lies in the task of fixing and describing in a certain kind the psychological differences between individuals, as well as among groups of people united on any sign. When performing the psycho-diagnostics of the researcher, he / she must arrange and classify the resulting research material.

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part 1

part 2