Description

Comprehensive, clear, and practical, Introduction to Research Methods in Psychology is the essential student guide to understanding and undertaking quantitative and qualitative research in psychology. Revised throughout, this new edition includes a new chapter on ‘Managing your research project’. This is the ideal guide for students just beginning and those moving on to more advanced research methods projects in psychology.

Features

User-friendly boxed features and illustrations across the book help to bring the subject to life. These include:

• ‘Research Examples’ at the end of every chapter put research methods in a real-world context.
• ‘Key ideas’ are highlighted to help students grasp and revise the main topics and concepts.
• ‘Talking Points’ address some of the controversial issues to critically engage students with the debates in the field.
• ‘Practical advice’ boxes give handy hints and tips on how to carry out research in practice
• Examples of published research with 'how to' advice and guidance on writing up reports, helps students to develop a practical, as well as theoretical, understanding.

New to this Edition

• New chapter ‘Managing your research project’ provides practical suggestions to help students successfully manage the intellectual, organizational, emotional, and social demands of their research projects.
• New sections on multi-method research and the analysis of the big data generated by the digital media. 

Table of Contents

• Part 1 Basics of research
• 1 Role of research in psychology
• 2 Aims and hypotheses in research
• 3 Variables, concepts and measures
• 4 Problems of generalisation and decision-making in research: Chance findings and sample size
• 5 Research reports: The total picture
• 6 Improving your quantitative write-up
• 7 Literature search
• 8 Ethics and data management in research
• Part 2 Quantitative research methods
• 9 Basic laboratory experiments
• 10 Advanced experimental designs
• 11 Cross-sectional or correlational research: Non-manipulation studies
• 12 Longitudinal studies
• 13 Sampling and population surveys
• 14 Data analysis issues and scientific progress
• Part 3 Fundamentals of testing and measurement
• 15 Psychological tests: Their use and construction
• 16 Reliability and validity: Evaluating the value of tests and measures
• 17 Coding data
• Part 4 Qualitative research methods
• 18 Why qualitative research?
• 19 Qualitative data collection
• 20 Transcribing language data: Jefferson system
• 21 Thematic analysis
• 22 Grounded theory
• 23 Discourse analysis
• 24 Conversation analysis
• 25 Interpretative phenomenological analysis
• 26 Evaluating qualitative research
• 27 Improving your qualitative write-up
• Part 5 Research for projects, dissertations and theses
• 28 Developing ideas for research
• 29 Managing your research project
• Glossary

Back Cover

Comprehensive, clear and practical, Research Methods in Psychology, sixth edition is the essential

student guide to understanding and undertaking quantitative and qualitative research in psychology.

Revised throughout, this new edition includes a new chapter on ‘Managing your research project’. This

is the ideal guide for students just beginning and those moving on to more advanced research methods

projects in psychology.

 

New to this Edition

• New chapter ‘Managing your research project’ provides practical suggestions to help students

successfully manage the intellectual, organizational, emotional, and social demands of their research

projects.

• New sections on multi-method research and the analysis of the big data generated by the digital

media.

 

Key features

• User-friendly boxed features and illustrations throughout the book help to bring the subject to life.

• ‘Research Examples’at the end of every chapter present research methods in a real-world context.

• ‘Key ideas’ are highlighted to help students grasp and revise the main topics and concepts.

• ‘Talking Points’ address some of the controversial issues to critically engage students with the

debates in the fi eld.

• ‘Practical advice’ boxes give handy hints and tips on how to carry out research in practice.

• ‘Examples of published research’ with ‘how to’ advice and guidance on writing up reports, help

students to develop a practical, as well as theoretical, understanding.

 

Author biography

Dennis Howitt and Duncan Cramer are with Loughborough University.

Author

Dennis Howitt and Duncan Cramer are with Loughborough University.