November 27, 2007
Research and Methodological Development in Psychology
Mihai Anitei
Chair of Psychology
Bucharest University
After teaching introductory research methods in Experimental Psychology for more years than I care to admit, I could not find a methods book whose style and organization satisfied the demands of the course. Methods courses tend to have formidable goals. The mentors/professors want students to understand the terminology, logic, and procedures used in research; to integrate statistical procedures with research methods and to gain the capacity to design and conduct research and write APA-style reports. I recognize that a methods course as I teach Experimental Psychology requires a laboratory component. Labs, however, pose the following problem: students must have some knowledge of methods for lab exercises to be meaningful, but the benefits of the lab exercises are minimal if students cannot conduct them until the end of the semester.
Students and nevertheless the psychologists often have difficulty not only understanding the basic concepts, but integrating them, applying them in different contexts, and sometimes simply remembering what a term conveys.
Europe’s Journal of Psychology represents a “golden mine” for undergraduate/graduated students and also for Psychologists in understanding the basic research designs, case studies, research methods and Of Course APA-style report. Talking about APA-style report, I have to underline that for more that a decade I introduced this report style at the Experimental Psychology labs as teaching and final research report evaluation of the students. Here comes the central role played by the EJOP since 2005: free access for research APA style reports, case studies, interviews with renowned Psychologists and Professors from Prestigious Universities as Harvard medical School, Maryland, Florida and many other.
Also, I have to underline that the pro-bono work of the EJOP’s Editorial Team is a symbol of a young and strong Psychologists generation.
I believe that no one is perfect and science suffers from human failings. Scientists also differ from nonscientists in their attitudes toward understanding nature. Therefore, we must always question the factors proposed as important might actually be irrelevant and whether the factors proposed as irrelevant might actually be important. Furthermore, researchers also have the ethical responsibility to conduct research in a way that does not cause harm to others.
In the end, I invite the undergraduate/graduated students, the Psychologists and nevertheless all the others interested in science to read the research studies and all the scientific articles from Europe’s Journal of Psychology. I want first of all the students and those interested in research to appreciate that the Psychology in our days demand a basic foundation of scientific research methods besides the foundation of scientific concepts.