Experimental research in psychology

An experimental study is increasingly used in the study of human sexual behavior. This method includes the presentation to participants of research of certain events (incentives) under controlled conditions, allowing reliable measurements of the reactions of the subjects.
Experimental study. A study conducted in a strictly controlled laboratory conditions in which the reactions of the subjects can be reliably measured.
Used, as a rule, in a laboratory setting, the experimental method has significant advantages over other methods. This is due to the fact that it provides a controlled environment from which all possible influences on the reactions of the subjects can be excluded, except for the factors that make up the subject of the study.
A researcher using this method manipulates a certain set of conditions or variables and monitors the impact of his manipulations on the behavior of the subjects. The experimental method is particularly suitable for establishing cause-effect relationships between variables.
In any experimental design scheme, there are two types of variables (forms of behavior or conditions that can be given (assigned) different meanings). These are independent and dependent variables. Independent variables are the conditions or components of the experiment that are under the control of the researcher. He can manipulate them or determine their values ​​at will. Accordingly, dependent variables are the result of a manipulation or a resultant behavior that the experimenter observes and records, but does not control.

An experimental study is one of the methods of psychology that aims to identify the relationship between cause and effect.

Changing one of the variables (independent), the researcher conducting the experiment observes the change in another variable (dependent), which is not manipulated. The data obtained from the experiment show whether the independent variable is the cause of the changes in the dependent variable.

Advantages of the method in the possibility:

1) artificially cause phenomena of interest to the experimenter;

2) clearly take into account the influence of conditions on the studied socio-psychological phenomena;

3) quantitatively change the experimental conditions;

4) change some conditions, while keeping the others unchanged.

The disadvantages of the experimental method include:

1) the artificiality of the experiment or its remoteness from life, due to the loss of essential conditions for the studied phenomenon;

2) analyticity and abstractness of the experiment. An experiment is usually carried out in artificial conditions, in connection with which the features and patterns of the course of socio-psychological processes, which are often abstract in nature, revealed during the experiment do not make it possible to draw direct conclusions about the patterns of the same processes in natural conditions;

3) the complicating role of the experimenter's influence (Rosenthal effect) is the inability to exclude the experimenter's influence on the course and results of the experiment.

Types of experiments:

1) in the form of:

a) natural experiment - is the actual impact on a real object in order to diagnose it;

b) a thought experiment - consists in manipulating not with a real object, but with information about it or with its model;

2) according to the conditions of:

a) field experiment - is organized in natural conditions for the diagnosed object; can be carried out at all levels of public life. Advantages: a combination of the naturalness of observation methods and the activity of the experiment. Disadvantages: related to ethical and legal issues;

b) laboratory experiment - proceeds in special conditions using special equipment that allows you to strictly record the characteristics of external influences and the corresponding mental responses of people. The actions of the subjects are determined by the instruction. Subjects know that an experiment is being conducted, although they may not understand the true meaning of the experiment. Advantages: the possibility of multiple experiments with a large number of subjects, which allows us to establish general reliable patterns of development of mental phenomena. Disadvantages: artificial conditions for research.

Special types of experimental techniques include instrumental methods carried out with the help of technical devices, which allow creating a certain significant situation, revealing one or another characteristic of the diagnosed object, taking indications of the manifestation of the studied characteristics, fixing and partially counting the diagnostic results.

The hardware is based on the classic in electrical engineering "Winston Bridge" - four resistances (resistors) connected in the form of a rhombus.

Hardware involves solving a group problem only if all the members of the group interact and adapt to each other. Currently, hardware techniques are used to measure the reaction of the media audience to certain programs or to count answers in an automated questionnaire.