23. Methods and means of research in social psychology

The development of socio-psychological research in our country was largely stimulated by the needs of practice.

This left an imprint on the formation of the scientific discipline itself.

Practical requests require fairly quick solutions.

This situation gives rise to both positive and negative points for the development of social psychology.

Positive aspects: various areas of the national economy and culture finance socio-psychological research and thereby create favorable opportunities for the development of science; negative points are generated by the fact that social psychology is often not ready to answer some of the questions posed by practice, but in the conditions of acute social need it gives these answers, which sometimes means a relatively low quality of applied research.

The development of applied social psychology as its most important condition has the development of fundamental research relating to the main problems of this science.

Any socio-psychological research conducted "in the field" is the intervention of the researcher in the life of a real group, where certain relationships develop.

The arrival of a social psychologist should not destroy this natural process.

There are a number of difficulties associated with the peculiarities of the research methods.

The entire strategy of applied research is based on the constant interaction of the researcher with people involved in the actual process of life activity.

Emotional assessment of the situation at the time of the study can give a shift in the data that will distort the whole picture of the relationship.

All the socio-psychological methods are cumbersome, their use requires considerable time.

If the study is carried out during working hours, it can disrupt the production rhythm, if after a work shift, you have to detain people for a long time, leave the "volunteers" - to allow sample bias.

In each case, you have to make a decision about the way in which there will be the smallest losses.

It is also necessary to comply with ethical standards.

A social psychologist conducting applied research fulfills the order of leadership.

The identification of a number of characteristics of groups entails certain critical comments to those people whose activities depend on the shortcomings and who are the customers of the study.

The researcher must be careful not to complicate relations in the team with his intervention.

There is a difficulty regarding the language.

The problem is the adaptation of this language in relation to the subject.

Another problem of the language is associated with the use of certain special socio-psychological terms that, due to a number of circumstances, appear to be compromised by their use outside of science (“conformist”, “authoritarian leader”, etc.).

Social psychologist can not ignore the norms of everyday use of terms.

Applied research requires high moral qualities and a sense of social responsibility from a social psychologist.

Industrial production is one of the main customers for applied social and psychological research.

The main problem is the formation of production teams, which made it possible to set the task of building a general model of the psychological service of an industrial enterprise .

The most common for all branches of industrial production, for all enterprises are the psychological climate of the team, job satisfaction, labor turnover, personnel certification, the adaptation of newcomers.

The topic of applied research is the problem of management, which is related to various parts of the social organism, be it a large organization or a health care system, etc.

One of the most important is the question of the necessary psychological qualities of a manager.

Organization development is an independent block of problems.

In the broadest sense of the word, organizational development means creating a special culture for using various technologies to improve the behavior of individuals and groups in an organization.

The system of mass media and propaganda cannot develop without relying on the studies of social psychologists; therefore, the problems of social and psychological research in this area are being developed quite actively.

Objects of applied research: communicator, message, audience, channel, efficiency.

Social psychology is also involved in the research of school problems carried out within the framework of pedagogy and educational psychology.

The whole complex of educational problems: communication, collective functioning, intergroup relations, socialization issues.

Special psychological services are being created.

The main activities of the school psychologist are psychological education, psychological prevention, psychological counseling, psychodiagnostics, psychocorrection.

One of the relatively new areas of application of social psychology is the sphere of scientific activity.

The importance of collective forms of activity increases, and this to a great extent breaks the steady stereotype of scientific creativity as the creativity of individual prominent personalities.

The type of the initial social cell for the production of scientific knowledge changes: if a scientific school used to be such a cell, now it is a research team.

The subject of research work becomes a small group.

Social psychology has traditionally paid great attention to the family, considering it as an example of a natural small social group.

All the features of such a group acquire a certain specificity in the family, but nevertheless, knowledge of the patterns of functioning and development of small groups may determine a certain contribution to the development of optimal forms of relationships in this micro-cell of society and its applications.

The list of problems of politics, in the analysis of which there is a place for social psychology, is obvious: these are the psychological factors of political decision-making, the psychological conditions of their perception; the role of personal characteristics and image of a politician; political socialization and much more.