Scientific Research in Psychology

Research is to find information and solve problem systematic and logically. In psychology, scientific research method is implemented to approach and reveal knowledge in better understanding of our human mind and behaviour. This research is known as basic research. Applied research is to solve and analysis on psychological problem. Psychology research is needed to identify the problem and find solution to solve problem encounter. These two researches are main category of research have done in psychology field. This scientific research psychology is usually carried out by the person with doctoral of philosophy and master’s degree holder in psychology area such as cognitive neuroscience, cognitive psychology and development psychology. There are 5 steps in doing psychological scientific research which are make a research question, empirical study, data analysis, make a conclusion and refer literature (refer to Figure 1 in Appendix 1).

The first step is make a research question is a fundamental part of a research. In a research, make a research question is useful in research design when use the problem solving and decision making as invented by psychologist (Evan, 2005). Hypothesis and research question are different. Hypothesis is a statement derived from theory and test with empirical evidence while research question is an open ended and the research need to provide detailed description, possible and explanation of a phenomena. (Willig, 2001). In psychology research, research question usually categorize to descriptive, relational and causal (Sammon, n.d.). Research question that related to descriptive question are question like frequency of wash hand in a hour in the research in excessive compulsive problem. For relational question ...

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