In: Physics
Discuss examples of when a naturalistic observational study would be the most appropriate design to select.
Naturalistic observation is a research method commonly used by psychologists and other social scientists. This technique involves observing subjects in their natural environment. This type of research is often utilized in situations where conducting lab research is unrealistic, cost prohibitive, or would unduly affect the subject's behavior.
Naturalistic observation differs from structured observation in that it involves looking at a behavior as it occurs in its natural setting with no attempts at intervention on the part of the researcher
Advantages and Disadvantages of Naturalistic Observation
One of the biggest advantages of this type of research is that it allows the researcher to directly observe the subject in a natural setting.
Some other advantages of naturalistic observation:
One of the disadvantages of naturalistic observation include the fact that it can be difficult to determine the exact cause of a behavior and the experimenter cannot control for outside variables.
Some other disadvantages of naturalistic observation:
Data Collection Methods Used in Naturalistic Observation
Researchers may utilize a number of different techniques to collect data from naturalistic observation. This might involve writing down the number of times a certain behavior occurred in a specific period of time, or making an actual video-recording of the subjects of interest.
How Often Is Data Collected?
Because it is rarely practical or even possible to observe every moment of a subject's life, researchers often use sampling to gather information through naturalistic observation. The goal is to make sure that this sample of data is representative of the subject's overall behavior.
Obtaining a representative sample can occur in a few different ways:
Examples of Naturalistic Observation
Let's imagine that you want to study differences in risk taking behavior between teenage boys and girls. You might choose to observe behavior in a few different settings, such as on a sledding hill, a rock-climbing wall, an ice-skating rink and a bumper car ride. After you operationally define "risk-taking behavior," you would then observe teens in these settings and record every incidence of what you define as a risky behavior.
Some famous examples of naturalistic observations include Charles Darwin's journey aboard the HMS Beagle, which served as the basis for his theory of natural selection, and Jane Goodall's work studying the behavior of chimpanzees.