Observation – one of the most available methods from among those that are applied in psychological researches. It consists in systematic, organized and purposeful perception of features of behavior of the individual or group. These observations become a basis for valid conclusions which confirm or disprove the hypothesis made at the beginning of the research.
Observation is considered one of the very first methods of a research which found application in psychology. In this case the psychological phenomena are studied in those conditions in which they proceed in reality. Observation usually does not demand the expensive equipment and long preliminary preparation. The notebook and the pen quite will be suitable for fixing of results of such research. Special blank forms of fixing of data can be necessary for bigger standardization of the procedure.
Scope of observation is rather wide. This method of research activity is irreplaceable in social, pedagogical and clinical psychology. It is expedient to use observation when it is undesirable to interfere with the course of the proceeding processes or with a concrete type of activity. In it the main difference of observation from experimental and measuring procedures.
Without interfering directly with the course of the studied process, the specialist psychologist has an opportunity to keep complete interaction of an object of a research with Wednesday. Observation of behavior allows to make complete idea of features of the personality and reactions of the person, to receive the generalized picture of what happens to a research object.
It is possible to refer existence of a direct connection between the observer to features of the described method and an object, the emotional involvement of the observer into a situation and complexity of repetition of the procedure. Use of a video and audio recording can be one of ways to remove shortcomings of a method that gives material for the subsequent analysis of a situation. The subject observation has various features of behavior. At the same time verbal and nonverbal characteristics, the substantial party of the speech, its intensity and duration, signs of an expression of the person and other expressive movements become a direct object of such research. Very often at observation it is necessary to reflect behavior of people in dynamics, for example, of movement, actions with objects and so on. Observation in psychology differs from the same procedure in natural sciences in the fact that a research object usually understands that watch it. The fact of presence of the researcher can quite influence behavior of the person or group that it is capable to distort the end result. Such feature raises requirements to the researcher and limits a little a circle of tasks which this scientific method is capable to solve.