Читать книгу Methods in Psychological Research - Annabel Ness Evans - Страница 27

Once a science has described, explained, and made predictions about its subject matter, control of the phenomena can be attempted. Applied psychology has a mandate to take the principles of behavior demonstrated by researchers and use them to help with problems people have. For example, a useful control application based on Epling and Pierce’s work might be to treat people with anorexia by reducing the amount of exercise they are getting, rather than trying to change their eating habits.

We have seen that scientists are critical thinkers, their beliefs are founded on empirical evidence, and their goals in doing their science are to describe, explain, predict, and control the subject matter of the discipline. Science, therefore, is a way of thinking and a way of doing things. Scientists view the world differently than many nonscientists do. The process of scientific inquiry involves certain assumed principles or tenets about how the world works.