3. The Psychology of Celebrity o It makes refutable predictions about human behaviour that can be investigated and falsified o It explains human behaviour in a parsimonious way (providing the greatest possible explanation in the simplest way) o It is objective and systematic in the way that research is carried out, meaning experiments can be repeated
Research methodology
Does the approach use scientific methodology? (see above) Does it collect qualitative or quantitative data? Qualitative data is in depth rich data but is open to interpretation. Quantitative data gathers data in a numerical form and can be used to generalise, but it can lack validity. Are animals used in studies? Can we generalise from animals to humans? Is the sample of participants used in the research representative of all humans? Is there a gender/culture/historical bias? Does the research methodology reflect real life (ecological validity)?
Practical/ therapeutic applications
Has the approach led to practical real world applications? How beneficial have these applications been? Has the approach been applied in a therapy? If so, what does research suggest about the effectiveness of this therapy? Are there any drawbacks to this therapy?
Benefit to psychology/society
How has the approach benefited psychology? Did the approach change the way we think about human behaviour? What is the current status of the approach? Is it still respected, or has it been overturned by another approach? Does the approach have historical significance?
Anything else
Does the approach explain individual differences between people? Does the approach focus on the “here and now” or is it too focused on past events in a person’s life? (retrospective) Does the theory fully reflect the complexity of human behaviour? Does the approach “fill the gaps” of another approach? Anything else!
AAFoster
Page 13