Opinion
Aren’t We All ‘Natural Psychologists’?
Science shops and citizen science approaches may enrich the academic study of psychology.
Most of us are intuitively interested in psychology, or at least some of its applications — this could include a fascination for how we relate to, and communicate with others, how we foster our mental health, or how we stay motivated in the workplace. To some extent, we are all ‘hobby psychologists’, ready to interpret and discuss why we behave and think the way we do.
Taking this idea a step further, Humphrey argued that humans evolved to be “natural psychologists” or “Homo psychologicus”: a species defined by constantly hypothesising about the intentions of others. This is somewhat reminiscent of the widespread notion that children are born natural scientists.
And whilst children do not run our laboratories, and most of us do not conduct psychological research, the academic discipline of psychology might benefit from consulting the curious and interested public.
Involving the Public with Research
Traditionally, science engagement involved an expert communicating (new) findings to a lay audience. Today, terms, such as expert and lay person, are contested — and rightly so. This becomes apparent when considering that a lay person might hold expertise on a topic, which an expert wishes to research. For instance, a psychologist specializing in memory might be an expert on the neural and psychological processes involved in encoding, maintaining, and retrieving a piece of information. However, to investigate the experience of amnesia (memory deficits following brain damage or disease), it is crucial to consider a patient’s expert opinion on the matter.
Indeed, researchers in most disciplines will have to engage in a dialogue with the public, if aiming to conduct research relevant to society’s needs.
To this end, Dutch universities developed so-called science shops. Starting in the 1970s, members of the public could visit science shops and suggest a research topic, which appeared worthwhile to them. Often, the researchers running these shops were bachelor or master students. Thus, driven lay people and the next generation of researchers supported each other in their common goal: exciting new research centered around the public’s needs and interests. Science shops still exist today, and they have spread throughout the world. If you’d like to get involved yourself, The International Science Shop Network is a great place to start. However, to date, science shops tend to operate outside the realms of psychological research.
Yet, establishing science shops within psychology departments is likely to lead to interesting findings. For example, some of the most important findings in social psychology seem predictable and obvious to lay people, highlighting that psychological science (at least in some areas) would benefit from investigating lay people’s hypotheses.
Citizen Science
The science shop model is complemented by another approach to involve the public in research — citizen science. Citizen scientists typically volunteer their time to collect or analyze data, for example by monitoring wildlife (e.g., observing how many birds nest in a given area). Information on current citizen science events, and further resources, can be found at the Citizen Science Association. Additionally, Zooniverse offers a great overview of citizen science projects across disciplines. Readers interested in getting involved with European projects might start at eu-citizen.science.
Traditionally, citizen science has been carried out in the fields of biology and geography. Therefore, it is not surprising that the American Psychological Association defines Citizen Psychologists as a psychologists contributing to society in particularly meaningful ways.
However, it might be worth rethinking this definition to include members of the general public, who contribute to psychological research in meaningful ways. Many psychology departments already have access to a pool of volunteers who take part in research projects. Thus, citizen science projects allowing for a greater hands-on involvement of volunteers in data collection and analysis would be a natural progression in the public’s contribution to psychological research.
Indeed, it seems that change might be on its way as some psychology departments have started to conduct citizen science projects and outreach events.
Nonetheless, whilst taking a citizen science approach might advance psychology, researchers, such as Funke, have argued that the discipline must also “protect its scientific principles”.
So, what do we as psychological scientists and researchers — or experts if you will — bring to the equation?
Research Methods and Statistics
At this point, it should be clear that many of us — irrespective of a formal education in psychology — form hypotheses about the intentions, thoughts, and actions of others, that are worthwhile investigating.
And yet, a central shortcoming remains. To generate knowledge, we need to be able to test our hypotheses. This is crucial to establish whether they are refuted or not.
Whilst some research is conducted hypothesis-free, most psychological studies are hypothesis-driven, meaning they are conducted in response to a research question and a hypothesis (or prediction) of what the researcher expects to find.
Designing a study fit to test a hypothesis, taking into account potentially interfering factors (e.g., participants’ age, or education), as well as analyzing the collected data, relies on learned skills. Psychological scientists are trained in research methods and statistics, allowing them to develop testable hypotheses, and to analyze the results of an experiment.
To come up with an idea for a study, researchers also need to be able to identify gaps both in the literature on a topic as well as in their own knowledge. Just as the above-mentioned research tools, such critical thinking is a learned skill.
Hence, by combining the public’s lived expertise with the expert’s research methods, statistics, and critical thinking, we might begin to ask (and find answers to) even more interesting research questions.
