OBSERVATIONAL DESIGN

~UNSTRUCTURED OBSERVATIONS~

→ the researcher simply writes down everything they see (most appropriate for small scale observations including few participants)

+ Strengths

• rich, in-depth data is collected

• observers aren’t ‘fixed’ to only recording certain behaviours

- Limitations

• observer bias (subjective)

• observer may only record behaviours that ‘catch their eye’

~STRUCTURED OBSERVATIONS~

→ when the researcher uses a pre-determined list of expected behaviours (behavioural categories) (most appropriate for when there is too much happening for one observer to record everything)

+ Strengths

• easy to record data

• creates numerical data (makes analysing and comparing behaviour much more straightforward)

- Limitations

• observers are ‘fixed’ to only recording behaviour from the pre-determined behavioural categories

~SAMPLING METHODS~

EVENT SAMPLING → count the number of times a particular behaviour occurs in a target individual or group (used when behaviour does not occur regularly)

TIME SAMPLING → recording behaviour within a pre-established time-frame, which reduces the number of observations that have been made (used when behaviour occurs regularly)