Observations

An observation enables researchers to find things out about people in their natural environment. As it sounds, an observation means that researchers will watch people’s behaviour, in order to find something out, such as how aggressive children are in playgrounds or how much non-verbal communication takes places between two people in a shop.

Several types of observation can take place:

• Overt: in this kind of observation, people know that they are being observed – researchers are ‘open’ about this detail and people will also know what the aims of the research are
• Covert: here, researchers are ‘undercover’ so people are not aware that they are being observed. The researcher may be seen by people but they will not know that he or she is involved in any form of research
• Participant: in this kind of observation, the researcher joins in with the group of people who are being studied but they may not always reveal who they are and definitely not so if the observation is covert
• Non-participant: this type of observation is when the researcher does not join in and observes from a distance without interfering

Observations can be combined and so there are four possible types:

• Overt non-participant
• Covert non-participant
• Overt participant
• Covert participant

Strengths of observations

• Overt observations are ethical – those involved will have given consent to be observed
• Covert observations are likely to bring about more natural behaviours as people do not know that they are being observed
• When the researcher takes part in the observation (participant) then they get an insight into the situation that they are studying, such as being at a football match

Weaknesses of observations

• Covert observations bring about some ethical issues, as people do not know they are being observed, they cannot give consent for it
• In an overt observation, people may behave differently because they know that they are being watched
• When covert observations are taking place, it is hard for researchers to write things down without ‘giving the game away’
• In a participant observation, the researcher can affect the group dynamics by joining in and so behaviour, again, may not be natural
• Observations are subject to researcher bias as what is observed may be recorded in a way that reflects their own opinions about something. To avoid this, researchers can ask others to observe with them – this is referred to as inter-rater reliability.