Tag Archives: research methods

Partners in Research

In my town there is a company called “Partners in Research”. “Partners in Research”, (PIR), is a business that conducts testing on consumer products. In order for companies to know how well their product is received, they have to conduct a multitude of tests with the general population. PIR obtains people to test all the different products by calling and surveying potential participants and asking various questions. If you have been accepted, you go to the building and are directed to a specific room along with other people who are involved in the test, usually taste test, in order to give reviews on the product.

The way Partners in Research conducts their business reminded me of the descriptions of the different research methods we learned in class. We learned in class many different kinds of ways to perform research including naturalistic observation, laboratory observation, case studies, and surveys. The situation that I have described would be classified as a laboratory observation. This is because all the participants had to go to a building and then to a specific room in order to complete the experiment. There are advantages and disadvantages associated with performing laboratory observations. One advantage is that there is more control for the people conducting the experiment. They would have more control because by assembling everyone in a room, they can make sure that everyone is concentrating and putting effort into what they are supposed to be doing. If this experiment was done at someone’s house the results would be a lot less reliable due to the fact that most people would not spend as much time on documenting their opinions on the products and most likely would not focus as much. Therefore, by completing the observation in a lab setting, the people in charge could control for every variable they wanted such as how long they wanted everyone to chew the gum for or how many chips they wanted everyone to eat before completing the review. Another advantage that could be utilized in the laboratory observation is that they have more specialized equipment and more things available for them to use rather that in a naturalistic observation. There were more trained people that were able to make sure that everyone was following proper protocol and to make sure that everyone was completely filling out the review sheet. However, a disadvantage to conducting a laboratory observation would be that the results gained are not always similar to the results that would be produced from a real life study. This is the case because some people who are in the study often feel like they do not want to be exceptionally harsh or exceptionally  forgiving to a product. They may be less likely to express their real feeling toward a product due to the fact that when researchers read your comments they may connect your answer to you. Also, people may skew their answers to what they think that the researchers would want to hear. However, this negatively impacts the researchers by not giving them a realistic view of how their product is perceived. Many people would not be willing to express honestly how they feel about a product just because it is not a natural environment and they may feel rushed, stressed, or nervous. Therefore, there are advantages and disadvantages to using laboratory observations. The type of research that is used is determined by what it is that is being tested.