PPT clase Nº 2 2020

Good afternoon, and welcome to this second theoretical class of introduction to psychological research. Today we will be working on the topics corresponding to Unit 2 of the program, which deals with what are called research problems. As we said in the last class, all scientific research begins with the posing or formulation of a research problem. It is

not possible, as the position called naive inductiveism, which you must have studied in general epistemology, supposed, that research can begin with the simple observation of facts. All research, regardless of its level of depth or complexity, begins with the posing of some kind of problem. It is therefore appropriate that we first try to define in

general terms what a problem is, and then distinguish between types of problems and arrive at those that interest us. A problem can be defined in very general terms as follows: a kind of difficulty that cannot be solved automatically, that is, solely on the basis of the knowledge or skills we already possess. In

other words, we cannot face this difficulty with the propositional knowledge or skills we already have; rather, to solve the problem, we need to acquire a New knowledge or new skills imply that problem-solving essentially involves creative or innovative activity. Consequently, and given that a fundamental component or part of scientific activity consists of problem-solving, scientific research

constitutes a creative or innovative activity par excellence. We can distinguish different kinds of problems according to the classification criterion that is most useful to us. That is to say, there will be different kinds of problems depending on the criterion we use to classify them in the context of the subject. We will be interested in distinguishing two kinds