Values Versus Facts in Scientific Research

Values Versus Facts in Scientific Research

Although scientifi c research is an important method of studying human behavior, not all questions can be answered using scientifi c approaches. Statements that cannot be objectively measured or objectively determined to be true or false are not within the domain of scientifi c inquiry. Scientists, therefore, draw a distinction between values and facts. Values are personal statements such as “Abortion should not be permitted in this country,” “I will go to heaven when I die,” or “It is important to study behavioral research.” Facts are objective statements determined to be accurate through empirical study. Examples are “There were over 16,000 homicides in the United States in 2002,” or “Behavioral research demonstrates that individuals who are exposed to highly stressful situations over long periods of time are particularly likely to develop health problems such as heart disease and cancer.”

Facts and the Formation of Values. Because values cannot be considered to be either true or false, science cannot prove or disprove them. Nevertheless, as shown in Table 1.1, behavioral research can sometimes provide facts that can help people develop their values. For instance, science may be able to objectively measure the impact of unwanted children on a society or the psychological trauma suffered by women who have abortions. The effect of capital punishment on the crime rate in the United States may also be determinable. This factual information can and should be made available to help people formulate their values about abortion and capital punishment, as well as to enable governments to articulate appropriate policies. Values also frequently come into play in determining what research is appropriate or important to conduct. For instance, the U.S. government has recently supported and provided funding for research on HIV and AIDS while at the same time limiting the possibility of conducting research using human stem cells.

Distinguishing Between Facts and Values. Although scientists use research to help distinguish facts from values, the distinction between the two is not always as clear-cut as they might like. Sometimes statements that scientists consider to be factual later turn out to be partially or even entirely incorrect. This happens because there is usually more than one way to interpret data. As a result, scientists frequently disagree with each other about the meaning of observed data. One well-known example concerns the interpretation of race-related differences in IQ. Data show that, on average, African-American students score more poorly on standardized exams than do white students (Herrnstein & Murray, 1994). Some scientists argue that these data indicate inherent genetic differences in intelligence among racial groups, whereas others contend that these differences are caused by social effects, such as differences in nutrition, interests, and schooling. Still others maintain that the data demonstrate not that intelligence is unequal between races but that the tests themselves are culturally biased to favor some groups over others. In most cases such as this, the initial disagreement over the interpretation of data leads to further data collection designed to resolve the disagreements. 

          Although data must also be interpreted in the natural sciences, such as chemistry and physics, interpreting data is even more diffi cult in the behavioral sciences. Because people have their own hypotheses and beliefs about human behavior, they can easily make their own interpretations of the results of behavioral research, such as the meaning of differences on IQ tests between white and African-American students. Furthermore, the measures used by behavioral scientists, such as asking people questions and observing their behaviors, often appear less sophisticated than those used in other sciences. As a result, to many people behavioral science research does not appear to be as “scientific” as research in the natural sciences. 

           Even though behavioral research has not advanced as far as research in the natural sciences, behavioral scientists follow the same procedures as do scientists in other fi elds. These procedures involve creating a systematic set of knowledge about the characteristics of individuals and groups and the relationships among them. In this sense, behavioral science research is just as scientifi c as that in any other fi eld. Furthermore, just because data must be interpreted does not mean that behavioral research is not useful. Although scientifi c procedures do not necessarily guarantee that the answers to questions will be objective and unbiased, science is still the best method currently known for drawing objective conclusions about the world around us. When old facts are discarded, they are replaced with new facts, based on newer and more correct data. Although science is not perfect, the requirements of empiricism, objectivity, and accumulation still result in a much greater chance of producing an accurate understanding of human behavior than is available through other approaches.

Values and Facts in the Research Report. Although the goal of the scientific method is to be objective, this does not mean that values do not come into play in science. Scientists must make decisions about what to study, how to study it, whom to use as research participants, and how to interpret their data. Thus, the goal of science is not to make everything objective, but rather to make clear which parts of the research process are objective and which parts are not.

      Scientific findings are made publicly available through the publication of research reports. The research report is a document that presents scientific fi ndings using a standardized written format. Different research report formats are used in different fi elds of science, but behavioral science frequently uses the format prepared by the American Psychological Association (APA). An overview of this approach is presented on the inside cover of this book, and a complete description of APA format can be found in Appendix A. If you

are not familiar with it, you may wish to read Appendix A now. 

       One of the most important requirements of the research report is that the appropriate information goes in the appropriate section. In this regard, two of the sections—Introduction and Discussion—are relatively subjective, because they involve such questions as what topics are of importance to study and how the data should be interpreted. However, two other sections—Results and Discussion—are completely objective, describing the actual procedures of the experiments and the statistical analyses. Again, the point is that science has both objective and subjective components, and it attempts to clearly differentiate the two. One of the major things you will learn in this book is how to draw the important distinction between the values and facts (that is, between the subjective and the objective aspects) in behavioral research.