The Psychologist as Detective conveys the excitement of research methodology through a lively, conversational style. To make the study of the research process interactive and accessible for readers, pedagogical features and critical thinking activities are integrated throughout the volume. Actual student research appears in each chapter to increase relevance and heighten reader interest.

This text evaluates the science of psychology, research ideas and hypotheses, ethics, nonexperimental methods and the basics of experimentation variables and control, statistics, designing-conducting-analyzing and interpreting experiments, as well as alternative research designs, external validity, critiquing experimental research and writing and assemblling an APA-format research report.