Sequential Analysis and Observational Methods for the Behavioral Sciences

Behavioral scientists - including those in psychology, infant and child development, education, animal behavior, marketing, and usability studies - use many methods to measure behavior. Systematic observation is used to study relatively natural, spontaneous behavior as it unfolds sequentially in time. This book emphasizes digital means to record and code such behavior; while observational methods do not require them, they work better with them. Key topics include devising coding schemes, training observers, and assessing reliability, as well as recording, representing, and analyzing observational data. In clear and straightforward language, this book provides a thorough grounding in observational methods along with considerable practical advice. It describes standard conventions for sequential data and details how to perform sequential analysis with a computer program developed by the authors. The book is rich with examples of coding schemes and different approaches to sequential analysis, including both statistical and graphical means.

Roger Bakeman is professor emeritus in the Psychology Department at Georgia State University. He is a fellow of the American Psychology Association and the Association for Psychological Science, and has served as program co-chair for biennial meetings of the Society for Research in Child Development (SRCD) and the International Conference of Infant Studies (ICIS). Vicen Quera is a professor in the Department of Behavioral Science Methods, Faculty of Psychology, at the University of Barcelona; director of the Master and D$$$torate Programme in Primatology; a member of the Institute for Brain, Cognition and Behavior; and leads the Adaptive Behavior and Interaction Research Group at the University of Barcelona.