ABSTRACT
What is the purpose of research? The purpose of psychological research is to increase our knowledge of humans. Research is generally seen as having one of four aims, which can also be seen as stages: the first is to describe, the second is to understand, leading to the third, which is to predict, and then finally to control. In the case of research in psychology the final stage is better seen as trying to intervene to improve human life. As an example, take the case of non-verbal communication (NVC). Firstly, psychologists might describe the various forms of NVC, such as eye contact, body posture and gesture. Next they will try to understand the functions of the different forms and then predict what will happen when people display abnormal forms of NVC, such as making too little eye contact or standing too close to others. Finally they might devise a means of training such people in ways of improving their NVC. This last stage will also include some evaluation of the success of the training.
