Naturalistic Observation

I walked into the busy mall on a Sunday morning and sat on a bench in a central area. I had my cell phone in one hand acting as my stopwatch and I held a clipboard in the other. I sat and observed the roughly sixty people who walked by me in the thirty minutes I sat there. Not only did people feel uncomfortable seeing me sitting there, I also felt uncomfortable sitting there watching people. This was definitely out of my comfort zone, but it was a well-needed experience. While observing the many people walking by me, I noticed some mixed reactions. Many people looked at me briefly and looked away, while others stared at me trying to figure out what I was doing. Some people did not even realize I was there, and had no clue I was even …show more content…
It took them about a minute to realize I was taking notes about people, and I am not sure they understood what I was doing with the stopwatch. Even though these few people saw I was taking notes about people, no one stopped and asked me what I was actually doing. I was very nervous about someone coming up to me, and I almost assumed it was going to happen. To be honest, I am glad no one talked to me. What I participated in was naturalistic observation. Naturalistic observation is the study of both children and adults in their natural environments (Eddy, 2008, P. 722). It seeks to answer questions by observing people in the real world (Smith & Davis, 2013, P. 61). This type of observation is very useful at seeing subjects in their natural setting. No parts of the study can be manipulated when it comes to this type of study. The guidelines for naturalistic observation are to determine what you are focusing on in the study, plan out the logistics of the study, and plan the trustworthiness of the study (Smith & Davis, 2013, P. 52). This type of observation can also have some limitations. One of the limitations is that the person observing cannot control the situation, which means they do not why the participants behaved the way they did (Eysenck, 2005, P. 288). Another is that if the participants see the observer observing them they may act differently and not in a natural

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