Wageningen, 20 December 1996 - Noldus Information Technology today announced the completion of the Video Course in Behavioural Observation, an interactive training course for students in psychology or biology.

The Video Course in Behavioural Observation, with class exercises and explanatory material, is a unique educational product, designed to teach students the fundamentals of behavioral observation. The primary aim of the 4-volume video course is to stimulate students to think about the purposes and the methodology of behavioral observation, to try it out for themselves, and to appreciate, critically, the usefulness of explicit categorization. The series is intended for class or individual use with students of psychology and biology at an undergraduate or graduate level. Excerpts from The Observer software for keyboard recording and analysis of the behavior on the films allow students to familiarize with direct recording of behavior into the computer, and the usefulness of the immediate availability of data for analysis. Each volume is designed to be used as a self-contained practical for students to use singly or in groups, without an instructor. The course is meant to be used as a series, but each volume can stand by itself.

The video course has been written and narrated by award-winning lecturer Dr. David Dickins (Department of Psychology, University of Liverpool). Co-author of the course (Volumes 1 and 2) is Dr. Roger Clark (Department of Psychology, Liverpool Hope University College). The series features three different species: kittiwake gulls (Volumes 1 and 2), chimpanzees in a zoo (Volume 3), and children in a university playgroup (Volume 4).

Volume 1 starts in the context of a university field trip, enabling viewers to empathize with the students' initial difficulties in making systematic observations. The approach of ethology is outlined, and then the kittiwake gull is introduced as an example species. The commentary explains the special behavioral adaptations of this small member of the gull family to its extreme cliff-nesting habitat.

Volume 2 centers on behavioral categories. Examples of students' field projects on Lundy Island show how categories are developed in relation to different research questions. Paper-and-pencil and keyboard recording are compared, as well as pairs of records to determine inter-observer agreement.

Volume 3 gives an idea of the richness of the social life of chimpanzees in a well-maintained captive colony. This stimulates questions about the problems of anthropomorphism when trying objectively to describe the behavior of anthropoid apes. Volume 3 introduces the necessity of sampling behavior representatively when conducting a scientific study and displays and compares some of the different methods of sampling.

Volume 4 introduces the ethological approach to the study of our own species, using the example of children is a university playgroup. A simple list of categories is presented which was collapsed from a larger list used in a classic study in a similar setting. It shows how behavioral observation can be used in conjunction with other investigatory techniques such as behavioral analysis, interviewing and doll play, to understand complex interpersonal and cultural situations such as parent/child relations. The course introduces further analyses of observational data supported by The Observer software: elementary statistics and lag sequential analysis.  

For more information, please contact the product manager of education tools.