“To what extent are dogs beneficial to people experiencing mental health issues? ” Summary of research question and the research outcomes My research question centres around how dogs effect us and how that can be beneficial. My question was decided through discussions as to how dogs can affect people in a positive manner and after further research on the topic through reading organisation pages, I decided on my question.
I explored organisations that involved dog therapy/assistance, sent a survey to ask the public on the topic, sent e-mails and read through books on mental health to grasp a better understanding of the factors involved. I presented all my key findings in a written essay format. I discovered that dogs have the ability to effect owners medically such as helping the body release endorphins. Also it was found that there are trained dogs that can assist people in multiple ways mentally.
Additionally, how every person experiences an event differently such as a mental illness, surfaced and this influenced my response. (Word count: 148) Evaluation of Research Processes 01: Library Research This research process was moderately valid as the information was fairly current on the types of mental health issues and treatments, however the data and treatments might have changed since the date of publication of each source found 1 OF 5 (2010 and 2006) as further research may have been carried out since publication.
The information within the sources found through this process contained relevant materials that supported many of my key findings within my research Although only two sources were obtained through this process, the information that they contained proved to be be very useful in gaining a better understanding of the subtopic of mental health and bringing to mind what dogs will need to aid to be beneficial. The sources found through this research process are apart of the Issues in Society books published by Spinney Press and both books which are by J.
Healey are used throughout Australian schools, TAFE colleges, universities and public libraries which indicated it is deemed educational and provides reliable and useful information on mental health issues that is agreed on by other professionals. This research process aided in primary sources and directed me to use other research process to further investigate. 02: Surveys The use of this research process allowed primary research to be collected.
This process is reliable as I sent out a survey to a range of people, which I chose by sending out to people I knew and asking to forward it around and also by going around and asking people myself if they would like to do my survey to get a mix of ages and gender so as to get a variety of responses from different kinds of people. However only a small sample of the people I sent my survey to completed the survey and 03: Online Sites The information found through this research process was valid as it offered highly relevant and up to date sources.
I relied a fair amount on this research process as majority of key findings where obtained through this process and this meant I relied more on secondary research and not balancing out both primary and secondary. Each source found through this process was evaluated and had referenced professionals in the field within to verify the validity of the information that it contained. This process also provided accurate data and statistics as they could be updated and altered if the data if proved outdated or incorrect. However, some information could be opinionated and not based off research that was carried out unbiased.
The majority of the sources where reliable as none of the sources contradicted any previously found findings and only further backed up other resources such as when Psychiatric Services stated that’s dogs are able to relax a person and is further backed-up by Dogtime. Additionally, sources discovered through this type of research process are reliable as the authors or sites such as Assistant Dogs Australia, that are qualified in the areas are only used to provide resources for people who may be in need for the use of treatments such as pet therapy.
On the contrary some sources for example Los Angeles Times, where from unqualified authors in the psychology field, but are published by journalist like K. Ravn, who would have researched prior to publishing the articles. Evaluation of decisions made in response challenges and opportunities A challenge that appeared from my research was that not every mental health issues was likely to be positively affected by dogs and that only a select few perhaps would benefit from the company of a dog, which indicated my research question could be too broad and that information gathered would not provide a clear answer to my research question.
I was able to overcome this challenge by furthering my research by reading online journals that contained studies on the topic and discovering specific groups of people who would potentially benefit from a canine. This provided the opportunity to further research more on how dogs can help specific mental health issues such as depression and anxiety. I discovered that there were types of treatments specific such as pet therapy, for people with mental health issues that involved dogs and this helped me develop my answer for my research question.
Also this provided me with the opportunity to gather more detail and this lead me to take into account other factors that might prevent dogs being beneficial besides the factor of the dogs themselves. Therefore, I took the opportunity to further research more on how dogs can help specific mental health issues such as depression and anxiety. I discovered that there were types of treatments specific for people with those issues that involved dogs and this helped me develop my answer for my research question.
Another challenge I was faced was of not having a sufficient amount of data for my survey and this effected my reliability and relevance of this resource. This may have been avoided if I had collected a larger sample which could have offered me with the opportunity to send out another survey and use the data collected as a primary source in my outcome. I also was I was unable to find any professional who was experienced/educated in the field only a mental health nurse which prevented me from obtaining first hand experience on my topic which challenged my range of sources.
This prevented extra reliability and validity of certain information as I had no primary research to back up my key findings. Evaluation of the quality of my research outcome My research outcome was supported primarily by secondary research rather than a mixture of secondary and primary as| was unable to find relevant primary sources that I could use within my outcome. This weakness did not influence the reliability and quality of my outcome as instead of using first hand experience I focused on finding information from rganisations and online journals, to which this rather only affected the validity and accuracy of the key findings in some circumstances. This did not significantly influence my concluding answer for my question, as although primary research was not a major source of information, multiple secondary sources were used and in most cases they backed up each other and were updated or provided by organisations that contained dependable and valid sources, which strengthened the reliability within my research.
As I was unable to obtain an outlook from primary sources on the topic it was difficult to know if research done in more recent times has provided evidence that the concept that dogs are possibly beneficial to those who suffer a mental health issues however, majority of the resources contain information that would not change over time rather only be proven incorrect e. g. scientific discoveries.
Furthermore, the information provided is relatively new or recently updated and this further backs up the accuracy of my answer towards the question. It is possible that my outcome will it be useful to the general public as it provides information on mental health issues and the benefits of owning a dog and how dogs are used to aid people with mental health issues. Additionally, this information could trigger people to further research this concept and provide useful information for psychologist.