Research is intended to be relevant and make an impact on the lives of people.
Critical psychologists have therefore looked at issues such as disability, mental health, adult and child development, ethnicity, gender, pedagogy, sexuality, health issues, social class, power and spirituality. Critical psychology researchers recognise the interaction, dynamism and subjectivity in these areas for study and therefore largely reject positivistic paradigms which assume that the world is predictable and objective. Instead they use a range of qualitative approaches which seek to discover meanings, processes, relationships and the reciprocal effects between individuals and larger social processes. Critical psychology research acknowledges the complexity of the context in which behaviour takes place and the importance of many factors including the inter and intra personal. Methods include interviews, focus groups, narrative accounts, textual analysis, observations and video diaries .