A framework for approaching policy-oriented educational psychology research

As a community of practice, educational psychologists are unpracticed in considering how educational policies might affect the phenomena they study. One reason is the traditional focus of educational psychology research on cross-contextual individual processes, to the practical exclusion of the political context that frames teaching, learning, motivation, development, and achievement. In this article, I argue that policy-oriented educational psychology research is imperative, not only for the relevance of educational psychology to educational policy and practice, but for generating ecologically valid educational psychology theory. To support policy-oriented educational psychology research, I offer a straightforward framework that incorporates policy and the lived educational context into the classic facets of educational psychology research projects. I end with an illustrative example of implementing the framework in designing a proposal for a small-scale investigation around a district policy concerned with a controversial and impactful educational practice—grading.