PSY 450: Research Methods in Psychology
LAB 2: APA Style Reports
Does watching crowding on television lead to more personal space preference among college students?
Theories: Personal space is subjective but based on experience and expectations.
We learn from watching others – creating expectations for ourselves.
Hypothesis: Watching a threat to personal space in others will make students show increased preference
for their own personal space.
· Sample includes 202 college students (87 Male & 115 Female) in introductory psychology. Divide the class using random assignment. Half view a documentary film of other students living in crowded conditions and the negative personal effects (personal conflicts, poor health, memory problems, sleeping difficulties) it has on them. The other half view a film on cognitive therapy.
· Then immediately afterwards give them a survey of demographic questions (age, gender, year in college, GPA – all open ended responses) and the Personal Space Preference Questionnaire (PSPQ) (Johnson, 1978).
o PSPQ gives a general size preference for space across situations.
o Projective method
o Image of person at center of page
o Draw how far you would like the boundary around your body to be if others could see it
o Represents the boundary you don’t want others to cross “in general”
o Measure general space preference as average distance (in mm) from image to boundaries
· Given 0.5 % extra credit
· Done during class time – all on the same day to control for diffusion of treatment
· Half stay in their classroom, the other half goes next door to a similar room.
· Film is 20 minutes long.
· Participation was voluntary (i.e. not mandatory)
· Completed anonymously
Predictions:
1) Personal Space Preference will be increase after seeing others experience difficulties as a result of decreased personal space.
Findings:
Average age of subjects = 23.35 (SD = 7.45), range 18 - 32
Average for males = 24.11 (SD = 4.42)
Average for females = 22.34 (SD = 6.33)
Average size of personal space preference of Control Group (therapy film): 24.22 inches (SD = 8.43)
Average size of personal space preference of Treatment Group (personal space film): 32.16 inches (SD = 7.08)
Independent sample t Test
· Compare space preference as DV, with film as IV (2 groups)
· t(195) = 4.55, p=.003
· hypothesis confirmed
Lab #2 Assignment:
Your task is to create a portion of an APA style report for the information provided. It must include the following sections (we’ll skip the introduction at this point because we focused on it in lab #1):
Title Page
Method
· Use the information on this handout and place it in the relevant sections about the process of this
study
Participants
Materials or Apparatus
Procedure
Results
· Use the information on this handout to write about the outcomes – include calculation of descriptive statistics, the statistical analyses used, and the actual outcomes. Use the many examples you now have to guide how this looks.
Discussion
· Include some evaluation and explanation of what the findings mean (i.e. don’t just repeat the outcomes from the results in different words – explain the outcomes. Are predictions verified or not? What do the outcomes really mean? What do they tell us related to theory, previous research, and implications)
· EXPLAIN alternate explanations and limitations – link to previous research?
· Future research?
References
Johnson, J. (1978). The Personal Space Preference Questionnaire: Measuring projective psychological space.
Journal of Space and Distance, 34, 19-44.
ALSO NOTE: ALL INFORMATION ON THIS SHEET IS MADE UP – EVEN THE JOHNSON (1978) REFERENCE - FOR DEMONSTRATION PURPOSES IN THIS CLASS AND SHOULD NOT BE TAKEN AS EVIDENCE FOR ANY RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN THESE VARIABLES – DO NOT CITE THIS LAB OR THESE OUTCOMES IN ANY PAPERS IN ANY OTHER CLASSES!
This is DUE March 18th at the beginning of class