On Feb 6, 2007, at 4:56 PM, Ken Steele wrote:
Are the clothing and hairstyles so out-of-date that their age guesses
are more random?
Not really... and both "groups" see the exact same clip as well (btw,
the woman is in the scene for only about 5 seconds).
And, yes, it is snowing in Boone, NC, at the moment.
Ken
Steven Specht wrote:
Dear Colleagues,
For over a decade I have been using a neat (and tidy) experimental
exercise in my methods course modeled after the work of the famous
psychologist Elizabeth Loftus. I show a 30 second video clip of a
scene in which there is a female screaming. She is definitely NOT the
focal point of the scene (which is a man being held over the side of
a bridge about to be dropped into the river below as a result of a
drug deal gone bad. BTW, it's the opening scene from the movie "New
Jack City"). Anyway, after I show this video, I distribute a short
questionnaire (4 questions to be exact). The third question asks
"What is your estimate of the age of the /woman/ who was screaming in
the video?" However, for half of the class, the word "Woman" is
replaced by the word "girl". The responses to the question vary, but
there has typically been a statistically different response (p<.01 in
many instances) when the word "woman" is used, compared to when the
word "girl" is used. This short demonstration is very effective in
starting to discuss experimental manipulation (and the importance of
careful word selection) and tends to capture students' attention.
Semester after semester, the results had been predictable (15 or 16
semesters in a row I would get impressively similar and statistically
significant results... on average the woman is estimated to be a bit
over 29 yrs and the girl around 23 yrs). What is curious to me is
that in the last 5 semesters I have done this exercise in class, it
has only "worked" 2 of 5 times (and one of those two the results were
barely significant). So I've asked myself "why has there been a
change in the results of something that had worked MANY, many times
consecutively?" One of the hypotheses I have to entertain--
especially given that the experimental manipulation is so subtle-- is
that students may becoming less concerned about "details" when they
read a sentence. They may be becoming "gist" readers (i.e., get the
gist of the sentence and don't worry about the details). That
interpretation would certainly be consistent with some of the other
academically-related problems I seem to be encountering with some of
my students.
Just thought I'd share these curious observations.
Cheers,
-S
========================================================
/Steven M. Specht, Ph.D./
Associate Professor of Psychology
Utica College
Utica, NY 13502
(315) 792-3171
"Mice may be called large or small, and so may elephants, and it is
quite understandable when someone says it was a large mouse that ran
up the trunk of a small elephant" (S. S. Stevens, 1958)
--
---------------------------------------------------------------
Kenneth M. Steele, Ph.D. [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Department of Psychology http://www.psych.appstate.edu
Appalachian State University
Boone, NC 28608
USA
---------------------------------------------------------------
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========================================================
Steven M. Specht, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of Psychology
Utica College
Utica, NY 13502
(315) 792-3171
"Mice may be called large or small, and so may elephants, and it is
quite understandable when someone says it was a large mouse that ran up
the trunk of a small elephant" (S. S. Stevens, 1958)
---
To make changes to your subscription go to:
http://acsun.frostburg.edu/cgi-bin/lyris.pl?enter=tips&text_mode=0&lang=english
