Anderson et al (1998) conducted a study to explore the \"weapons effect\" (i.e.,
ID: 3336609 • Letter: A
Question
Anderson et al (1998) conducted a study to explore the "weapons effect" (i.e., the finding that people tend to behave more aggressively in the presence of weapons). They take this a bit further by hypothesizing that people are quicker, on average, to say aggressive words after reading weapons names, than after seeing other non-weapon words. 35 undergraduates (19 men and 16 women) at the University of Missouri-Columbia volunteered to participate in this study. Participants were told by the researcher that the study was being conducted to test reading ability for various types of words. The task involved reading a word on a computer screen (the authors called this word the “prime” and it was either a weapon name like “shotgun” or a non-weapon word like “butterfly”), then saying a “target” word (either an aggressive word like “assault” or a nonaggressive word like “joke”) out loud when prompted. Each subject repeated this task 192 times so that all the possible “target” words (i.e., 24 aggressive ones and 72 non-aggressive ones) could be repeated for a weapon and a non-weapon “prime” word. The order in which the target words were presented was randomly determined for each study participant. The times it took for the participants to say the “target” words verbally after they were shown were recorded so the mean times could be compared across the different combinations of “prime” and “target” words. More information on this study is available on pp 309-210 of the paper (although you do not need to read the paper to answer the assignment questions): Anderson, C.A., Benjamin, A.J., & Bartholow, B.D. (1998). Does the gun pull the trigger? Automatic priming effects of weapon pictures and weapon names. Psychological Science, 9, 308-314. Available at http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1111/1467-9280.00061
d. What is “showing a non-weapon ‘prime’ word on the computer screen” in the context of this study? Select all that apply.
Response variable Explanatory variable Factor Level Treatment Experimental unit Block
e. What is an “undergraduate student participant” in the context of this study? Select all that apply.
Response variable Explanatory variable Factor Level Treatment Experimental unit Block
f. What is “the type of ‘target’ word (i.e., aggressive or nonaggressive) on the computer screen” in the context of this study? Select all that apply. Response variable Explanatory variable Factor Level Treatment Experimental unit Block
Explanation / Answer
This is a two-way factorial design test.
The treatment is comprised of two explanatory variables or factors (Independent variables which are controlled by the researcher):
Thus, f) is Level- since the type of target word is one of the two possible values of the factor target word
Showing these sequences of words is the "treatment" which is given to the "experimental unit" or the university student. Then, the response variable or "time taken" is recorded across different combinations of levels of explanatory variables (words).
Thus, Answer to d) is treatment - since it refers to the controllable action of showing words. Also, e) is Experimental unit since student is the entity facing different treatments
In order to prevent other variables from distorting our study, we have "blocks" of boys and girls to avoid gender bias . We also have "blocks" of 72 different target words which are shown for both weapon and non-weapon word