Question 424 Points Removed: A Researcher Believes That Part

Question 424 Pointsremoved64 A Researcher Believes That Part Of C

Question points) [removed] 64. A researcher believes that part of college students' success in school is attributed to their personality type. Her research hypothesis is that college students with Type B personalities will endure frustration in an academic assessment better than students with Type A personalities. She obtained a convenience sample of 40 volunteer college students and classified each person as having either Type A or Type B personality. Next, she sent the volunteers individually to a lab where they were frustrated by a confederate experimenter who asked them to solve 10 anagrams that were unsolvable. Then the confederate experimenter gave the volunteers a new set of 10 anagrams that did have valid solutions and timed how long it took each of them to solve these anagrams (in minutes). The following data was obtained: GROUP n M SD Type A Personality 20 12.96 3.943 Type B Personality 20 9.34 4.318 t = 1.63 df = 38 p = 0.273 Cohen’s d = .23

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The research design employed in the study is a between-subjects comparative design, specifically a quasi-experimental design. This is evident because the researcher categorized participants based on pre-existing personality types—Type A and Type B—and then compared their performance on a task without manipulating these conditions directly. The classification of personality type was not randomly assigned but based on participant self-report or assessment, indicating a non-random, observational grouping typical of quasi-experiments (Shadish, Cook, & Campbell, 2002). The primary purpose was to observe differences in performance (time to solve solvable anagrams) between the two naturally occurring groups, which classifies this as a comparative or correlational study within a quasi-experimental framework.

This study is not a true experiment because the independent variable—personality type—is not manipulated or randomly assigned to participants. Instead, the researcher observes existing personality differences, which makes it a non-manipulative, correlational study rather than a controlled experimental design. True experiments require random assignment to levels of the IV to isolate cause-and-effect relationships, which is absent here (Cohen, 1988). Consequently, although the study compares two groups, it cannot definitively establish causation between personality type and endurance to frustration, only association.

The independent variable (IV) in this research is "personality type," which has two levels: Type A and Type B. The scale of measurement for this IV is nominal because the variable classifies participants into mutually exclusive categories based on personality assessment; that is, each participant is labeled as either Type A or Type B, with no inherent numerical or ordered relationship.

As the original description lacks a detailed operational definition of the IV—personality type—we can specify one for clarity. If I were the experimenter, I would operationally define the IV as follows: "Personality type is determined based on a standardized questionnaire score, with Participants scoring above a specified cutoff on the Type A/B Personality Inventory classified as Type A, and those below as Type B." This operational definition explicitly states the measurement tool (a personality inventory), the classification criterion (score cutoff), and the categories (Type A or B), ensuring clarity and reproducibility without altering the levels of the IV.

The dependent variable (DV) in this study is "time to solve solvable anagrams," measured in minutes. This variable captures the duration taken by each participant to complete the second set of anagrams that have valid solutions. The scale of measurement for this DV is ratio, as the time measured in minutes has a true zero point (no time elapsed) and equal intervals, allowing for meaningful arithmetic operations and comparisons.

Statistically, the results indicate that the difference in mean times between the two groups was not significant, with a p-value of 0.273, which exceeds the conventional alpha level of 0.05. The t-test result (t = 1.63, df = 38) suggests no statistically significant difference in the mean time to solve the solvable anagrams between Type A and Type B personality groups. Cohen’s d effect size of .23 indicates a small effect, further suggesting that the personality type had minimal practical impact on performance in this task.

In conclusion, the statistical analysis shows that there was no significant effect of personality type on the time taken to solve the solvable anagrams, t(38) = 1.63, p = 0.273. The small effect size (d = .23) supports the interpretation that personality type, as operationalized in this study, does not significantly influence endurance or performance in this specific academic frustration task. Therefore, we fail to reject the null hypothesis, indicating that, based on this data, there is no evidence to suggest that Type B personalities endure frustration better than Type A personalities during this academic task.

References

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