anxiety- EVALUATION Flashcards
one issue with the weapon focus study is that it may NOT be measuring anxiety, but surprise.
Pickel conducted a study where people were shown holding scissors, a handgun, a wallet and a raw chicken in a hairdressing video. Scissors would have been the low anxiety, low unusual-ness level.
Lower accuracy for ewt in the high unusual-ness condition of the chicken and the handgun, showing it may be SURPRISE and not anxiety measured.
Therefore the weapon focus study may have low internal validity as they’re not measuring anxiety but unusual-ness, and so doesn’t tell us anything about the EFFECT of anxiety on ewt.
one limitation is that there is a lack of control in Yuille and Cutshalls study..
Studied a real life bank robbery but interviewd 4 moths later, highlighting a LACK of control.
During this large gap, other FACTORS may have interfered with the original ewt such as p.e.d, where multiple recordings MUDDLE into one, or the influence of MEDIA.
this is an issue as the EXTRAN variables may become CONFOUNDING and lower the IV of the study on anxiety, as we are not measuring the effects on ewt.
So this study supports that anxiety increases accuracy of ewt, but it can be QUESTIONED whether it was purely just anxiety that effected it.
one problem with johnson and scotts weapon focus study is that it was STAGED.
this may lead to problems as D.C’s are more likely to appear as ppts may GUESS aim of the study and act ACCORDINGLY (screw you or please you) replying based on social desirability.
this is a CONFOUNDING variable which lowers the IV as the answers may be INFLUENCED and we can’t be sure from these lab studies. that we are measuring the effect of ANXIETY on ewt.
one problem with the inverted U theory is that it only considers the PHYSICAL element of anxiety
although it offers a good explanation of the contradictory findings of anxiety as an effect of ewt, as it can produce greater or lower accuracy.
The theory only considers physical element and doesn’t account for the cognitive, behavioural or emotional side.
This means that it may not be ACCURATE as the way we think about a stressful situation is also important as it may have a diff impact.
Therefore it is too SIMPLISTIC in showing a LINK between anxiety and ewt.
