Grant et al Study Flashcards
What was the experimental method and design?
Laboratory experiment and independent measures design
What were the independent variables?
The study context (silent or noisy)- when article is read
Test conditions- matching or mismatching conditions (silent or noisy)- when memory is tested
What was the dependent variable?
Memory score out of 26 ( recall out of 10, recognition out of 16)
What was the sample?
- Eight members of a psychology laboratory class recruited five people each to be participants
- 39 participants from 17-56 years (17 female 23 male) ((1 participants results were omitted from results))
What were the grant et al interested in determining?
Whether environmental context dependency effects would be found with the type material on the type of test typically encounted in school
What was the stimuli?
- each experimenter provided their own cassette player and headphones which contained a master tape of background noise recorded during lunch time in a university cafeteria which was played at a moderately loud level
- two-page article on psychoimmunology
- 16 multiple choice questions
Why was the short answer test administered before the multiple-choice test?
To ensure that recall of information from the article is being tested and not recall of information from the multiple-choice test
What were the findings?
silence/silence- 6.7, 14.3 = 21
silence/noisy- 5.4, 12.7 = 18.1
Noisy/silence- 4.6, 12.7 = 17.3
Noisy/noisy- 6.2, 14.3 = 20.5
What are the possible conclusions?
- There are context dependency effects for newly learned meaningful material regardless of whether recall or recognition is used to assess learning
- studying and testing in the same environment leads to enhance performance
- there is evidence for context dependent see which suggest jeans are better studying with that background noise as it will not be present during actual testing (practical application)
