Lee - 1997 Flashcards
What is the aim?
to test the effect of culture on lying and truth telling - in relation to prosocial and antisocial actions
What is the method?
lab experiment
What are the strengths of a lab experiment?
- highly controlled = less impact of EVs
- replicable = more reliable
What are the weaknesses of a lab experiment?
- lack ecological validity
What are the IVs?
- social or physical story
- prosocial or antisocial
What are the four conditions?
- prosocial / truth telling
- prosocial / lie telling
- antisocial / truth telling
- antisocial / lie telling
What is the DV?
the rating given to the story characters deed and verbal statement
What is the scale used?
7 point scale ranging from
very very naughty - very very good
(3 crosses XXX - 3 stars ⋆⋆⋆)
What is the design?
independent measures
Why can the design also be considered as a repeated measures?
even though participants only did physical or social they did both social and antisocial (4 scenarios - 2 pro and 2 anti)
What are the strengths of the design?
less likely to have order effects or demand characteristics
What are the weaknesses of the design?
individual differences = decreases validity
What is the sample?
120 Chinese children and 108 Canadian children
What are the details of the Chinese sample?
- recruited from elementary school
- 3 groups of 40 kids (7,9 and 11)
- equal gender
What are the details of the Canadian sample?
- recruited from elementary school
- 36 seven year olds (20 m, 16 f)
- 40 nine year olds (24 m, 16 f)
- 32 eleven year olds (14 m, 18 f)
What are the strengths of the sample?
- both girls and boys tested - no gender bias
- large samples
- population validity
What are the weaknesses of the sample?
- limited as only focus on small towns and Canadian middle class children
- age bias
What is an overview of the procedure?
- children tested individually
- instructed of the meaning of words and symbols for rating scale
- start story with deed
- ask to rate deed
- continue story with verbal comment
- ask to rate verbal comment
What were some of the controls in this study?
- to control for order effects the order of the 4 stories were randomised
- post-experimental discussions
- meaning of the rating scale repeated every time a question was asked
What is a strength of having so many controls in the procedure?
- more likely to be replicable
- more reliable results
What are the weaknesses of the procedure?
- lack mundane realism
- interviews = self report = social deniability bias
- lack ecological validity
What are some key findings?
- P/T = rated prosocial behaviours similarly BUT Chinese children grew less positive as got older
- P/L = no sig diff in story type, rated prosocial differently (both in age and story type) - Canadian - less negative as older but Chinese go to positive as older
- A/T = rated similarly and positively
- A/L = no sig diff in story type, rated antisocial differently (age and story type)
What is the type of data gathered?
quantitative - 7 point rating scale
What are the strengths of this data?
- objective
- easy to analyse and compare cultures
What are the weaknesses of this data?
no reasoning why there are cultural differences or similarities between lie telling
What are the conclusions?
- moral development is a highly contextualised process by culture and social environment
- morality modified by age and experience in particular culture
Why is this study reliable?
- standardised procedure - 7 point rating scale
