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Memory Experiment Essay

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Memory experiment

In my research experiment, I will be finding out which gender has the better short term memory recall. I have conducted a Literature Review so that I can review the past experiments on memory.

Literature Review
The first experiment that I read about was conducted by Liz B, and was conducted from 2004-5. Her hypothesis was that gender had an effect on short term recall. This made it non-directional, since she wasn't sure how gender effected memory, or if it was a positive or negative effect. The Independent Variable was the quiz sheets that were given out and the Dependant Variable was the number of words the students got correct.
The results of the experiment was that girls received a better score than boys, however because the difference between the results was so small - with the girls' average at 43% correct and boys at 40% - that Liz felt gender had no effect on short term memory recall.

The second experiment was conducted by Danah Henriksen. Henriksen's experiment was conducted to test the memory of an individual. Henriksen’s Independent Variable is the list of words that Henriksen asked the participant to remember, and the Dependant Variable is the short term memory of the participant.

Henriksen felt that the participant that he conducted the experiment on was fifty-six year old male 'who seemed motivated to score well, possibly in the hope of combating a reputation for age-related memory loss'. This means that the results are unreliable.

In Henriksen's research, he mentioned George Miller, a famous psychology based in Harvard University. Miller came up with the theory of '7 plus or minus two' in relation to memory. This is the theory that short term memory can remember 7 items, give or take 2.

Planning the experiment

Aim
The aim of this experiment is to find out which gender has the better short term memory recall.

Hypothesis
Boys have a better short term memory on word tasks than girls. My hypothesis is directional one; since I am know which boys will have better recall than girls.
I have operationalised my variables so that I can measure the results of the experiment effectively.

Research methods
The research method that I will be using is a field experiment. I have chosen this so that I can conduct the experiment in a controlled environment like my school. This will mean that the results of the experiment will be reliable since they can replicate in another experiment under the same conditions.

Target population
The target population is year eight students of both genders. I have chosen year eight students only since they are familiar with the school, and aren't as scared as year sevens could be to say no, while being young enough that they aren't overwhelmed with homework, and most likely to have free time. I decided the experiment should be based on one year group so that the difference in age isn't something that will make the results of my experiment invalid.

Sampling technique
My sampling technique will be Opportunity. I will stand at the entrance to my school and hand out a poster advertising the experiment and a consent form for the student and their parents to fill out. I have chosen Opportunity since it is the most cost effective and is easy to carry out since I spend most of my time at school and there will be lots of people available after school that will be willing to take part.

Research design
The research design that I have decided on will be matched pairs. The common characteristic will be year eight students. One group will consist of boys, and the other of girls.
Designing the experiment
I have decided that I will conduct the experiment once with the group of boys, and a second time with the group of girls. I will hand out a copy of the consent form to each student, and then ask them to complete it. I will tell them that they can ask questions at this point, but not during the experiment. I will clearly state before the experiment that no one is allowed to speak during it. I will then hand out pens and paper, and tell them they have 30 seconds to try and memorise the words. When the time is up, I will then flick to the next slide and tell them to write down all the words that they can recall. I will at no point say what the aim or the hypothesis of the experiment is, in case this inspires unreliable results.

Variables
Situation variables – this is when the environment of the experiment can interfere with the independent and dependant variable. This means that the results could become reliable since you wouldn’t know if they are affected by the surroundings or the experiment. To overcome this, I will make sure that the room temperature is 21°, so it’s not an uncomfortable temperature, and I will make sure noise level is low and the lights low so the words on the interactive whiteboard can be seen.
Participant Variables – this is when a participant of the experiment brings a variable to the experiment which can change the outcome of it. For example, if the participant didn’t get enough sleep the night before, they could be tired, or if they hadn’t had any breakfast, they would be hungry. These variables change the outcome of the experiment since it makes the participants distracted, and so they don’t focus on the task at hand. I will ask them if they are in a positive mood, if their too hot or cold, or if they are hungry or thirsty.

Investigator effect – this is where the person carrying out the experiment, somehow influences the results of the experiment can makes it unreliable. To prevent this from happening, I will plan what I will say beforehand and include the script in this report. I am unable to carry out a double blind effect since I do not have enough time available to find someone to be the investigator and ensure that they know how not to influence the results.

Demand characteristics – this is where the participant of the experiment figures out the aim of the experiment and changes their behaviour in order to change results of the experiment in their favour. For example, if the participant is a female, and the experiment’s aim is to find out which gender is best at a certain subject, the participant may try extra hard in order to prove that women are equal or superior to men. This would mean that the results will be unreliable. I will write a script of what I will say and read from it, in order to make sure that what I say does not clue in the participant to what is happening. I will include this script in the project.

Results of the experiment participant

The average of the results is 7.4, while the mode is 6 and 8, and the median is 8. There were only 5 participants of the experiment, which was less than I hoped for, which was 8 for both genders.
The results of my experiment are inconclusive since only girls participated in an experiment to determine which gender has the best recall.

Evaluation
As part of preparation for the experiment, I made of a script of what I plan to say. When the students came into the class room where the experiment was being held, they were on time, but I was running late and in a rush, trying to set the experiment up so that they become bored and leave before the experiment was over. This meant that I was distracted from what I should have been doing, which was reading the script.
The purpose of the script was to avoid the participants of the experiment figuring out what going on and changing their behaviour in order to conform or defy the stereotype of their age, gender or race. Another result of not reading the script was that the situation variables were not avoided, which means that any results that I can draw from the experiment are unreliable.
I remembered to ask the participants before the experiment if they felt alright. The purpose of doing this was so that I could avoid my results becoming unreliable due to participant variable such as not feeling well or too hot.
Some of the words on the list of word to remember were difficult for the year 8s to spell, which could suggest that they spent some time on the spelling on the recall, which suggests that my results were unreliable, since it’s possible the girls could have remembered more, if they hadn’t been concerned on the spelling.
I was successfully able to follow the presentation, and they girls were able to remember some of the words shown, which suggest the 30 seconds was enough time to remember the words and later recall them.
The results of my experiment are rendered inconclusive. This is because the aim of the experiment was to find out which gender had the better short term memory recall. The students that turned up to participate in the experiment were only girls, which meant that I was unable to analyse the results, since I have nothing to compare the girls’ results to.

Bibliography

B, L. 2004 [Tuesday 30th September 2014] http://www.selah.k12.wa.us/soar/sciproj2005/LizB.html Henriksen, D. [Tuesday 16th September 2014] https://www.msu.edu/~henrikse/cep909/memoryexperiment.htmmm Miller, G. [Tuesday 16th September 2014]
http://www.psychologistworld.com/memory/millermagicnumber.phpppp

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