Experimental Variables Paper

Usra Robow

Department of Psychology, Georgia State University

Psych 1101: Intro to General Psychology

Dr.April Crisp

April 19,2022
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Experimental Variables Paper

The article "Cookie Monster" was about an experiment that looked at how people

conceive of emotional eating as solely being for the depressed, but new study shows that even

people who claim to be happy are likely to consume a couple of chocolate bars if they believe the

sweets will keep them happy.According to a study, university students ate twice as much

cookies, pretzels, and cheese when they assumed the meal would alter their mood. Some people

believed the snack would make them happier, while others believed it would merely keep them

happy. A professor of psychology found that it doesn’t matter what mood you’re in, but how you

attempt to regulate it. As a result, even joyful people must refrain from using food to determine

their emotions.

After reading this article, there is not enough adequate details about the research so that I

can evaluate the experimental procedures.In order to understand and evaluate the research I

would need accuracy and reliability.The experiments findings are as follows “We found that it

doesn’t matter what mood you’re in, but how you attempt to regulate it”. The problem with this

is the articles lack of evidence. The article made claims that “about twice as many university

students are cookies, pretzels and cheese when they thought the food would affect their mood” or

“even happy people have to avoid using food regulate it” but there were no trials, and there was

no statistical evidence to back up the claims that were made which leads this article to be

baseless.

“Fighting Anorexia” is an article that talks about how researchers, medics, and mental-

health specialists, the average age of their youngest anorexia nervosa patients is dropping from
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13 to 9 years old.According to the article,. psychiatrists have begun to see surprising diversity

among their anorexic patients, Tyre reports. Not only are anorexia's victims younger, they're also

more likely to be black, Hispanic or Asian, more likely to be boys, more likely to be middle-aged

-- all which go against the conventional wisdom that victims are mostly white, type-A girls from

privileged backgrounds succumbing to pressures. scientists are tracking important differences in

the brain chemistry of anorexics. Using brain scans, researchers at the University of Pittsburgh

led by professor of psychiatry Dr. Walter Kaye, discovered that the level of serotonin activity in

the brains of anorexics is abnormally high.

In comparison to the "Cookie Monster" experiment, this experiment had a sufficient

amount of data to support its conclusion.The scientists made an observation that the average age

of their anorexia patients declined from 13 to 9 years old.They then formed a hypothesis which

was anorexics use starvation as a mode of self-medication. They then made a prediction that

starvation prevents tryptophane, an essential amino acid that produces serotonin, from getting

into the brain. By eating less, anorexics reduce the serotonin activity in their brains, says Kaye,

"creating a sense of calm," even as they are about to die from malnutrition.They then tested the

prediction by coming up with a treatment model.The Maudsley approach, the most prominent of

the home-based models, was established in the 1980s at the Maudsley Hospital in London. When

very emaciated, treatment-resistant anorexics were admitted to the hospital and fed by nurses,

two doctors saw that they progressively gained weight and began to participate in their own

rehabilitation. They came to the conclusion that, with the correct support, family members might

help anorexics eat like the nurses did.Thus, making this article more sufficient that the “Cookie

Monster” as it uses the scientific method.

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Despite the fact that the "Cookie Monster" experiment lacked sufficient data, the

"Fighting Anorexia" study only employed one independent variable that could not be changed.

The young girls are unable to change in this experiment because they suffer from anorexia.

When very emaciated, treatment-resistant anorexics were admitted to the hospital and fed by

nurses, two doctors noticed that they gained weight and began to participate in their own

rehabilitation. They came to the conclusion that, with the correct support, family members might

encourage anorexics to eat in the same manner that the nurses could. Because the approach only

comprised of support from the family and did not involve anyone outside, the independent

variable of family members was the only valid variable to contribute to the data.However, this

didn’t cause a problem for the researchers drawing a conclusion.

If I was a psychologist I would perform a follow-up research on the anorexia experiment

because I feel as though it would be easier because more data was provided.I’d start with the

previous anorexic patients. According to the article, They explain that while the causes of

anorexia are unclear, it is a severe, life-threatening disease like cancer or diabetes. Food, they tell

the family, is the medicine that will help the child get better. Like oncologists prescribing

chemotherapy, the team provides parents with a schedule of calories, lipids, carbohydrates and

fiber that the patient must eat every day and instructs them on how to monitor the child's intake.

Because this is a follow-up my observation I would largely focus on the procedures utilized in

the initial experiment to determine whether they had a long-term effect.I’d ask things like: “Are

the patients still receiving support from their family? How has correct support with family

member encouraged the children ? Did the child gain weight ? If so, how much weight has the

child gained with this method ?” I'd also do more research into the anorexia notion and what

causes it.Because the article stated “Researchers, clinicians and mental-health specialists say
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they're seeing the age of their youngest anorexia nervosa patients decline to 9 from 13 years old”

This leads me to conduct further research on anorexia and how social media could possibly play

a role in the patient’s decline to 9 from 13 years old. These inquiries, together with more study,

are useful strategies to back up the solid findings and maybe prevent anorexia from becoming a

significant problem.
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References

McCarthy, K. (2001, May/Jun). Cookie monster. Psychology Today, 30.

Newsweek. (27, Nov) Fighting anorexia. New York, NY.

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