PS2001 – Research Methods - Your Experiment

The Design
• Design and run an experiment to examine the production of false memories
using the DRM paradigm.
• Test the theory that false memories are created due to activation of
associates at study.
– You need to Choose one independent variable:
• You decide, but think of a variable that can be manipulated to
effect remember and know responses.
– Dependent variable: false recognition rates for remember and know
responses
• Ideas for your Independent variable
• Novelty not essential, importance is rationale for your choice
• Do a literature search and read around
• Remember! In your Introduction you will need to justify why
you have selected your Independent variable and what
outcomes you predict based on past literature and theory.

Example ideas for the DESIGN

• Independent Variable (factor):
– Examples:
• Divided attention at study
• Generate versus Read
• Forewarn vs. no information
• Strong associate word lists vs. weak associate word lists
• Short (4-5 words) versus long (15 words) lists
• English Versus Non-English Participants – why important??
• You will be analysing differences in Remember/Know
responses. Think how each will effect the remember/know
responses

Participants
• How many?? The more the better! The fewer you have, the less likely
you are to get significant results.
• You should test about 15-20 participants per condition.
• Use a between or within design?
• Within = fewer participants. But you’ll need to present
participants with more word lists because they will do both
your conditions!
• Ask for volunteers/get friends and family to help out.
• Do not test each other –experimenter bias!
• Record Age and Gender of your participant to report

Stimuli
  Choose 4-6 DRM lists per condition of your independent variable. Each list
has 10-12 words. Remember each list has ONE critical lure.
 DO NOT make up your own lists. Use normed lists. Some are better than
others for producing false memories.
 Use the Roediger, Watson, McDermott, & Gallo (2001) paper to get your lists.
This paper is available of moodle.

Procedure
• Participants are presented with word lists.
• Each word presented one at a time in the centre of the screen. Use
powerpoint presentation.
• Or make an auditory recording of the words(free software available –
audicity). See Examples available on Moodle
• At the end of the study phase, all participants will complete a 5 mins filler
task as a gap between study and test. You choose this.
• Recognition Task:
• Use the remember/know procedure
• Should consist of critical lures, unrelated filler items, words from the
list. Must be equal number of seen and unseen words.
• Example: if you have shown participants 8 lists:
Recognition test has 8 critical lures, 8 unrelated words, 16 words from the lists (3
from each list). Total: 32 words

Example Recognition test instructions

(These are on moodle – use these instructions and make sure participant
understands the difference)

Recognition test instructions:

1. Circle “New” if you feel a word was not in the word lists.
2. Circle “Old” if you feel a word was in the word lists AND THEN circle either:
a) “Remember” if you vividly and consciously recollect the word being presented.
• For example, you might remember the word appearing second in a
list, you might have had an image pop into your head as your read the
word, or you may have associated it with another word in the list to
help you remember it.
b) “Know” if you know a word was presented but only because it feels familiar
• For example, you know it appeared but do not remember where in a
list, you did not have an image pop into your head when your read it,
or you did not associate it with another word.

nurse New Old Remember or Know

band New Old Remember or Know
jump New Old Remember or Know
walk New Old Remember or Know
high New Old Remember or Know
tribe New Old Remember or Know
To Sum:
Important things to think about:
• Experimental design (within or mixed)
• Presentation formation – visual/auditory
• Who should you test and how?
• Your DRM list choice
• Your Recognition Test and Coding

ANALYSIS
• You will conduct a 2x2 mixed or repeated measures ANOVA
– Factor 1: Your manipulated variable (example: Fast vs. Slow
presentation of words in list)
– Factor 2: Recollective experience: remember or know response made
to critical lure. You are recording remember/know responses but you
want to see how your independent factor influences(interacts) with
remember and know responses. So in this instance we use
remember/know as a factor. – This is a post hoc factor because we
did not manipulate recollective experience.
• We can therefore ask 3 questions:
– Do we produce more false recollections of critical lures when word
lists are presented fast or slow?
– Do we make more remember or know responses to critical lures?
– INTERACTION _ IMPORTANT ONE
• Does speed of presentation effect remember and know
processes when make false memories in the DRM paradigm?

Example:
• Design:
– 1 independent variable with 2 conditions (speed of presentation: fast
vs. slow). And one dependent variable –
• Method:
– 15 participants saw the fast presentation , 15 participants saw the
slow presentation. In each presentation there were 8 DRM lists
– Recognition test given after a short filler task that lasts 5 mins
• Filler task should not involve words to confuse with those just
learnt. Give a maze task or where’s wally!
– Recognition Task: Example: contains all Critical lures from the 8 DRM
lists. 24 words taken from the word lists (3 from each list) and 16
unrelated filler items. Participants will be given the option to make a
remember or know response next to each word they recognise as old

Download the guidelines for writing up your lab report