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Describe how the biological sex of a researcher can act as an extraneous variable in a psychological experiment, and recall the specific findings of the pain perception study by Ibolya, Brake, and Voss (2004) that illustrated this effect.
Question: Describe how the biological sex of a researcher can act as an extraneous variable in a psychological experiment, and recall the specific findings of the pain perception study by Ibolya, Brake, and Voss (2004) that illustrated this effect.
Sample answer: The biological sex of a researcher can act as an extraneous variable because male and female experimenters often interact differently with participants, and participants in turn respond differently to them. This variation introduces unintended influences on participant behavior, which can confound study results. In the pain perception study by Ibolya, Brake, and Voss (2004), this was demonstrated when participants immersed their hands in icy water for a longer duration when the experimenter was of the opposite sex, highlighting how researcher characteristics can introduce noise or confounds if left uncontrolled.
Key points:
- Experimenters of different biological sexes interact differently with subjects.
- Subjects respond differently to male versus female experimenters.
- Uncontrolled researcher sex can act as an extraneous variable and confound study results.
- In Ibolya et al. (2004), participants kept hands in icy water longer with an opposite-sex experimenter.
Rubric: A complete response must state that experimenters of different sexes interact differently with subjects, subjects respond differently to them, and this introduces confounding variation. Additionally, it must accurately identify the findings of the 2004 pain perception study (that participants tolerated icy water longer when the experimenter was of the opposite sex).
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Research Methods in Psychology - 4th American Edition @ KPU
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Ibolya, Brake, and Voss's Pain Perception Experiment
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