PSYC5922M Advanced Research Methods RESIT

SPSS Assignment

Within this assignment there are three exercises, you must try to answer all the questions for every exercise. In total there are 25 marks to be gained.

· To pass you must score 12.5 or more marks out of 25 (i.e. ≥ 50%)

· Whilst you may score higher than 12.5 (i.e. 50%) your resulting overall grade, which will appear on your academic record, will be capped at 50 because this is a resit.

· Whatever your resit mark, this new mark will replace the previous mark at first-attempt, which currently appears on your academic record

Important Note: max word counts for each question are based on the length of ‘example answers’ that would achieve full marks, with an additional further ~15% leeway added. In other words – you should be able to answer all these questions perfectly in far fewer words than the generous word limits we’ve allowed here.

The deadline for this assignment is Friday XX July 2025, 12 noon.

Exercise 1 (10 marks)

For this question use file: Dataset1_2024R.sav

This file contains data from a (fictional) undergraduate study, investigating the relationships between personality traits and physiological responses to stressful events. There are 7 variables in this dataset – the first three are personality variables: Toxic achieving; Non-toxic achieving; and Anxious-tense. The fourth is a measure of daily caffeine consumption and the fifth is a measure of participant’s age. The last two are heart rate measures, before and after performing stressful task.

a) Identify outliers by ID number. Provide justification for how you would manage them in any outliers you find in any  further analysis (3 marks, max 80 words)

b) Choose and run an analysis that will allow you to test the hypothesis that, after controlling for age, personality traits predict changes in heart-rate following a stressful event. Write a brief summary and interpretation of your findings that uses appropriate formatting. (5 marks, max 250 words)

c) If the researchers subsequently wanted to test the hypothesis that daily caffeine consumption (in addition to personality variables) was a useful predictor of stress-response, after controlling for age and then personality variables, what problems would inclusion of this additional predictor create within such a model? (2 marks, max 70 words)

Exercise 2 (6 marks)

For this question use file: Dataset2R_2024.sav

This file contains data from a (fictional) longitudinal study on the predictors of academic performance in high school. In phase one of the investigation, researchers assessed a cohort of 4-years-old children on their ability to delay gratification, by leaving each of them alone in a room with a colourful marshmallow placed on a table. Researchers told the children to wait 10 minutes until one of their parents would come pick them up – if the marshmallow was still on the table at that point, the child would get a second treat. Researchers measured the amount of time the children were able to resist from eating the marshmallow and, in phase two of the investigation, they compared it with the academic performance of the same cohort in high school 10 years later. Additionally, they were interested in the impact that being raised in a big city versus in the countryside had on the participants’ ability to consider time and resources when planning their studies.

Academic performance was measured using a standardized index calculated through a weighted average of the high-school grade, with higher values indicating better performance overall at school. Also measured were:

· The number of minutes each individual, as a child, waited before eating the colourful marshmallow;

· Whether the individual was raised in the countryside (Yes/No)

The researchers hypothesised that being able to delay gratifications as a child (ie, longer waiting times alone in the room without eating the treat) will predict higher academic scores later in life. However, they also predicted that this relationship may vary depending on whether someone was raised in the countryside compared to a big city.

a) Identify a type of analysis that would be best suited to testing this hypothesis. Run this analysis and in reporting its results include an APA formatted table. Then summarise your key findings in a few sentences. (4 marks, max 150 words [excluding table])

b) Imagine that further data becomes available on the participants involved in this study. Specifically:

· Results for how each child performed on a battery of Cognitive Development tests they undertook alongside the delayed gratification test. This includes an overall score for each child on the battery (i.e. a global average) and for how children performed on each subtest.

· A more detailed breakdown of the academic performance. Now, instead of just a single value for each individual, you have data that breaks this up into grades for specific classes (e.g. maths, English, history et cetera).

Building off the results of your analysis in Question 2a, plan a further analysis that could use this additional data to best effect to study whether one of the mechanisms by which delayed gratification (ie, the waiting time) influences academic performance is through it being influenced by the cognitive development of a child. In your answer clearly state the type of analysis you’d use to test this hypothesis, what roles specific variables would be designated in this analysis, and any adjustments you’d make to the original sample (2 marks, max 70 words)

Exercise 3 (9 marks)

For this question use file: Dataset3R_2024.sav

This file contains data from a (fictional) study in which researchers investigated the impact of two kinds of Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) interventions on self-reported psychological well-being (PWB) in adolescents. The research team were interested in exploring whether a newer kind of CBT, involving Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), might be more effective in this age group at enhancing PWB than traditional CBT methods.

They were also interested in exploring whether this newer kind of intervention was more effective, specifically, in helping adolescents with particular sorts of mental health problems. To investigate this they recruited two groups of patients from Adolescent Mental Health Clinics, one group was being treated for Generalised Anxiety Disorder (GAD), whilst the other was being treated for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). They also recruited a control group of adolescents with no diagnosed mental health problems but who were in their examination year at school (i.e. they were exposed to higher than normal levels of stress, and thus might also gain benefits from participating in the CBT programmes). The researchers predicted differences in psychological wellbeing (PWB) between these groups. Specifically, they expected the control group to have higher levels of self-reported PWB than either of the two clinical groups. They also predicted those with PTSD would have lower levels of PWB than those with GAD.

Participants were assessed before and after the intervention programme on a standardised self-report PWB questionnaire. It was theorised that both types of CBT would result in positive changes in PWB but that, out of the two, the ACT method may be the more effective. It was also predicted that any observed benefits from intervention would be greater in the two patients groups, compared to the control group.

a) State the specific type of ANOVA you would use to analyse this dataset and summarise (using proper notation) the results for the statistical significance of the main-effects and interactions in your model (2 marks, max 175 words).

b) For any significant main effect(s) not involved also in significant interaction(s) use appropriate further procedures to explore between-level differences and present a summary of your findings, which also draws conclusions as to whether these results support any initial predictions by the research team (2 mark, max 130 words).

c) For any significant interactions include an appropriately (APA) formatted graphical illustration of them and write a brief summary that describes and interprets this figure. Where appropriate break down interactions further using additional statistical contrasts to give more detailed interpretations (3 marks, max 100 words [excluding graph])

d) Reflect on your responses to questions 3a, 3b and 3c and provide a conclusion summarising your results. This should include recommendations for further research and an indication of which groups within the adolescent population it might be appropriate to promote this intervention to, with such claims justified by reference to your findings. (2 marks max 100 words)