One More Day...

Okay, tomorrow is the day my lab report is due! I worked on my report some on Friday and today will be spent finishing up my lab and creating some graphs to use in my paper as well as the presentation I have to give on Wednesday. I can't believe Interim is almost over and I have just two days before it's all over! I've got to get back to work for now...

Reagan

Writing, Writing, Writing

Yesterday has no post, seeing as I have been writing my results and discussion for my lab report/paper, which is also what today has been dedicated to doing. Because this project is only over for the time being, I'm having a little bit of trouble writing everything and trying to pick and choose what should be included for my final interim paper. I'm having trouble because I feel like I clearly cannot tell the entire story in this experiment just yet, and especially not in this paper. However, I'm doing my best to tell as much as I can in the clearest way possible. This will allow others to understand the project from a scientific perspective, and it will also help me remember what I've been doing in my experiment up to this point as this interim winds down. So for the time being, I'm still just writing! Wish me luck...

Reagan

Data Day

Up to this point, all of the data analysis I have been doing had been fairly basic and prelimary. Today I finally transformed some of the data and collapsed it even further and ran tests on the overall accuracy of the participants in the study! It was a lot more complex than I had imagined, but now that I have the hang of things, the data analysis and ANOVAs that I am running are going alot more quickly. Again, I'm sorry for the short blog post, but I've literally been doing data analysis and fixing the data files to make sure that everything is in the right order ALL DAY LONG. We had a minor hiccup while pasting data into the new SPSS file, because it had accidentally been entered into the original excel file in the reverse order, so that had to be fixed. In addition, there were a few variables that didn't exist for certain accuracies so those had to be checked and deleted out. So today was definitely data day! I'm going to do some more work writing today though as well, because I officially have less than a week until my final interim paper (lab report basically) is due, so I really need to get rolling!

Reagan

The Downhill Slide

Now that data collection is officially finished, all of my day was spent going back through the articles I’ve been reading in order to analyze the “Methods” section of each article. I read numerous articles but focused on the Methods section to help me write my own Methods section for my paper, and eventually the journal article for this study. With the exception of a few questions, I’ve finished my Methods section, which is super exciting! I also finished most of the raw data input and some basic analysis yesterday after all of the subjects were finished. Basically, it’s all down hill from here! Over this week, I will be writing and getting my power point presentation ready.

Wish me luck,

Reagan

Why, yes, it is Saturday...

I am indeed writing this blog post on a Saturday at 5 pm. Why, you may ask? Because I am currently running my final test subject and doing the initial data analyses for the data group! YAYYY! I'm not necessarily excited to be doing work on a Saturday, but you have to do what you have to do. Therefore, I'm here finishing up work so that I can stay ahead on my workload before my rapidly- approaching deadline sneaks up on me. Yesterday was fairly uneventful other than running one subject, typing up the coding for the data in Excel and SPSS, and reading more journal articles to help me begin writing my methods section for the paper, which I will begin writing today and tomorrow. And as I stated earlier, I'm simply running my final two subjects today and finishing up data analysis, in addition to reading of course!

Even on a Saturday, everything is business as usual...

Reagan

My Last Victim

Yes, it's true. Today I found the final subject, or rather victim, for my research project! By the end of this week I will officially be done testing (unless the data tells me I need more people) and will begin an entirely new level of data analysis, in addition to the things I have already been doing in SPSS and Excel.  But, that's really my only news for today, other than the fact that I spent a greater part of the afternoon writing a code to understand all of the variables and headings in the SPSS and Excel data. I basically created a list of all of the variable abbreviations we've been using and wrote down and explained what they meant so that if we don't see the data for a while we won't forget what all of the headings mean. Dr. Bopp read about this idea in an SPSS manual and we both felt that this was a such a great idea since we have so many headings that have been shortened and we are looking at so many things; it can be easy to forget everything! But other than that, things were business as usual in the office and I'm eager to finish up testing subjects over the next two days. Looking forward to the weekend as well!

Reagan

Research Never Ends

Hi all! I hope everyone is having a pleasant Wednesday! May it also be noted that exactly two weeks from today, interim will be over and at this exact moment I may be presenting my research findings to the Independent Research interim group and anyone else who decides to listen in on the presentations. This is both terrifying and exciting, because I cannot believe that interim is already half-way over and that I only have 2 weeks to pull together a paper and a powerpoint presentation for my peers. As always, things will work out but this realization that I really only have two weeks left made everything feel like it was happening so quickly! However, although I realized I only have two weeks left, I spoke to Dr. Bopp today about doing even more research. As stated in the title of this blog, the research never ends! For this entire month, I have only been gathering young adults for the cognition study I am working on; however, the entire study includes a group of older adults as well. Thus, Dr. Bopp and I discussed running tests and gathering the data for the older adult age group this spring and in the early part of the summer, so that we can completely finish up this research project. This is very exciting and I'm really excited that I will be able to continue with the project because I am already so invested in the study that I can't stop now! I will also likely be spending a fair portion of my summer writing up the article for the current study (and possibly another study) as we work toward publication of the experiment. I honestly never though I would like (or rather love) research this much, but I do and I can't wait to continue what I am doing right now. So this has been the highlight of my Wednesday, in addition to running tests on my lovely subjects (you know who you are, and thank you!) and doing data analysis as always. I hope your day has been equally exciting...

Reagan

The Final Stretch

As you may have noticed, I didn't blog yesterday. This was mostly because I was in the midst of a couple new things and a couple of old things. Yesterday morning consisted of a meeting in which Dr. Bopp explained the syntax and SPSS analysis for another part of the data that I had not looked at yet. Now, I'm no computer expert or a statistician, I feel like I'm finally getting the hang of data analysis and exactly how it works and what it means, which is super exciting for me because I can't stand it when I don't understand how things work! Following my meeting all morning, I also ran three subjects in the afternoon, bringing me to a total of 19 subjects so far in the experiment. This is so exciting for me because I've basically found all 19 and run them through the study in the course of about 10 days which is difficult many times. In addition, I met with Dr. Bopp again and we discussed the writing portion of the study and the final powerpoint I will eventually have to present to the entire Independent Research group. So my newest project beginning yesterday and today has been looking though and reading old journal articles and related research papers to my topic in order to get a feel for how to write a methods section. I need to write a methods section because, in addition to  my final powerpoint and final paper, I am trying to help Dr. Bopp write the journal article that could potentially be published for this entire study. This is really cool, but not an easy task by any means, so I will let you know how that goes! But in the meantime, I'm still scheduling and running subjects, which should be done by the end of the week, and doing data analysis as I go. Just staying busy in my Psychology Suite nook! I hope everyone's research is going well and I can't wait to see what everyone comes up with!

Keep the faith,

Reagan

Dropping Like Flies

First, my apologies for missing out on my blog post yesterday, because I know you all are just DYING to find out what happens next with my research.... Well, yesterday was fairly interesting and busy, hence my late update. Yesterday was the first day in my research career in which I lost a participant. And not only did I lose a participant, but I almost lost a second participant! The first participant's computer decided to run an automatic computer update in the middle of the test, causing the computer program to stop in the middle of the test. The way the computer records the data for each subject's test doesn't allow participants to stop in the middle of the test and continue the testing later.Thus, when the computer stopped the test as the participant was almost finished, the subject would have had to wait at least a day to retake the test if she had wanted to remain in the data group for the experiment. However, the subject was not able to complete the test the next day or even next week, because she was leaving the country! So, we lost our first subject. The second subject was not very far into the test when the computer randomly terminated the test. I still have no idea why. Dr. Bopp said that sometimes when subjects accidently double click or do something funky when entering answers into the program, the computer program has a bad reaction, so to speak and stops the test. Regardless of why the test was stopped, I got super lucky because the subject agreed to come back the next day to redo the computer part of the test! SO, THANK YOU SUBJECT! You know who you are!
I've been aware for years now that attrition in psychology and other types of research is fairly common-- people don't show up to begin with, people don't complete all parts of a multi-part trial, participants end up being outliers, and the list goes on and on. However, I never actually believed that I would lose a participant. In some ways I feel as if I have failed a little bit; but I almost feel as if I have finally reached a sort of "researcher status," where I have the right to say, "I know what you mean!" when other experimenters talk about losing subjects as well. Overall, it is now clear to me that losing participants is just part of the process and finding tons of participants to ensure that you have a large enough sample size is a crucial part of experimenting. So yesterday was a learning experience and a bittersweet day for me, but I wouldn't change a thing! Monday begins week two, so get ready for the latest news...

Reagan

The Hardest Part

If you ask any scientific research the most difficult aspect of experimentation, many times they will unanimously tell you that finding participants for their study is the hardest part. Psychology experiments (among other scientific studies) can sometimes take a considerable amount of time, which leads potential subjects to shy away from the study. For this reason and others, subjects are usually drawn from the population based on convenience or by volunteering though newspaper ads and word of mouth. Many times the convenience sample consists of white, female, college students who are in psychology classes because much psychology research is done by professors and researchers on college campuses. This type of sample may not always provide adequate and relatable results for experimenters, which can be difficult and frustrating. Thus, recruting a good sample size and an evenly distributed participant group make scientific research especially hard.
I have always known that recruiting subjects is a difficult task, but today as I began to notice the number of subjects I had booked for testing dwindling...how do I keep a steady stream of participants coming to take my test? Today I tapped into my email, classmates, more friends and just aboout anyone I could find. I have people booked for the experiment through the end of the week, but its looking like I'm going to have to dig even deeper into my data base to find subjects. Especially male subjects, who are the hardest to come by. So, if you're a man and you would like to help with a psychology study... HOLLA!
Other than that, research is coming along nicely. I'm pretty much caught up on the data analysis so far and charts and graphs are starting to show some interesting results... Stay tuned!

Reagan

Working Overtime

Today was the day I officially realized that research is no part-time job… it is definitely a full-time, ongoing project that you sucks you in verrrry quickly. It has now been less than a week working on my independent research project and I already feel the need to work in the morning, all afternoon, and sometimes at night to “tie up lose ends.” This is partially due to the fact that research and data analysis does take a considerable amount of time, seeing as you can’t just plug some information into the computer and expect to receive instantaneous results and answers. However, I am somewhat ashamed to admit that data analysis and seeing results start to appear is a little bit addicting. Once I begin to input data, analyze the data and see charts and graphs linked to the data changing, I’m intrigued and I want to understand what it all means… NOW! Needless to say, I’m beginning to see some preliminary results and trends forming across the subjects’ data, which is very exciting. One reason I am able to see these results so early is because I am analyzing the data as I go through the trials. Dr. Bopp suggested that I do this in order to quickly see whether there are some outliers in the experiment, or perhaps if there is an error in any of the experiment trials. Analyzing as you go is a good way to see if there are mistakes or the test is too difficult, in addition to recognizing and detecting whether the data is supporting any of our hypotheses. Analyzing as you go also saves the researcher time after all of the testing is completed because the researcher has already pieced together much of the data already. So word to the wise: analyzing as you go through an experiment is one of the best things you can do as a researcher!

Enjoy the wisdom for today!

Reagan

Stats, Stats and More Stats

In addition to running three more subjects today, I spent the majority of my day learning how to run statistics in SPSS (a data analysis program) and how to transpose raw data from our initial findings. Basically, I spent most of my day in front of a computer. Honestly, I can't say that I've ever been really good with data analysis or math, but once you get into a rhythm it really isn't that bad! I'm actually really enjoying taking the data and the findings and doing something with it because the project is starting to feel like real research! I wish I could say more about the research at this point, but things are still getting underway and I'm still learning tons. However, the initial findings seem to show the same general trend which is a great thing! I can't wait to see what the rest of the data says....

Reagan

Psychology Student Problems

Now, I don't want to say that today put me at a standstill in my study by any means, but I will say today, my second day on my research project, has been much slower than my opening day. Much of today I have spent preparing for a few participants to pilot the experiment for me in order to see about how long the experiment actually lasts and to get a feel for the difficulty level of the experiment based on the opinions of college students.  Because this particular study has never been done on any young or older adults it is important for us to run a few practice trials to make sure that the program is running properly and smoothly, that the task is not too difficult and that the experiment can be completed in a reasonable about of time. Thus, I am running one practice trial today and definitely one (if not two) more practice trial tomorrow. Even in these pilot tests, the goal is to run the experiment as similiarly to the actual experiment as possible, because if everything in the practice trial runs smoothly, then the data gathered in the pilot testing can likely be used in the actual experiment data.

So, in preparation for these pilot tests, I spent the morning looking back over consent forms, demographic forms, information sheets, etc. to ensure that they are completely ready for the participants. Today, I also created a debriefing form to give to participants after they have completed the experiment. The purpose of a debrief is to educate the participant about the true nature of the experiment. Prior to many experiments, the participants are told very little about the task they are completing and are rarely given explanations as to why they are doing a certain task. Participants are not told much about the task in order to eliminate any bias that my come about from knowing too much about the experiment, which can lead to abnormal or bad data.

 While today may have been a little slow, running out first participants will prove exciting! I can’t wait to starting getting results and learning what the data has to say about our participants.

Stay tuned,

Reagan

Getting Started

To begin this blog, I feel as if I should give you a better idea of what I'm going to be doing this month other than what I previously stated in my opening post, which doesn't provided you a big picture of what I will be exploring. So what's the deal with short term memory? We hear this term all the time, and I'll admit I throw it around many times in my every day language. But what is it really? Well, that's what I'm trying to figure out. Over my Christmas vacation, I read some literature about working memory and cognition and how much information we can actually store at once for a period of time. Based on the articles, it became clear to me just how many conflicting ideas still exist in the realm of psychology and science as to defining what working memory means, how it works and how it differs between people. 

Hence the current study! My project is in conjunction with some continuing research my professor and advisor, Dr. Bopp, has been doing over the years comparing working memory functioning and processing between younger and older adults. This study uses a repetition-detection paradigm to help determine whether people are actually able to hold two different pieces (or “bins” in psychology lingo) of information in your memory at the same time without getting the information confused or without outside information interfering with the memory people are holding in their short term memory.

Today I essentially started at the beginning… sort of. Luckily, the entire repetition-detection paradigm and computer program was already created last summer by Dr. Bopp, so today was really all about getting things prepared to begin running subjects for the actual psychology experiment.  It sounds boring, but I spent all day revising verbal instructions that I will read out to subjects, consent forms and demographic forms. In addition, I had to go through some trials on the actual experiment to make sure that program was running correctly and the data that was automatically recording on the computer was recording the correct numbers. However, all of this is completely new to me! I’ve never really worked on any real research projects or done a big experiment so everything is so interesting and cool to me at this point, but stay updated to find out if I keep loving my research….

Until next time,

Reagan