Social practical

• we conducted an experiment which aimed to investigate if there was a difference in perceived obedience between men and women based on their responses to certain social situations
• The independent variable of the practical was the gender of the participants
• The dependant variable was the perceived obedience measured from 1 being very unlikely and 5 being very likely
• We sampled the participants using opportunity sampling from 24 participants aged 16 to 60 who were friends and family of students from Surbiton High School
• Our data collection methods was having independent groups filling out a self report questionnaire, qualitative data was collected through asking the participant to complete one open answer question in their own words. the quantitative data was gathered through 9 closed questions with a likert scale includin one reverse order question and 2 filler questions.
• Step 1 Participants signed a consent form before answering questions on obedience
• Step 2 A pilot study was conducted with 3 participants to test the objectivity and reliability of the questions
• Step 3 Questions were changed and adapted before being sent to 24 participants
• Step 4 The 10 most recent male and female responses were selected to remove researcher bias
• Step 5 Scores for the 20 participants were calculated by adding their scores after removing filler questions and reversing scores on the reverse scoring question
• Step 6 Quantitative data analysis included calculating the mean, median, mode, range, and standard deviation
• Step 7 Thematic analysis was conducted on qualitative data by deciding themes and codes for each
• Conclusions:

  From our quantitative date males(21.8) have a higher perceived obedience than females (18.6). Although, The male data has a higher standard deviation (4.47) than the female data (3.77) which means there’s a greater dispersion from the mean and this could suggest that the male groups had greater individual differences.
• generalisability strength high generalisability as both males and females are used from a range of ages (16-60) and backgrounds so it can be applied to a large target population
• reliability strength the questions and procedure are standardised so that the study can be repeated to find consistent results which increases the reliability as the study can be repeat in order to ensure accurate results
• application strength to see differences between males and females in obedience in real life situations 
• Validity strength high internal validity as extraneous variables were controlled so only the IV (gender) affects the DV (perceived obedience) and there were no other contributing factors 
• ethics strength the questionnaire follows the ethical guidelines as the Ppts are kept anonymous and they have the right to withdraw at any time which fits with the ethical guidelines. In addition the Ppts received a debrief
• Generalisability weakness low generalisability as opportunity sampling was used. Only friends and families of 12D Psychology students who are available for the study have participated in the study, which means the results could not be generalised to the wider population.
• Weak reliability as some of the ms forms were  sent last minute through some ways other than email (i.e. phone, text messages). This could mean that the procedure isn’t standardised which makes the results less reliable.
• weak application because it was not a true representation to how they would respond in real life
• Weak validity the study has poor external validity due to the fact that it’s measuring perceived obedience through a self report questionnaire, which doesn’t allow situational factors to influence ppts behaviours towards obedience.  This is a weakness and would suggest that future research should look to measure perceived obedience via observation rather than self report. 
• Weak ethics questions may get too personal and raise ethical concerns. Researchers must ensure that their personal information is handled with care and confidentiality. (only use if the question specifically asks)
• one improvements and why it would be better are we could improve this study by gathering a range of participants, as opposed to just friends and family of Surbiton High School, we could have approached members within United Learning Schools Trust (which Surbiton is a part of). This would improve generalisability of the results as it would provide more variation in participants meaning they would be more representative of the target population of men and women
• Another improvement could be by doing a peer report questionnaire as well as the self report questionnaire used. This would improve reliability as someone’s own perception of their obedience may be biased and including a peer report would provide consistency of the ppts answers.