The variables:
The independent variable in this study is the way that the words are presented. There will be two sets of 15 words that are identical apart from the way that they are presented. One set will be words that have images that match them and they will be presented on a yellow background card. The other set of words will be the same but on a plain white backing without words. The dependent variable will be the number of words that each participant will remember from the 15. The words are:
1.vaccine, 2.lion, 3.horse, 4.hunter, 5.dentist, 6.drama, 7.ballet, 8.cinema, 9.violin, 10.star, 11.magic, 12.cupid, 13.sofa, 14.justice and 15.summer.
Condition A:
Participants in this condition were led to a room. Once they were all seated the procedure was explained to them whilst a colleague placed the words with pictures on the wall. Participants were then given 1 minute to remember the words and as soon as the minute was over the words were taken down. Participants were then given 2 minute to remember the words and write as many down as they could.
Condition B:
In condition B the participants were tested in the same conditions as those in condition A however the material they had to remember was presented differently.
Population/sample/sampling method:
There were 10 participants, 5 in each group. The sample was an opportunity sample from the common room Quintin Kynaston School. They were randomly allocated into the two conditions. There were 6 boys and 4 girls all aged between 16 and 17.
Procedure:
Including myself there were 4 experimenters in conducting this particular investigation. Myself and a colleague led the group 1 participants into a room. As my colleague began to put the words on the wall the participants sat down and I began to explain the experiment. This is what I told the participants once they were all seated:
You are helping us to research the effects that the presentation of information has on short-term memory. You will see a list of 15 words on the wall in front of you and you will be given 1 minute to remember the words. After 1 minute you will be asked to write all the words that you will remember and you will be given 2 minutes to do so. Whilst you are remembering the words pencils and paper will be placed in front of you but you must not write any of the word s down until you are told to. You do not have to stay here and you can leave now if you do not want to take part.
When it was time to start the experiment I told the participants: The timing will begin now
When the minute was over they the words were taken down off the wall and the participants were told that they could start writing. My colleague was in charge of timing the duration of exposure and the duration that the participants were given to write the words they had remembered.
Once the experiment was over we informed the participants that:
All the information that has been recorded will remain anonymous and confidential. Thank you for helping us.
In order to ensure that the results were as accurate as we could possibly make them the two colleagues who tested condition B participants had to say exactly the same thing to the participants and there were two copies of the script that was given to the experimenters in both conditions.
The papers that contained the words that the participants had written down were collected and the results analysed.
Results:
The above table displays the number of words that each participant in the two conditions recalled.
Summary of findings:
It becomes apparent that there is a clear difference between the two conditions. The highest number of words recalled was 12 out of the 15 and this participant was tested under condition 1. The lowest number of words recalled by a participant was 4 and this participant was tested under condition 2. It can be stated that participants generally scored higher when they were in condition1.
Record of inferential statistics used (The Mann-Whitney) and the results of calculations:
N1= 5
N2=5
Tx=T1=40
U= (25+15) –40
U=0
Conclusion:
By using the Mann – Whitney test we were able to come up with a U value of 0. From the significance table we found out that the level of significance .005.
It becomes clear that there is a significant difference between the amounts of words that participants with interesting presentation remembered when compared to those with plain presentation. The probability of the results that we obtained were due to chance is very low, .005 and this result enables us to accept our hypothesis. The way that information is presented does affect the way that information is integrated into Short Term Memory and the more interesting method of presenting information leads to higher scores in the memory test. Therefore we are able to reject the null hypothesis. The research that we have conducted and the results that we have obtained provides support for our hypothesis.
