NPR's journalists covered a study that tested whether different forms of Tetris would help people feel less anxious.
The journalist writes that
...research suggests that Tetris can ease us through periods of anxiety by getting us to a blissfully engrossed mental state that psychologists call "flow."
"The state of flow is one where you're completely absorbed or engaged in some kind of activity," Sweeny explains. "You lose your self-awareness, and time is just flying by."
Here's more on the detail:
Sweeny and her collaborators gathered a group of more than 300 college students and told them their peers would be evaluating how attractive they were. "I know, it's kind of cruel, but we found it's a really effective way to get people stressed out," Sweeny says. While the participants awaited their attractiveness scores, the researchers had them play Tetris.
Some played a painfully slow, easy version of the game — which bored them. Some played an extremely challenging, fast version — which frustrated them. And everyone else played the classic version, which adapts to each player's individual skill level and gets them into that state of flow.[People were randomly assigned to the three groups.]
In the end, everyone experienced a degree of worry. But the third group reported slightly higher levels of positive emotions (on average, about a quarter of a point higher on a five-point scale) and slightly lower levels of negative emotions (half a point lower on a five-point scale).
"It wasn't a huge difference, but we think it's noticeable," Sweeny says. "And over time, it can add up."
Questions:
a) In this study, they decided to manipulate the conceptual variable, "degree of flow." How did they operationalize this variable?
b) What were the dependent variables in this study? (there seem to be two DVs here)
c) What was the independent variable? What were its levels?
d) Does this seem to be an experiment or a correlational study? How do you know?
e) Sketch a graph of the results.
f) The journalist mentions details about the results (e.g., "about a quarter of a point higher on a five-point scale" and "half a point lower on a five-point scale"). Which aspect of statistical validity is being discussed here?
g) What questions would you ask to decide if this study was internally valid? Which of the internal validity threats in Table 11.1 could you rule out? Which could you ask about?
h) What about the external validity of this study? How might you see if this effect might generalize to other flow-related activities (other than Tetris)?
