The study that I chose was very different than the title indicated, but I am glad I chose it since it created much though for my discussion.

• Perceptions of an Interaction with a DoctorLinks to an external site.(Illinois State University)

I participated in professional research about social perception. The study was titled "Perceptions of an Interaction with a Doctor" from Illinois State University. The purpose of the research within the consent form was to "examine perceptions of doctors and patient interactions". The study started with a scenario that gave background about the patient that included her age, children's ages, her marital status, what she enjoyed doing in life and what her position was professionally. It also included the background of her health issues, why she visited her doctor and his diagnosis and prescribed treatment. It then presented a series of questions asking about the perception of the interaction, how the patient perceived it and how the doctor treated her during the visit. It then asked a series of questions about the relationship between the patient and her husband, whether she was happy in life and their sexual attraction to each other and whether each was faithful in their marriage. The last set of questions were about menopause, my knowledge of the subject, where I received my information and who I knew that had gone through or was going through menopause.

The type of research fits into the correlational method, by using surveys the researcher is able to measure similarities or differences in the answers to the questions about the control scenario (Feenstra, 2020. sec. 1.3). I concluded that the hypothesis was to measure a person's conclusion based on inference in the scenario and the questions were leading to a subjective response where you would have to speculate and draw your own conclusion. There was a debriefing statement at the end of the survey that revealed there were four different versions of the story about the woman and the researcher will be analyzing whether the answers were different based on the version of the story they received.

It was unclear if the researcher used random assignment of the four different versions of the story. The first page was demographics information and asked your age, sex, and ethnicity. Upon completion of that information, I then received the scenario to read. It also appeared to include confounding variables since the study was presented as perception about an encounter between a patient and a doctor and the questions asked included about her marriage, her temperament and what I knew about menopause. After reading the questions and the possible answers it led me to believe that the true purpose was experimental realism. It is human nature to conclude a perception about other people with limited facts and presumption about what we have heard, I answered almost all the questions with a neutral response since any other response would have been speculation.

I believe deception was used in this study to aid in collecting the data from respondents that the researcher was looking for but although there was a debriefing statement that revealed the four versions it did not explain the additional questions unrelated to the patient/doctor encounter. It would be enlightening to see the differences in each version and if the questions asked were the same. In Boynton et al., (2013) the author concludes it does not have lasting negative effects when the participants are informed about the reason for the deception.

If the purpose of the research was to show that people come to conclusions about others with limited information, then this study will probably support that hypothesis. One question asked if the doctor was highly intelligent? The only facts that could be used to determine that were the diagnosis and treatment prescribed, but answering yes would be speculation. It is a great example of social psychology.

References:

Boynton, M. H., Portnoy, D. B., & Johnson, B. T. (2013). Exploring the Ethics and Psychological Impact of Deception in Psychological Research.IRB: Ethics & Human Research,35(2), 7-13.

Feenstra, J. (2020).Social psychology(2nd ed.). Zovio.

Questions?

• What lingering questions do you have about the research in which your peer participated?
• Can you identify any additional methodological or ethical concerns?