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intro.psych (Psyco 105) Discussion: Group 3 Discussion Group: Reading the Research-DID: Are the measures appropriate for addressing the research questions?
By Admin on Thursday, November 12, 1998 - 10:31 am:
Sort the tasks out here. What tasks did Eich et al. use? Why did they include the tasks they did?
As I read over the tasks, the first that strikes me as weird in this experiment is the fact that the researchers use DID patients that can "switch" from personality to personality at will. I am not sure what percentage of DID patients can do this, but I am very interested in this statistic. The reason that the researchers used this type of patients is obvious, it would have been a lot more difficult, if not impossible to do this with DID that could not switch. But this, rather than make it seem OK actually hurts their case. It seems to me that the researchers are taking a shortcut to the answer. Shortcuts are often the cause of invalidity.
In Phase 2, when the testing began, P1 read aloud then rated 20 words for visual imageability and connotative pleasantness. P1 then completed a test of picture fragment completion involving 10 objects. These two tasks set the stage for the next phases.
The tasks they used, recalling word stems, effectively tested the implicit memory. It was a valid test for what they were researching. I think that although Montresor's point is true about the unknown generalizability of the results; it is the same for almost all research, especially experimental. I am also wondering how these results could be used in real life?
This discussion is for marks
Back to the Method
By Montresor on Monday, November 23, 1998 - 01:15 pm:
The tasks seem valid, I am just questioning the generalizability of this experiment to other DID patients.
By Jene on Monday, November 23, 1998 - 01:23 pm:
In Phase 3, P2 came forward and was asked if he had any recollection of the 20 words P1 rated - this was to test explicit recall. P2 was then presented with three-letter stems that corresponded to words P1 had rated earlier and asked if he had any conscious recollection of how to complete them - this was another test of explicit recall. P2 was then asked to free associate by naming the first word that came to mind when presented with word stems (some of which corresponded to words rated by P1) - this task tested implicit memory. Finally, P2 rated 20 words and completed a picture-fragment test. 5 items of the picture-fragment test had been seen by P1 so this was another implicit memory test.
Phase 4 returned to P1. P1 was tested for conscious recall of the 20 words P2 had rated, then given word-stems (corresponding to the words P2 had rated) and asked if he conciously remembered any words - both these tasks were to test explicit memory. P1 was then asked to explicitly remember words he had rated using word stems. P1 then undertook an implicit memory test using word-stem completion and free association. P1 finished with a picture-fragment completion task to test implicit memory.
By Mollyc on Wednesday, November 25, 1998 - 12:48 pm: