Reference no: EM133352397

Conduct an observational study. This should be a systematic observational study; you should not intervene in the situation you are observing. This study does not have to be complex and I suggest keeping your observation time to 60 or fewer minutes, depending on the nature of your research question. For instance (please do not use my idea): I am interested in consumer spending behavior. Therefore, for my observational study, I chose to sit at a mall entrance for an hour on a Saturday afternoon. My research question was, "Do teenagers buy more than older adults?"  To study this question, I counted all teenagers (or people who appeared to be in their teens) and older adults (those who appeared to be 65 or older) who exited the mall during the chosen hour and counted how many teenagers and older adults carried shopping bags vs. how many did not. 

Describe in a  short report detailing the nature of your study, including -- but not limited to -- your research question/prediction and where and for how long you observed. Be sure to summarize your findings (including counts and/or percents for the behavior of interest for each group) and tell me whether your prediction was supported! Did you encounter any problems during your observation? How could you improve this study? What would you suggest as a follow-up study?

Some guidelines:

1. You must observe humans. You should observe only public behavior.
2. The behavior you select must be related to some psychological phenomenon about a hypothesis. You should develop a prediction about the outcome of your study before conducting the study.
3. The chosen behavior must be one for which you would expect a difference in the count data based on some IV (e.g., age, use of headphones/electronic devices, being alone vs. being in a group). When counting those who meet your IV conditions, be sure to count those who did not select chosen behavior (DV) during the time you conducted the study and do not just focus on those who did the chosen behavior. For instance, in the example above, notice that I did not count just the teenagers and older adults who carried shopping bags, but counted all teenagers and older adults exiting the mall.