Original_To:  PGLIST
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.psycgrad
Date:         Thu, 28 Jan 1993 01:55:00 CST
              <PSYCGRAD@UOTTAWA.BITNET>
From:         Betty Harris <B1H6017@TAMVENUS.BITNET>
Subject:      Reposting of Bathroom study that started all this.

Hiya,
Since a couple of people have requested to see the original posting
that started this bathroom/ethics discussion, here it is again.
Tis interesting that my original concern (Subj: Validity of self
report data) hasn't been the major focus of discussion. :)
Betty

Original post begins here
-------------------------
Hiya,
We collected some interesting data last semester when I was teaching
an experimental psych lab.  We found large discrepancies between self
report and observational data in handwashing behavior in public
restrooms. The students in the experimental psych class either
hid out of sight in the restroom or were in sight the
sink area and noted whether ppl washed their hands after using the
restroom or not.  We found in this behavioral observation portion
of the study that females are more likely to wash when others are
present, the effect for males was nonsignificant tho was in the
same direction.  Then we administered a public facilities
questionnaire to a convenience sample with two questions embedded
1) did you wash, 2) were there people present.  In this self report
data, we didn't find the social norm handwashing effect.  Using the
behavioral observation data as an estimate of how frequently
people usually wash their hands, we found that people overreported
hand washing on the questionnaire.  From the behvioral data,
about 50% of people washed their hands.  However in the self report
data 67% of males and 88% of females said they washed their hands.
I kinda think this is a social desirability bias...  However
it could also be a result of errors in memory, or using two different
samples, or even demand characteristics of the public facilities
questionnaire.  This semester I'll have my lab pretest the questionnaire
to check for demand characteristics and we'll administer it to the *same*
people that we collect observational data on, to rule out memory and
sampling.  If indeed we do find the same over reporting of handwashing
behavior then It'd be nice to be able to be able to administer
questionnaires to find out if it's related to self deception/other
deception or some social desirability measure.  I might even include
self monitoring.  Does anyone have such scales on disk and references
for them, that they could e-mail me?  This is a new area of research for
me.  Also ideas for other measures which might explain why this
is happenin would be appreciated.

Anyone have any comments or ideas about this project?  It worries
me that we found such a large discrepancy between self report and
observational data, since a large portion of the data in psychology
is self report in nature.  What other behaviors could we *both*
observe and ask for self report on that vary in social desirability
pressures?  Replication of this paradigm in different behaviorl
domains should allow us to get a better idea of just when we can
and can't get accurate estimates of behavior from self report data.

Betty
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      TTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT
      TTT     TTT     TTT        Betty A. Harris
              TTT                Department of Psychology
    AAA       TTT    MM     MM   Texas A&M University
   A   A      TTT    M M   M M   College Station, TX 77843-4235
  A A A A     TTT    M  M M  M   1-409-845-2566
 A       A    TTT    M   M   M   Bitnet: B1H6017@TAMVENUS
AAA     AAA TTTTTTT MMM  M  MMM  Internet: B1H6017@VENUS.TAMU.EDU
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