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Conducting an experiment

Category
Completed Projects
Pragmatics
Psycholinguistics
Research
Date

I'm looking for a student interested in experimental techniques, to help run a series of experimental tasks on young adults, as part of a research project on the referential and cognitive abilities of young bilingual children.  We need more adult data to use as a baseline, against which the performance of children will be evaluated.

The tasks I need your help with are two referential tasks, in which participants look at pictures on a computer screen (representing scenes with playmobils) and need to provide information to an investigator (who cannot see the screen) so he can reproduce them with his own playmobils.  We need to test 10 adults, and the sessions are expected to last approximately 30 minutes each.  You will be working with Jack Wilson, a final-year PhD student.

To participate in this project, I would need you to commit to testing at least 3 participants.

For more information please see the project's website.

Start Date: 16 March 2015
End Date: 20 March 2015 (with possible extension if participants prove difficult to recruit)

Hours: between 2 and 6 (negotiable)

Possible activities to be undertaken by RES Student:

  • Assisting research assistant with the running of 2 experiments
  • Scanning forms for electronic backup
  • Recruiting experimental participants
  • There may be a follow-up opportunity to transcribe the data using specialist software (priority will be given to the students who helped with data collection)

Number of Possible Students: 2

Likely outcomes:

  • Experience in running language experiments.
  • Experience in psycholinguistic testing procedures, e.g. gaining informed consent, giving instructions, data collection, and debriefing participants.
  • An insight into the data collection phase of the research process.

Students who have questions about this project should contact Cecile De Cat on [email protected]

If you would like to work on this project, please submit an RES application form by 12/03/15.

If your application is successful, the supervisor will be in touch in due course.