data analysis in psychological studies
thoughts? What
are your
Felix Grant explores the ways in which statistical data analysis is vital to psychology
‘I
used to think I was indecisive, but now I’m not so sure.’ So runs one of the oldest entries in the bumper fun book of psychology jokes. It parallels one in
the statistician’s equivalent volume: ‘Statistics means never having to say you’re certain’ which, if you are too young to remember Ali McGraw and Ryan O’Neal[1]
in Love Story, plays off
the strapline ‘Love means never having to say you’re sorry.’ And both have serious echoes in professional practice because psychology is an area in which data trees are always compromised by a forest of confounding factors and samples can oſten be small. In most pure, classical psychology, to an even greater extent than in the physical sciences, only statistical analysis can, to mix metaphors, tease out the pure signal from the white noise with confidence. Even in its pure and classic form, the concerns
of even the most abstract psychological research are rarely far from pragmatic utility. Roland Bremond, a mathematical morphologist currently concerned with the very down-to- earth business of transport planning, neatly encapsulated the data analytic nature of the beast[2]
in Saussurian terms: ‘La “réalité”, du
monde des objets, en psychologie expérimentale, est définie statistiquement comme l’ensemble des propriétés perçues partagées par tous les sujets “normaux”... Autrement dit, la réalité est une propriété statistique, sur une population...’ (In experimental psychology ‘reality’, the world
www.scientific-computing.com
of objects, is defined statistically as the set of properties shared by all perceived ‘normal’ subjects... or, to put it another way, reality is a statistical property of a population...) Not that pure classical psychological research
is the only strand or even the most evident. Without straying too far into monist and dualist controversies, it’s fair to say that complete separation of mind from body was abandoned a long time ago and psychology interpenetrates deeply with neuroscience and biochemistry amongst many other physical areas. In its classic guise, especially in combination
with modern computerised statistics, psychology is one of the areas of science where real, useful, original research can still be done by the solitary researcher without institutional funding or resources. In my freelance consultancy life I regularly work with research psychologists and frequently encounter such individuals, most of them right at home in one data analysis soſtware package or another. In the run up to this article, several lines of thought came from lone workers including the occasional pre-university student. Taking Bremond’s transport interest as a
departure point, one motivator for turning to psychology is the very high potential cost (economic and human) of error in areas where people interact with kinetic technologies. Psychological assessment of pilots and other crew is a well-established contributor to the enviable safety record which airlines enjoy in
relation to other modes of travel. Drivers of road vehicles are not, for obvious reasons to do with volume feasibility, monitored in the same way and investigation of how their psychological states affect behaviour can only, realistically, ever be statistical. A look at the literature shows that this is
reflected in the different types of research which predominate. Airline and air traffic control studies have an emphasis on understanding conceptual issues such as, to take an example[3] which happens to be on my desk, the differing cognitive states which underlie modes of professional attention. Research into traffic psychology tends, by contrast, to seek predictors for particular behaviours associated with increased risk taking by individual drivers. So, for example, a quick opportunity sample of papers on my desk show intensely data analytic investigations into factors which predict aggressive road behaviour [4]
, associations
between of attention deficit symptoms to driver decision making[5]
, psychological
linkages between degree of multitasking and concentration on priority foci[6]
perception of motorcyclists by other road users[7]
of own visual acuity in adverse conditions[8]
, accuracy or otherwise in assessment ,
risk perception differences between adult and adolescent drivers, and so on. I asked transport psychology researchers from each school what statistical soſtware they used and both said
AUGUST/SEPTEMBER 2012 11 , factors affecting
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