Research Lab Survey Design

Context and Background

Investigating the cause of the Age-Related Positivity Effect:

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As we age, we tend to focus more on positive stimuli (or less on negative stimuli). For instance, older people are less likely to be interested in watching a fight that has broken out than younger people are. There are many theories about why this is. In our research lab, which focused on memory and aging, we hypothesized that this attentional shift is at least in part due to our perceived time left to live–how long we think we will be alive for.

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Before I arrived, the lab's attempt to measure this relationship was unsuccessful. The effort was to manipulate the perceived time left to live by proposing hypothetical scenarios, and then measure changes in attention to positive and negative stimuli. Looking at the survey questions, it seemed to me that the manipulation was unsuccessful, because the hypothetical situations didn't feel real. We had to elicit an emotional response.

I proposed adding a reflection portion in which people contemplated their life and loved ones and the impact of the hypothetical changes in their timeline, and a relationship between the variables emerged. Check out the survey to see what I wrote.