I seek the Help of OtakuBoarders Assembled

[DeathBug]

[color=indigo][size=1][font=comic sans ms]Okay, what I'm really looking for are responses from psyche students.

See, in my freshman psyche course, I'm preforming a simple experiment with the general public. I'm setting forth a simple petition to increase penalties on people that speed in school zones. However, the actual paper I'll hand the folks to sign won't say anthing about the subject matter; instead, it will confess that the entire petition is a fake, and the experiment's purpose is too see how many people will actually read what they're sighning.

Cool, neh? I call it "Lying to Stangers"; my group doesn't think anyone will actually read the thing.

Now, what I need help with: for the purpose of the final draft of the paper, I have to reference a similar experiment. And, for the life of me, I can't find one.

Have any OB psyche students ever read of a similar experiment being preformed, or know where I can find details regarding one? If you help, I'll be your best friend forever and always.[/color][/size][/font]

[Brasil]

The only thing that comes to my mind is actually a skit from The Man Show, where Jimmy and Adam go around, asking women to sign this petition to "End the suffraging of women." Either they didn't read the petition, or they just simply had no idea what "suffrage" really meant. I'm betting on the latter. [i]But[/i], it seems to be similar to what you're going for. I'm just doubtful it could be used as a comparison/support point. It's probably too "pop culturey" to work, but...you figure, why do people not read something? Because they can see it on TV, or have been raised on TV.

So, you may be able to use that, if you make the correlation between a lack of reader comprehension and TV viewing. Social and psychological conditioning, as it were. Granted, The Man Show is hardly intellectual stimulation, but if you get the results you want with this experiment, those you're talking to are hardly being intellectually stimulated, either. Er, no offense, lol.

So, you might be able to use that if you find the right hook for it.

EDIT: I'll give one of my friends a call. She just got a Psych degree from Rutgers this past May, and is doing Grad School at La Salle for a Masters in Psych, I believe. I'll get back to you with what she can tell me.

[Boba Fett]

[color=green]Well, I?m not sure if this is close enough in topic, but wasn?t there something a while back about students going door to door asking people to ban ?BihydrogenOxide? or something to that affect?

Essentially they listed all the bad things water could do and asked people to sign a petition to ban it. Most did, without realizing what it was.

Meh, that wasn?t exactly the same, but hopefully it was close enough.[/color]

[Godelsensei]

[COLOR=Gray][FONT=Courier New]Rather reminds me of Talking to Americans.

"Will you sign this petition that is put forward to ban seal hunting in Alberta?"

You should watch that reel some time; I'm sure it's filtered to showcase the morons, but it sure is funny. : ) (I suppose it ties into the assignment at hand because it shows how people don't think about what they are being told.)

I think people automatically assume that any one with a clipboard must be serious about what they are saying. Which is rather silly.

I'm not a student of psyche, but I love your idea for a project. Be sure to keep us posted on its results, eh Buggie?[/FONT][/COLOR]

[Solo Tremaine]

[COLOR=#503F86]That sounds really cool ^_^ Much better than the experiments we did in Psychology, heh.

I'm not sure where you'd be able to find a reference for something like that, but I'm sure it's probably been done. You could try looking through the archives on [URL]http://psychology.about.com/[/URL] to see if there's anything similar about, or consult a textbook.

I did a relatively similar experiment in which I walked down a street holding a white envelope. I dropped the envelope on the pavement and recorded if anyone helped, and who the helpers were. Who would be more likely to help if a man/woman dropped the paper, for example. Make sure you have a few things to record, otherwise the variables could become too confounding-some groups of people (i.e. law students) might be more prone to reading through than others. Ideally, you want to be able to target a reprasentative amount of the population, but it's not always an ideal practice, heh.[/COLOR]

[Sol-Blade]

Yeah now that I think of it, there was one experiment done like this before last year at my high school. It's the same exact one Boba Fett's thinking of...

Our teacher's handed around a pamphlet that called "Should we ban Dihydrogen Monoxide?" and we had to write a paper stating yes or no and why. It was so funny because I caught onto it but my friends didn't. Anyways, I still have this actual document right here if you want it. It's not copyrighted as far as I know...

[URL=http://img72.exs.cx/my.php?loc=img72&image=DHMODocument.jpg][IMG]http://img72.exs.cx/img72/4383/DHMODocument.th.jpg[/IMG][/URL]

You would be surprised how many people wanted to ban...[I]water[/I].

Dihydrogen Monoxide = H20. Di meaning 2, Dihydrogen meaning 2 hydrogen molecules and Mono meaning one, and Monoxide meaning 1 molecule of oxygen. Alas, so many people failed lol. Anyways, the point of the assignment was to get us to read the document closely and even do some research on it. Typing Dihydrogen Monoxide into Google easily gets you a couple thousand sites devoted to water (:D).

Best part is where it says "Most of these deaths are caused by accidental inhalation of DHMO...", aka Drowning or Choking.