A researcher recently argued that, because of our culture’s emphasis on competit

Question

A researcher recently argued that, because of our culture’s emphasis on competition among boys and men, men should perform better than women under the pressure of competition. To test his hypothesis, he gave 20 women and 20 men the task of assembling a model airplane as quickly as possible. To create a competitive atmosphere, the researcher promised that the person who assembled his or her plane most quickly would win four tickets to the Super Bowl (and you can assume that his participants believed him). As a group, the men assembled their planes in about half the time required by the women, and a statistical test showed that this difference was highly significant. The researcher concluded that men do indeed work better than women under competitive conditions.

1.Name and explain at least one flaw of this study. (5 points)

Explanation / Answer

A problem with the study is that it used tickets to the Super Bowl as an incentive to motivate participants. The Super Bowl is the annual American football game and its viewers and audience are predominantly men. Therefore, the difference between the time taken by men versus the women to arrange the planes may be due to the fact that men were more motivated to do so because the reward was more appealing to them, compared to women.

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