Student Experiences of Mental Health Issues in Further and Higher Education.
subject: Mental health, stress, achievement anxiety, depression, students, education, provisions, resilience.
description: Previous research has shown that students are at risk of experiencing mental health difficulties, specifically relating to anxiety, depression, and stress (Andrews, Hejdenberg, & Wilding, 2006; Holland, 2016; Landow, 2006; Lattie, Lipson, & Eisenberg, 2019; Nascante, 2001; Shankar & Park, 2016). This study aimed to understand whether level of education, provisions to aid mental wellbeing within educational establishments, and students’ resilience were related to their mental wellbeing. A total of 94 participants were recruited for this study, however only 47 sets of data were complete enough to be used for the analyses. An online questionnaire using a series of demographic questions and subscales was used to collect data. No significant relationships were found between students’ mental wellbeing and their level of education or the provisions accessible to them in their place of education. However, a significant, negative correlation was found between students’ overall mental health and their resilience scores. Additional analyses were completed to better understand this and the same relationship was found between resilience and anxiety, depression, and stress. It was concluded that due to issues with power, more research with a larger sample is required to investigate these relationships further. It was also concluded that more understanding of resilience and mental health in students is required to be able to create better provisions.
creator: Rachel Jordan
source: Participants 94 participants (25 males, 43 females) were used for this study, they were a minimum of 18 to over 51 years old and were from educational establishments around the UK. Participants were recruited using the SONA participant recruitment system through Lancaster University and also by advertising on Facebook and Instagram. All participants were treated in accordance with BPS ethical guidelines and Lancaster University Department of Psychology provided ethical approval for the study (Appendix A). Only data from 47 participants was used due to incomplete datasets. Design This cross-sectional study used volunteers from the student population as participants as one sample group. This was a questionnaire-based study with four sub-scales using correlational analyses. The factors being analysed are detailed in the procedural section to follow. Procedure Adverts were placed on Facebook, and Instagram to help recruit participants to the study. Potential participants were provided with a link to the online survey, administered through Qualtrics. They were then provided with a participant information sheet (Appendix B) and gave informed consent (Appendix C) to participate on that basis. Informed consent was gained by participants selecting all six consent statements on the questionnaire. Following this, participants were presented with demographic questions and four measures (Appendix D). Following this, participants were presented with a debrief sheet (Appendix E) before being asked to close the tab. Materials Demographic Questions The questionnaire started with two demographic questions. These were: “How old are you in years?” with the options of “18-21/22-25/26-29/30-35/36-40/41-45/46-50/51+/Prefer not to answer” and “What was your assigned sex at birth?” with the options of “Male/Female/Prefer not to answer”. These items were included in this questionnaire to better understand the sample of participants included in the study. Level of Education Participants’ leve…
publisher: Lancaster University
date: 17/09/2023
contributor: Megan Grace Liddell
rights: Open
relation: None
format: Data/excel.csv
language: English
type: Data
coverage: LA1 4YF

Is selfie-related behaviour motivated by sexual orientation and gender conformity
subject: Selfie, Self-expression, Gender conformity, Sexual orientation
description: In the digital age, selfie culture has become an integral part of social media platforms. This globally widespread phenomenon created a distinctive form of self-expression, allowing selfie- makers to convey their identities, shape online personas, and build connections with others. Selfies are more than photos presented but also refer to a series of backstage to finally lead to creation and sharing. As research into selfies, gender differences in selfie-related behaviours have enabled further comprehension of selfies in terms of self-expression. Social Role Theory (SRT) explained the existence of gender differences in selfie culture that gender role norms and social expectations shape individuals' identity and behaviours. This study explored the concept of gender conformity among heterosexuals and non-heterosexuals and the impact on selfie-related behaviours. A total of 120 participants, categorized into heterosexual men, heterosexual women, non-heterosexual men, and non-heterosexual women, engaged in an online questionnaire, and contributed a total of 150 selfies. Data analysis involved one-way variance (ANOVA) to test the differences between the four groups, and multiple regression analysis to assess the influence of gender, the Traditional Masculinity-Femininity (TMF) scale and sexual attraction to me score. The results revealed no differences across the four groups in terms of the nine domains of selfie motives, as well as preoccupation. However, retention of moments and entertainment as the most prominent motives for selfies. For selfie behaviours, time spent on taking, editing, and selecting selfies, as well as taking amount and edit frequency differed significantly among the four groups. Specifically, both heterosexual women and non-heterosexual women tended to allocate more time on taking, editing, and selecting selfies for posting. Meanwhile, heterosexual women and non-heterosexual men displayed a higher trend for taking a greater number of selfies and edit…
creator: Wen Li
source: Participants This study recruited 120 normal adults as participants through a Qualtrics online questionnaire voluntarily and anonymously, of which 67 completed the questionnaire, including 22 men, 42 women and 3 self-identified as non-binary gender. However, since only binary gender was considered for the analysis of gender conformity, the three non-binary gender responses were removed. Additionally, in terms of sexual orientation, there were 48 heterosexuals, 6 homosexuals, 8 bisexuals and 2 others. The participants were divided into four sample groups, that is, 19 heterosexual men, 29 heterosexual women, three non-heterosexual men and 13 non-heterosexual women. Materials Sexual orientation and gender conformity were the two domains of prediction, and selfie- related behaviours were regarded as the outcomes. Sexual orientation was measured by self-rated sexual attraction to men and women, while gender conformity was measured by self-ascribed the Traditional masculinity/femininity (TMF) scale. As for selfie-related behaviour, it involves several aspects of selfie taking, editing, and posting. In addition, selfie motives and attributes of uploaded selfies were also be taken into account. Sexual attraction score Sexual orientation was self-identified by participants themselves as heterosexual, homosexual, bisexual, and others. The participants were asked to self-rated two statements about their sexual attraction to men and women. The latter, with some adjustment to Lippa's (2002) methodology, included two questions: "I am sexually attracted to men" and "I am sexually attracted to women". In both cases, participants were asked to self-rated on a scale of 0-10, where a higher score indicated greater sexual attraction to men or women. This measure transformed sexual orientation from a categorical variable to a continuous variable for further analyses of differences and relationships. In particular, the separate assessment of sexual attraction to men and sexual attraction…
publisher: Lancaster University
date: 2022-2023
contributor: Mshary Al Jaber
rights: Open
relation: None
format: .xlsx
language: English
type: Data
coverage: LA1 4YF

Investigating infant expectation on object search tasks.
subject: Infant, behaviours, theory
description: The current study aims to distinguish between Piaget’s (1954) theory of object understanding, highlighting the role of object permanence on A not B task performance, and Diamond’s (1985) theory highlighting the role of motor demands and lack of ability to inhibit habitual behaviours during the task. These two theories differ in their predictions for the expectations of the infants taking part, with Piaget (1954) predicting that infants’ lack of object permanence causes poor performance on the task and Diamond (1985) predicting that infants understand the movement of objects and a lack of inhibition of habitual behaviours cause error in performance. We tested 15 nine-month-old infants on a looking version of the A not B task. The use of impossible and possible outcomes was also incorporated on B trials, with the object being revealed from either the correct or incorrect location (e.g., see Ahmed & Ruffman, 1998). Infant first look direction, accumulated looking time during trials and the number of social looks initiated post-outcome, were used as measures. We found significant evidence of the ‘AB’ error during trials, with an significantly increased number of incorrect first looks on B trials. There was also a descriptive pattern showing surprise at object location reveals with increased number of social looks during B compared to A trials, though this was not significant. Accumulated looking analysis showed that infants looked longer on A than B trials, suggesting that infants expected the object to be in location B on B trials, demonstrating infants’ ability to understand objects and supporting Diamond’s (1985) theory. However, implications for a small sample size and presence of individual differences on interpretation of looking time data are discussed. Implications in theory and future research are suggested and overall, results provide support for the application of Piaget’s (1954) theory and suggest that infants have limited object understanding based on their…
creator: Leah Murphy
source: 3.1. Participants In this study, 15 participants took part, aged 8 months and 12 days to 9 months and 27 days old (M = 9 months and 3 days, SD= 11.3 days). Six further infants were excluded from data analysis as they became too fussy to complete the study. Participants were recruited from the Lancaster Baby lab database, along with the Lancaster Baby lab Facebook page and were also recruited via word of mouth from guardians taking part in the study. 3.2. Materials The video stimuli were created using Canva software (Canva.com, 2023) and was uploaded onto ‘Habit 2’ software (see Oakes et al., 2019) to display the stimuli during testing and to measure the accumulated looking time of the infant participants. The stimuli involved a novel object obtained from the NOUN database (Horst & Hout, 2016). A camera was used to record the social looks exchanged between the infant and guardian, as well as the direction of the infants’ first looks during testing. 3.3. Design This study had a within-subjects design, with all participants being exposed to the same experimental conditions and the same stimuli. To counterbalance for location effects, half of the participants witnessed A trials being hidden in the box on the left, whilst the other half witnessed the object being hidden in the box on the right during A trials. The presentation of the accurate and inaccurate B trials was further counterbalanced across participants, as half of the participants viewed the inaccurate B trials first, and the other half viewed the accurate B trials first. 3.4. Ethical approval Ethical approval for this study was granted by the departmental ethics committee (DEC) at Lancaster University. Guardians were recruited via their preferred contact method and were sent the participant information sheet to read before agreeing to take part in the study. A date and time of testing was arranged at the Babylab building at Lancaster University, via telephone or email. Upon arrival, guardians were presented w…
publisher: Lancaster University
date: 2023
contributor: Alicja Kowalska
rights: Open
relation: None
format: Text/Word.doc
language: English
type: Text
coverage: LA1 4YW

Cerebral Lateralisation for Emotion Processing of Chimeric Faces in Individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder
subject: autism spectrum disorder, cerebral lateralisation, emotion processing, adults, children, chimeric faces task
description: Many studies have suggested that typical lateralisation for emotion processing tasks, such as facial emotion recognition, is lateralised to the right-hemisphere, with different emotions eliciting differing strengths of lateralisation (Bourne, 2010). However, there has been much debate as to the lateralisation of individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) (Ashwin et al., 2005; Shamay-Tsoory et al., 2010). This study assessed the cerebral lateralisation of 30 adults with ASD, five children with ASD, 435 neurotypical adults and ten neurotypical children in a chimeric faces task, and aimed to identify whether the atypical lateralisation seen in children with ASD persists into adulthood (Taylor et al., 2012). Furthermore, the study aimed to identify whether lateralisation strength is affected by the emotion of the facial stimuli. No emotion- or age-related change in lateralisation was found, however, participants with ASD demonstrated a weaker right-hemispheric lateralisation compared to neurotypical participants. Therefore, this study supported the concept that individuals with ASD show atypical lateralisation which persists into adulthood, however, no evidence was found to support the concept that different emotions elicit different strengths of lateralisation.
creator: Alexandra Crossley
source: Method Participants Data from a total of 481 participants with native level English proficiency (or age expected language development in children), normal or corrected-to-normal vision and no history of neurological disease or hearing loss were analysed for the current study (Table 1). Participants in the group ‘adults with ASD’ (N = 30; age: M = 30.17, SD = 9.85) were recruited through adverts on social media, through Prolific Academic (www.prolific.co), and through word of mouth. Participants in the groups ‘children with ASD’ (N = 5; age: M = 6.8, SD = 1.48) and ‘neurotypical children’ (N = 11; age: M = 7.0, SD = 1.90) were recruited through primary schools and word of mouth (Brooks, 2023), and parents of potential child participants were required to email a researcher to express their interest in participation. Participants in the group ‘neurotypical adults’ (N = 435; age: M = 29.44, SD = 8.03) were recruited through Prolific Academic (www.prolific.co) as part of a larger online behavioural laterality battery (Parker et al., 2021). Of the 481 participants who took part in the study, 32 were excluded during the data cleaning process (see Table 1 and Data Analysis for further information). Measures As part of the study, a series of questionnaires were administered to collect information about the participants to ensure that individual differences could be accounted for. Participants were asked to complete the study and its associated questionnaires and tasks prior to beginning the main chimeric faces task, and were requested to use a desktop or laptop computer for the entirety of the study. For the ‘neurotypical children’ and ‘children with ASD’ groups, parents were asked to complete the questionnaires on behalf of the children and were asked to be present for the tasks, which were completed during a Microsoft Teams call with a researcher. The study was completed online using the Gorilla Experiment Builder (www.gorilla.sc), a cloud-based tool for collecting data in…
publisher: Lancaster University
date: 5th September 2023
contributor: Mshary Al Jaber
rights: Open
relation: None
format: .csv
language: English
type: Data
coverage: LA1 4YF

What person attributes influence the comprehension of written health information? A scoping review and critical appraisal
subject: health literacy, comprehension, person attributes, health outcomes.
description: Increasingly, individuals are required to be actively involved in their healthcare. To do so successfully, individuals need to possess the skills and resources to be able to access, understand, and apply health information. Health communication guidance proposes that health information is not understood due to the mismatch between adults average literacy skills and the literacy skills required to comprehend health information. To tackle this, the use of plain language, such as shortening sentences and removing jargon, is promoted. Policies, however, do not commonly consider the impact of person attributes, such as age, education, and gender, on the comprehension of health information. To understand the nature and scope of current research, and whether person attributes do have an impact, a scoping review was conducted. The search strategy yielded 5,459 articles which were then screened, resulting in a final sample of 99 studies. Quantitative analyses and a critical appraisal revealed three main findings: (1) the research is heterogenous and evolving; (2) person attributes are not commonly used in analyses; and (3) when person attributes are included, the effects on comprehension vary. The findings and implications of this review have the potential to influence how future research is conducted, and crucially inform policies about the importance of person attributes on the comprehension of health information.
creator: Charlotte Betts
source: Stage 1: Identify the Research Question The current research is an updated scoping review, building upon earlier work by Davies et al. (in preparation), which seeks to answer: What person attributes affect or can be predicted to affect the response of individuals to written health information? Table 2 Form Developer: Rebecca A. James Search strategy methods Strategy Method Bibliographic Searched the following: Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature (CINAHL); PsycINFO; PubMed; and Web of Science (WoS). Journal Obtained all sources from the following journals between 2018-11-08 and 2023-05-05: Patient Education and Counselling; Health Communication; and Journal of Health Communication. Author Obtained sources from the following authors between the dates 2018-11-08 and 2023-05-05: TC Davis; Dan Morrow; Chiung-Ju Liu; Michael Paasche-Orlow; Lisa Soederberg Miller; Rima Rudd; and Michael Wolf. Reference Once the full text of the bibliographic, journal, and author searches were complete, the reference lists of the included items were examined to locate new and possibly relevant articles. Stage 2: Identifying Relevant Studies Sources were identified using four methods: (1) bibliographic search; (2) journal search; (3) author search; and (4) reference search. Grey literature was not searched due to concerns with the quality of the literature and possible time constraints. Excluding the reference search, all articles were published between 8th November 2018 to 5th May 2023. Details of each of the search methods are outlined in Table 2. Stage 3: Study Selection Once articles were imported to Rayyan, a free online software application for conducting reviews (Ouzzani et al., 2016), duplicate articles were identified and removed. Then articles went through a title and abstract screening whereby articles which did not include the following were excluded: (1) a measure of understanding, comprehension, or readability; (2) a quantitative outcome; (3) populations wh…
publisher: Lancaster University
date: 11/09/2023
contributor: Oliver Powell
rights: Unsure. Contact Dr. Rob Davies.
relation: In part, in collaboration with TM. Supervised by Dr. Rob Davies
format: Data.csv and Text.doc
language: English
type: Scoping Review
coverage: LA1 4YW

Prospect theory and intermediate audience: the effects of context on behavioural intention
subject: Prospect theory, gain/loss framing, intermediate audience, communication research, health communication, vaccination
description: Prospect theory predicts how people react to gain or loss-framed outcomes in dilemma situations, where the potential consequence of the choice is framed as a gain (e.g., lives saved) or as a loss (lives lost). This gain-loss framing communication strategy, derived from the theory, has been applied in many contexts, from promoting the use of reusable coffee mugs to vaccination compliance, with loss-framed appeals being found generally to be more persuasive than gain-framed appeals in the context of promoting vaccination. The current study focused on exploring whether these well-established effects persist when an intermediate audience is exposed to gain/loss-framed messaging, using influenza (flu) vaccination intentionality as an outcome. Intermediate audiences refer to those who are evaluating the gains and losses from the message on behalf of someone else (the ultimate audience), while normal audiences are those making decisions on their own behalf. Two hundred participants were recruited for an online, between-subject study, in which participants were split into two audience conditions and within which they were further split to view a gain-framed or a loss-framed message. Their subsequent behavioural intentions were measured as the outcome, with age as a potential moderating factor (and emotional attachment as a potential mediator exclusively for the intermediate audience condition). Results indicate that neither age nor emotional attachment are significant moderators or mediators. Loss-framed appeal enjoyed a persuasive advantage over the gain-framed appeal only in the intermediate audience condition. Possible interpretations of results, along with potential further directions of research, are discussed.
creator: Wai Man Ko
source: To test the outlined hypotheses, our current study took the form of an online Qualtrics questionnaire (see appendix B for questions) where the questionnaire would introduce participants to one of the audience conditions and view the appropriate version of the manipulated message before moving on to answering some items measuring their behavioural intention and emotional attachment. The study has a 2 (intermediate/normal audience condition) X 2 (gain/loss-framed appeal) design with emotional attachment as a potential mediating variable for the intermediate audience condition and behavioural intention as the outcome variable for all audience conditions. Participants We recruited 200 healthy adults based in the UK on Prolific, an online research participant recruitment platform. Participants have provided consent and completed the study remotely with their personal devices. Their unique Prolific ID was used in this study as the only identifier, which cannot be traced back to them personally. Participants were compensated monetarily for their participation. We randomly assigned our participants to one of the four audience conditions with 50 participants each: the normal gain-framed condition, the normal loss-framed condition, the intermediate gain-framed condition, and the intermediate loss-framed condition. Questionnaire design Consent The participant gave consent to participate in the study with the Qualtrics consent element so that participants can check a box for each item. There were seven items that the participants had to check one by one before commencing the study. Responses which failed to provide a full response in the consent item would be removed from the study. Demographics For demographics, we have recorded the participants' age and gender for the records. As mentioned, age was also analysed as a moderator as part of our analysis. We have also recorded their Prolific IDs to ensure completion and arrange payment. Settings of the study After giving demograp…
publisher: Lancaster University
date: 2023
contributor: Hannah Clough
rights: Open
format: Data.csv
language: English
type: Data
coverage: LA1 4YF

Does Noise Affect How Children Learn Grammar in the Classroom?
subject: Grammar, Noise, Working Memory
description: In a classroom environment noise can be a significant impediment, obstructing and distorting essential information being taught. Extensive prior research consistently indicates that noise has a detrimental impact on learning, those who learn in noise retain and comprehend far less information than their counterparts who learn in quiet. To date there are no studies that investigate the effect of noise on learning grammar specifically -the primary aim of the current study is the address this research gap. This paper details our recruitment of 16 children aged 7– 12 through the Babylab database at Lancaster university. This study employed a between participants design, where children completed a three-part audio evaluation, engaged in an artificial grammar paradigm, and a undertook a working memory task. The artificial grammar paradigm was employed as our primary assessment tool, participants were exposed to the grammar either in noise or in quiet. Results were analysed using a multiple regression with total grammar score as the dependent variable and age, gender, condition, and working memory as the independent variables. In contrast the prior research, our results revealed that the effect of the independent variables on the dependent variable was statistically nonsignificant, proving our null hypotheses to be true. These findings suggest that background noise does not affect how children learn grammar in the classroom challenging the existing understanding that noise negatively impacts learning. Analysis In order to answer our research questions we will carry out a multiple linear regression using IBM SPSS Statistics (version 28). We will be employing a between participants design where we will examine the effect of background noise (noisy and quiet) on total grammar score. Our additional independent variables will be working memory, gender and age. If we find a statistically significant result with regard to grammar score then we will be conducting a post hoc test o…
creator: Ashlynn Mayo
source: Participants 16 children aged 7-12 years old participated in this study, unfortunately due to technical issues 5 participants’ data were excluded leaving 11 children’s data to be included in the analysis (M=8.64, SD=1.63, female=7, male=4). Children were recruited through the Lancaster University Babylab database and by flyers posted on social media and local community. A requirement of the current study was that children be English speaking monolinguals, this is because an abundance of research has indicated that those who can speak two or more languages are at a far greater advantage when it comes to new language acquisition (Antoniou et al., 2015). Therefore, in order to control the likelihood of extraneous variables such as this we ensured all participants were English speaking monolinguals only. Furthermore, children were also required to have normal vision or corrected to normal vision. To rule out hearing loss all children had to pass an otoscope inspection, a tympanometry test, and a pure tone hearing screening at 20dB in the standard frequencies (250Hz-8kHZ). The current study employed a between participant design whereby subjects were allocated to a condition based on their age and gender -age was categorised into 7-9 and 10-12 in order to ensure that there were as equal an amount of males and females in each condition over all ages. It is crucial for the validity of the study that children are only exposed to the artificial grammar paradigm once or data will be rendered unreliable as they will have an unfair advantage over the other participants. Ethics for the current study have been obtained from the Departmental Ethics Committee (DEC), Psychology Department at Lancaster University. Materials This study was conducted within a double walled soundproof chamber at Lancaster University’s PELiCAN lab where the participant sat at a desk with a monitor placed in front of them. A secondary researcher was present in the lab for health and safety purposes. Consen…
publisher: Lancaster University
date: 2023
contributor: Tejasvita Rajawat Audred Visaya
rights: Open
relation: None
format: Text/Word.doc Data/Excel.csv
language: English
type: Data
coverage: LA1 4YF

Hemispheric Lateralisation of Facial Emotion Processing: A Possible Explanation of Atypical Empathetic Responses in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder
subject: Hemispheric Lateralisation, Emotion Processing, Autism Spectrum Disorder, Empathy, Chimeric Face Task
description: Existing research suggests that children with autism are endowed with a significant delay in the lateralisation of facial emotion processing (Taylor et al., 2012), and that this delay is associated with some of the social and emotional based deficits that manifest within the disorder. The present study therefore aimed to ascertain the reliability of Taylor et al.’s (2012) findings by determining whether the strength of lateralisation for facial emotion processing differs between children with and without autism, while also determining whether this difference can explain atypical empathetic responses in children with autism. To explore these aims, an online version of the chimeric face task was administered to 11 neurotypical children and 5 children with a diagnosis of autism. The Child Empathy Quotient was completed by parents of all children, and The Autism Quotient – Children’s Version was completed by parents of children with autism. Results indicated that there was no significant difference in the strength of hemispheric lateralisation for facial emotion processing between children with and without autism, and that the strength of lateralisation did not predict a child’s level of empathy, nor did a child’s autism severity. Instead, levels of empathy were best predicted by an individual’s diagnostic status and age. The present study was therefore unable to support the finding of Taylor et al. (2012) or explain empathy deficits in the autistic population. However, the limitations identified in this study help to inform future research on the relationship between the lateralisation of facial emotion processing and empathy.
creator: Lydia Brooks
source: Participants Participants were recruited from mainstream primary schools, wrap around care settings and specialist educational provisions in the Lancashire area, as well as via social media. A total of 22 parents completed the required questionnaires on behalf of their children, out of which 17 parents arranged a date and time for their child to complete the chimeric face task. One child, who is non-verbal and has received a diagnosis of ASD had difficulty completing the task and selected responses impulsively without looking at, or taking sufficient time to consider, the facial stimuli and the emotion it depicted. For this reason, the chimeric face task was terminated prior to completion and the child’s data was not included in the analysis. The final sample of participants consisted of 16 children aged between 5- and 10-years-old, of which 5 had received a formal diagnosis of ASD (5 boys; Mage = 6.8, SDage = 1.48). One child with ASD had a comorbid diagnosis of hypermobility and sensory processing disorder. All children with ASD were reported to speak English at home, one child was left-hand dominant, and four children were right-hand dominant. The remaining participants were 11 typically developing children (6 girls, 5 boys; Mage = 7.0, SDage = 1.90), who had not been diagnosed with any neurodevelopmental disorders. One of these children was reported to speak Russian at home, however, is fluent in English. All children in the typically developing group were right-hand dominant. Design A two-factor between-subjects experimental design was employed to determine whether the strength of hemispheric lateralisation for facial emotion processing differs between children with and without a diagnosis of ASD. The independent variable for this research question was diagnostic status, a between-subject factor, with two groups; ASD and typically developing. Participants were assigned to one of these groups based on their diagnostic status, which was ascertained by their paren…
publisher: Lancaster University
date: 07.09.2023
contributor: Ching Yee Pang Aleeza Sulaman
rights: Open
relation: N/A
format: Data/Excel.csv
language: English
type: Data
coverage: LA1 4YF

The Effect of Positive and Negative Emotional States on the Price Sensitivity to Green Fast-Moving Consumer Goods in the UK
subject: Psychology, behaviour, mood, pricing, green marketing, advertising
description: Consumers are growing increasingly aware about the environmental consequences of their daily purchases, creating a potentially lucrative space for agile brands to leverage sustainable or green fast-moving consumer good (FMCG) production and increase revenue and profit. However, a fuller exploitation of this growth is impeded by the high costs of offering greener FMCG’s, which are passed onto consumers via higher prices, leading to a preference for cheaper, non-green FMCG’s due to price sensitivity. The purpose of this study was to investigate the power of positive and negative emotional states in reducing this price sensitivity and thus, increasing green FMCG buying behaviour. To induce the two emotional states, conventionally happy and sad video stimuli were utilised, followed by a fictional product selection between green and non-green FMCG’s. The research involved two phases. Phase 1 applied a qualitative method in the form of two focus groups (total n = 10) to test and enhance the general research procedure, while gathering additional insights regarding the overall study subject. Phase 2 integrated the refined procedure into a quantitative questionnaire, which involved a sample for each emotional state and a third sample as a control (total n = 300). The results demonstrated that neither positive nor negative emotional states had an overall significant influence on FMCG product selection. The discussion of the results includes insights from Phase 1 and provides recommendations for brands. The study limitations and future research directions are also presented. The research was conducted for and funded by Astroten – a behavioural science consultancy in London.
creator: Oleksandr (Alex) Myroshnychenko
source: Methods Overall Design In accordance with the research questions and hypotheses, the methodology tested the effect of positive and negative emotional states, which were induced by two online videos. Each video contained copyright-free footage, one depicting humorous scenes (positive state), and the other depicting sadness (negative state). The impact of the videos’ mood-inducement was primarily measured by the outcomes of a fictional product selection in which participants chose between a more expensive green FMCG and a less expensive non-green FMCG. Specific Design The project comprised two data collection and analysis phases. Phase 1 was a pilot qualitative study in which the overall design described above was discussed/tested and a series of additional questions regarding the relationship between green and non-green FMCG’s, emotional state (mood), and price were asked. Hence, the utility of Phase 1 was two-fold. First, it obtained richer insights afforded by the inherent advantage of qualitative research over quantitative research, through an in-depth exploration of participants’ perspectives around their decision-making regarding more expensive green FMCG’s. Second, this same advantage also yielded direct feedback from the participants on the general procedure so that it could be refined for Phase 2 – an online quantitative questionnaire. The questionnaire’s purpose was to achieve a stronger empirical basis for the effects of positive and negative emotional states. Phase 1: Pilot Qualitative Study The qualitative approach for Phase 1 consisted of focus groups. This method was selected because focus groups could facilitate the dynamic development of ideas between participants in contrast to individual in-depth interviews. In the latter, certain thoughts and perspectives could have failed to emerge, and to introduce these thoughts and perspectives, the researcher would risk posing leading questions, affecting data validity. In addition, given the study timeframe, …
publisher: Lancaster University
date: 08/09/2023
contributor: Dan Qiao
rights: open
relation: None
format: Data
language: English
type: Data
coverage: LA1 4YF

Third Parties and Police Use of Lethal Force: Evidence from the Mapping Police Violence Database
subject: Lethal force, Third Parties, Police Citizen Interactions, Use of Force
description: Over recent years media coverage has highlighted the use of excessive force by some police officers. The use of lethal force towards black and other ethnic minority citizens has been identified as a cause for significant concern. Research in the bystander literature and in non-fatal force policing contexts has identified that third parties can have positive impacts in reducing the severity of these incidences. The role of third parties in fatal force events, however, has not been investigated. This is something which the current study seeks to address. The Mapping Police Violence database was used to identify a year’s worth of lethal force events in the US. Newspaper articles relating to these incidents have been coded in line with a predefined coding framework to examine the presence of third parties in these incidents, and the nature of any social relationships with third parties in relation to the type of lethal force utilised. The results revealed that third parties were present in just under half of incidences and that the presence of a third-party with a pre-existing social relationship to the citizen was associated with a lower likelihood of officers utilising forms of ‘less lethal’ force to the extent that it results in a citizen fatality. These findings highlight the potential importance of third parties in understanding the nature of lethal police citizen interactions, and also the potential protective role the presence of known others may have in reducing the likelihood of officers excessively utilising forms of less lethal force.
creator: Sian Reid
source: A secondary data analysis was utilised to examine the presence of third parties in incidences of police use of lethal force. The Mapping Police Violence database (Mapping Police Violence, 2020) was the primary dataset utilised for the study. This is a freely available and open public database compiled by researchers in the US which aims to provide a record of all police involved deaths in the US. This database has been recording police involved deaths in the US since 2013, primarily gathering information through news articles published by various American news outlets. The type of force engaged in by officers that resulted in death was utilised as the outcome variable. The predictor variables were the presence of third parties, the presence of any known third parties, or unknown third parties, the number of officers present, the presence of other emergency services, the location of the incident, the race of the citizen, the gender of the citizen, the alleged presence of a weapon, the initial reason for the encounter, the presence of any digital technology capturing the event and the level of threat posed to the officer. The Mapping Police Violence database records multiple variables in relation to these incidences, including individual and situational factors. Several of the predictor variables included in the current study have been gathered from this dataset; specifically, the type of lethal force used, the alleged presence of a weapon, the race of the citizen, the gender of the citizen, the level of threat posed to the officer, the initial encounter reason and the presence of a body worn camera. Within the current study, most of these variables have been used as recorded in the dataset, however, the level of threat posed to the officer has been recategorized. The multiple different levels of threat recorded in the dataset have been regrouped into three categories: attack (indicating the greatest level of threat to the officer), other (referring to any other level…
date: 6th September 2023
contributor: Charlotte Thompson
rights: Open
relation: N/A
format: Excel.csv r_file. R
language: English
type: Data
identifier: Reid, 2023