Chapter 1. Is Public Affection a Public Affliction?

Introduction

In this activity, you will refine your observational research skills by identifying instances of public displays of affection. You will use these observations to draw conclusions about commonality of displays of affection among couples in public settings.

Dr. Natalie J. Ciarocco, Monmouth University

Dr. David B. Strohmetz, Monmouth University

Dr. Gary W. Lewandowski, Jr., Monmouth University

Something to Think About…

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Scenario: It’s Friday night and you’re standing in line, waiting to buy tickets for a movie you’ve been anticipating for months. The line is long, which gives you a chance to watch people. As you scan the crowd, you notice a couple in the next line being overly affectionate, kissing, rubbing noses, giggling, and talking to each other in that goofy voice people who are dating use. Sure, they appear to be in love, but for some reason their behavior comes across to you as sickeningly sweet. Are you predisposed to dislike this behavior, or does it just catch you off-guard? After all, when you were looking at everyone in line, you did not see any other couples acting this way.

Something to Think About…

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Public displays of affection occur when a couple engages in acts of physical intimacy in view of others, typically strangers. There are many factors that play a role in how you react to seeing public displays of affection. Observer comfort with such acts varies from person to person and from culture to culture, but your comfort level may depend on which acts a couple publicly displays. Before you can know why people react differently to public displays of affection, you must first identify how often people who appear romantically involved engage in these behaviors.

Our Research Question

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Given your observation at the movie theater, you decide to develop a research study to investigate public displays of affection. But first, you need something to guide your exploration of this topic. Research studies all start with a question, so here is your chance to ask one of your own.

Picking the Best Design

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Now that you have established a research question (“How common are public displays of affection?”), you must decide which type of research design best answers your research question. To narrow down your options, consider the following:

Picking the Best Design

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Now that you know a behavioral measure will work best, you must determine which type of behavioral measure to use.

• Behavioral Choice

• Behavioral Trace

• Behavioral Observation

Picking an Observational Method

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If you want to collect data using a behavioral observation, you will need to figure out which type of behavioral observation is best. When in doubt, think back to your research question (“How common are public displays of affection?”). Now, consider the following:

Picking an Observational Method

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Picking an Observational Method

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Here are 3 common types of observations that researchers use:

• Naturalistic

• Contrived

• Participant

Picking an Observational Method

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You now know you will not be part of the observation, but how much do the couples you are observing need to know? You must decide whether your observation should be concealed or nonconcealed.

• Concealed

• Nonconcealed

Developing a Coding System

You are well on your way to completing a naturalistic concealed observation. But before you begin, you are going to need a coding system to keep track of the observations you make.

• Coding System

This means you need an operational definition or a description of exactly what you mean by “public displays of affection.”

Given that you want to determine how common public displays of affection are, what behaviors might you observe and record? List 3 behaviors that could be examples of affection seen in public.

Developing a Coding System

Now that you know which behaviors you want to observe, you need to determine what aspects of the behaviors you want to code most. Although a certain behavior, such as a kiss, might seem simple, there are many aspects of it that you could analyze. For example, you could complete a duration recording, writing down for how long a couple kisses, or a frequency-count recording, writing down how many times a couple kisses.

• Duration Recording

• Frequency-Count Recording

Determining Your Hypothesis

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Now that you have determined how and what you will observe, you need to think about how the study might turn out.

Finding a Sample

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Before you can conduct your observation, you need to determine exactly whom you want to observe and where you can find this target sample. In a naturalistic observation, you must find your participants in a place where the behaviors you are interested in (in this case, displays of affection) will occur organically. There are many settings in which your observation could occur, but you are seeking the place that best fits your research needs.

Submitting to the IRB

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Now that you have determined how you will collect your data and your intended sample, you must submit your research procedure to the Institutional Review Board (IRB) for ethical approval. The IRB or ethics board will determine whether or not your study meets all ethical guidelines.

• IRB

Each IRB has its own protocol which conforms to the national standard when a researcher submits an application for proposed research to be reviewed. In addition to the appropriate paperwork and other information submitted to the IRB, the board would consider the following description during their evaluation of your proposed experiment:

• The purpose of this research is to determine how common public displays of affection are. To study this topic, the researchers will conduct a naturalistic observation at a local coffeehouse. Participants will be unaware of the observations. Research observers will monitor participants’ behaviors from a distance and will not interact with them in any way. During the observations, the researchers will record the number of couples that enter the coffeehouse, as well as the number of times couples engage in a variety of affectionate behaviors.

Responding to the IRB

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The IRB reviewed your submission and has a major concern. While they understand that you are observing naturally occurring behaviors and therefore do not need informed consent, they are concerned about observations of people under the age of 18, which is considered a special population by the IRB.

You must now determine how to respond to the IRB, keeping in mind that you want to address their concern while still upholding the quality of your study.

Design in Action

With your IRB approval secured, it is time to begin conducting your observation of public displays of affection in the coffeehouse setting. Note how often each behavior you submitted on Screen 11 occurs, and how many couples are present during your observation.

Pilot Testing

What you just did was a pilot test, which is a trial run of a study that researchers use to refine its design, methods, and instruments prior to carrying out the actual research.

• Pilot Testing

Take a moment to think about whether your coding system was effective. Did you find the behaviors you were looking for easily? Was the location you chose an adequate place to gather data?

Revising the Coding System

Now that you have practiced collecting observational data on public displays of affection, you likely need to revise and improve your coding system. Researchers rarely get everything right with their original coding system, which is why they pilot it first and then revise it.

Design in Action: Take 2

Collecting Data

Now that you have seen how to conduct observational research and use observational coding, let’s consider what a full version of this study might look like.

If you were to run a full version of this study, you would want to have 2 trained observers spend 45 hours at a local coffeehouse. Having 2 observers helps with the reliability of their observations. The observers would record the number of couples who patronized the coffeehouse and would code the frequency of hand-holding, kissing, and hugging that occurred between couples during the observation. As an example, let’s say that in all, observers coded behavior from 72 couples.

Example Data Set

This is an example of what the data set would look like. The top row shows the variable names; the other rows display the data for the first 10 couples observed.

Selecting the Proper Tool

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Now that you have collected your data, you must decide the best way to summarize your findings. The decisions you made about how to collect your data dictate the statistics you can use with your data now. First, you need to consider if your study is descriptive or inferential.

• Descriptive

• Inferential

Tutorial: Evaluating Output

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The following is an example of output for another observational study. This study investigated how often people text and call while having dinner in a restaurant.

Your Turn: Evaluating Output

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Below is the output from your study.

Your Turn: Evaluating Output

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Based on the results of your statistical analyses, match the correct number to the term requested:

Activity: Graphing Results

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Your Turn: Results

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Now that you have worked with your data, you must determine the best way to express your findings in written form. You must be sure that how you describe your findings accurately represents the data itself.

Take Home Message

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You have determined how to express your findings in a scientifically responsible way. Now, you need to be able to talk about what your findings mean in everyday terms so that the world can benefit from your science.

Congratulations! You have successfully completed this activity.

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