Chapter 7. How Would You Know If People Can Learn to Reduce Anxiety?

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You must read each slide, and complete any questions on the slide, in sequence.
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confounding variable
A factor other than the factor(s) being studied that might produce an effect in a research study.
random assignment
assigning participants to experimental and control groups by chance, thus minimizing preexisting differences between the different groups.
negative reinforcement
increasing behaviors by stopping or reducing negative stimuli, such as feelings of anxiety. A negative reinforcer is any stimulus that, when removed after a response (such as meditation), strengthens the response.

By:

C. Nathan DeWall, University of Kentucky

David G. Myers, Hope College

Credits: Kevin Law/All Canada Photos/Getty Images

7.2

INTRO
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Note: You will be guided through the Intro, Design, Measure, Interpret, Conclusion, and Quiz sections of this activity. You can see your progress highlighted in the non-clickable, navigational list at the right. Watch this video from your author, Nathan DeWall, for a helpful, very brief overview of the activity.

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DESIGN

So, how would you know if people can learn to reduce anxiety? To study this question in your role as researcher, you need to DESIGN an appropriate study that will lead to meaningful results, MEASURE if people can learn to reduce anxiety, and INTERPRET the larger meaning of your results, considering how your findings would apply to the population as a whole.

For the purposes of this study, let’s assume our participants will be learning to meditate as a means of reducing anxiety. By meditate, we mean to engage in thoughtful reflection or contemplation.
We know from other researchers’ work that therapeutic meditation reduces anxiety, but let’s study whether people can learn to use meditation as a way to reduce their own anxiety.

Question

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Click on "Video Hint" below to see brief animations describing Experiments, Naturalistic Observation, and Correlational Studies.

Video Hint

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7.4

Experiments:

Download transcript.

Naturalistic Observation:

Download transcript.

Correlational Studies:

Download transcript.
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You have chosen Naturalistic Observation as your design, which means you want to carefully observe participants in a natural environment—outside the lab—and make notes about what they do. For example, researchers have used naturalistic observation designs to learn about how children play. They have spent many thousands of hours observing children playing in different environments, carefully tracking their behaviors, and watching for meaningful patterns.

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What could we learn from these participant choices?

A small group of people who regularly meditate. Observing this group of people over time would not help you test whether people can learn to meditate in order to feel less anxious. You would instead need to have two groups to compare—those who have not learned to meditate when they feel anxious with those who have learned this skill

A small group of people who enjoy reading meditation books. Studying a group of people who enjoy reading meditation books would not help us address the question of whether people can learn to meditate to reduce their anxiety. We would instead need to have two groups to compare—people who learn to meditate when they feel anxious and people who do not learn to meditate when they feel anxious.

A small group of people who learn to meditate when feeling anxious and another small group of people who do not learn to meditate when feeling anxious. You do need to compare two groups—those who learn to meditate when feeling anxious and those who do not learn to meditate when feeling anxious. HOWEVER, you need to study a large group, not a small group of people as you would in this naturalistic observation approach, in order to determine if the idea of people learning to reduce their anxiety may apply to a larger population. You would also need to do more than observe behaviors, which wouldn’t be a clear indicator of the degree of anxiety a participant may be experiencing.

I'm not sure.

Trying to choose a sample of participants helps us realize that NATURALISTIC OBSERVATION IS NOT THE BEST RESEARCH DESIGN to test this question. Although we could use naturalistic observation to gather detailed information about a small group of people, do you think it would be appropriate to apply those findings to a larger population? Would knowing that a few people learned to use meditation to reduce anxiety tell you something about people in general? Or might it be difficult to know if something other than meditation affected their anxiety in a way that would not hold true for most people?

We’d get more helpful results by studying large groups of people, which would allow us to apply our results to a broad population. We would also want to do more than observe our participants; we would need to measure how systematic changes in meditation practices influence anxiety levels. And we would need to compare results in two groups—those who learn to practice meditation to reduce anxiety, and those who do not.

Click “Next” to go back and try again to select the most effective research design.

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A small group of people who regularly meditate. Observing this group of people over time would not help you test whether people can learn to meditate in order to feel less anxious. You would instead need to have two groups to compare—those who have not learned to meditate when they feel anxious with those who have learned this skill.

A small group of people who enjoy reading meditation books. Studying a group of people who enjoy reading meditation books would not help us address the question of whether people can learn to meditate to reduce their anxiety. We would instead need to have two groups to compare—people who learn to meditate when they feel anxious and people who do not learn to meditate when they feel anxious.

A small group of people who learn to meditate when feeling anxious and another small group of people who do not learn to meditate when feeling anxious. You do need to compare two groups—those who learn to meditate when feeling anxious and those who do not learn to meditate when feeling anxious. HOWEVER, you need to study a large group, not a small group of people as you would in this naturalistic observation approach, in order to determine if the idea of people learning to reduce their anxiety may apply to a larger population. You would also need to do more than observe behaviors, which wouldn’t be a clear indicator of the degree of anxiety a participant may be experiencing.

I'm not sure.

Trying to choose a sample of participants helps us realize that NATURALISTIC OBSERVATION IS NOT THE BEST RESEARCH DESIGN to test this question. Although we could use naturalistic observation to gather detailed information about a small group of people, do you think it would be appropriate to apply those findings to a larger population? Would knowing that a few people learned to use meditation to reduce anxiety tell you something about people in general? Or might it be difficult to know if something other than meditation affected their anxiety in a way that would not hold true for most people?

We’d get more helpful results by studying large groups of people, which would allow us to apply our results to a broad population. We would also want to do more than observe our participants; we would need to measure how systematic changes in meditation practices influence anxiety levels. And we would need to compare results in two groups—those who learn to practice meditation to reduce anxiety, and those who do not.

Click “Next” to go back and try again to select the most effective research design.

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A small group of people who regularly meditate. Observing this group of people over time would not help you test whether people can learn to meditate in order to feel less anxious. You would instead need to have two groups to compare—those who have not learned to meditate when they feel anxious with those who have learned this skill.

A small group of people who enjoy reading meditation books. Studying a group of people who enjoy reading meditation books would not help us address the question of whether people can learn to meditate to reduce their anxiety. We would instead need to have two groups to compare—people who learn to meditate when they feel anxious and people who do not learn to meditate when they feel anxious.

A small group of people who learn to meditate when feeling anxious and another small group of people who do not learn to meditate when feeling anxious. You do need to compare two groups - those who learn to meditate when feeling anxious and those who do not learn to meditate when feeling anxious. HOWEVER, you need to study a large group, not a small group of people as you would in this naturalistic observation approach, in order to determine if the idea of people learning to reduce their anxiety may apply to a larger population. You would also need to do more than observe behaviors, which wouldn’t be a clear indicator of the degree of anxiety a participant may be experiencing.

I'm not sure.

Trying to choose a sample of participants helps us realize that NATURALISTIC OBSERVATION IS NOT THE BEST RESEARCH DESIGN to test this question. Although we could use naturalistic observation to gather detailed information about a small group of people, do you think it would be appropriate to apply those findings to a larger population? Would knowing that a few people learned to use meditation to reduce anxiety tell you something about people in general? Or might it be difficult to know if something other than meditation affected their anxiety in a way that would not hold true for most people?

We’d get more helpful results by studying large groups of people, which would allow us to apply our results to a broad population. We would also want to do more than observe our participants; we would need to measure how systematic changes in meditation practices influence anxiety levels. And we would need to compare results in two groups—those who learn to practice meditation to reduce anxiety, and those who do not.

Click “Next” to go back and try again to select the most effective research design.

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Credit: Kristian/Sekulic/Vetta/Getty Images

A small group of people who regularly meditate. Observing this group of people over time would not help you test whether people can learn to meditate in order to feel less anxious. You would instead need to have two groups to compare—those who have not learned to meditate when they feel anxious with those who have learned this skill.

A small group of people who enjoy reading meditation books. Studying a group of people who enjoy reading meditation books would not help us address the question of whether people can learn to meditate to reduce their anxiety. We would instead need to have two groups to compare—people who learn to meditate when they feel anxious and people who do not learn to meditate when they feel anxious.

A small group of people who learn to meditate when feeling anxious and another small group of people who do not learn to meditate when feeling anxious. You do need to compare two groups - those who learn to meditate when feeling anxious and those who do not learn to meditate when feeling anxious. HOWEVER, you need to study a large group, not a small group of people as you would in this naturalistic observation approach, in order to determine if the idea of people learning to reduce their anxiety may apply to a larger population. You would also need to do more than observe behaviors, which wouldn’t be a clear indicator of the degree of anxiety a participant may be experiencing.

I'm not sure.

Trying to choose a sample of participants helps us realize that NATURALISTIC OBSERVATION IS NOT THE BEST RESEARCH DESIGN to test this question. Although we could use naturalistic observation to gather detailed information about a small group of people, do you think it would be appropriate to apply those findings to a larger population? Would knowing that a few people learned to use meditation to reduce anxiety tell you something about people in general? Or might it be difficult to know if something other than meditation affected their anxiety in a way that would not hold true for most people?

We’d get more helpful results by studying large groups of people, which would allow us to apply our results to a broad population. We would also want to do more than observe our participants; we would need to measure how systematic changes in meditation practices influence anxiety levels. And we would need to compare results in two groups—those who learn to practice meditation to reduce anxiety, and those who do not.

Click “Next” to go back and try again to select the most effective research design.

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You have chosen a Correlational design, which means you want to examine the association between two or more variables. For example, when testing whether sleep deprivation relates to slower mental processing, researchers have recruited a large group of people and measured (1) how much they sleep and (2) their mental processing speed. This allowed researchers to determine whether the two variables of sleep deprivation and slower mental processing are related. (They are.)

Question

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One possible correlational design would examine the association between meditation behavior and anxiety levels. In fact, researchers have found that these two variables are related—the more people meditate, the less anxiety they feel. But this does not tell us whether the meditation CAUSES people to feel less anxious, or if perhaps naturally less anxious people enjoy meditating. We need to determine whether learning to meditate, compared with not learning to meditate, causes people to reduce their anxiety.

So, CORRELATIONAL IS NOT THE BEST RESEARCH DESIGN for this study. We’d get more helpful results by using a different design.

Click “Next” to go back and try again to select the most effective research design.

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Nice work! You have correctly chosen to use an Experimental design for your study.

Next, you need to choose the most appropriate study participants.

Question

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
Correct.
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You chose A group of people who regularly meditate, but that is NOT CORRECT.

To know whether people can learn to reduce their anxiety, you need to be able to compare TWO groups—those who learn to mediate when they feel anxious AND those who do not learn to meditate when they feel anxious. This way you can know whether learning to meditate, compared with not learning to meditate, causes people to reduce their anxiety.

Click “Next” to go back and try again to select the best participants for your experimental study.

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Credits: Shuji Kobayashi/The image Bank/Getty Images

You chose A group of people who enjoy reading meditation books, but that is NOT CORRECT.

Knowing that people enjoy reading meditation books does not tell us whether they would be appropriate study participants. To know whether people can learn to reduce their anxiety, you need to compare people who learn to meditate when they feel anxious with people who do not learn to meditate when they feel anxious.

Click “Next” to go back and try again to select the best participants for your experimental study.

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You chose A group of people who have family members who meditate and another group of people who do not have family members who meditate, but that is NOT CORRECT.

Knowing whether people have family members who do, or do not, meditate does not tell us whether they would be appropriate study participants. We need to compare two groups—those who learn to meditate when they feel anxious and those who do not—in order to know whether people can learn to reduce their anxiety with meditation.

Click “Next” to go back and try again to select the best participants for your experimental study.

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MEASURE
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Good job! You have correctly chosen to use an Experimental design. You will randomly assign participants either to meditate when feeling anxious, or not to meditate, in order to determine whether people can learn to meditate to reduce anxiety. You also selected an appropriate sample of participants—a group of people who you instruct to meditate when they experience anxiety, and another group of people you instruct not to meditate when they experience anxiety. Now you need to determine how best to MEASURE the relevant behavior or mental process, which in this case is how much people learn to reduce anxiety through meditation.

Learning to reduce anxiety will involve the principle of negative reinforcementstrengthening a response by reducing or removing an aversive stimulus. For example, people learn to take a painkiller because it reduces or removes the aversive stimulus of pain. In this study, we want to know whether learning to meditate will reduce or remove the aversive stimulus of anxiety. So, let’s first review positive and negative reinforcement.

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Here’s a quick overview of Types of Reinforcers from the text. After you’ve read this carefully, click “Next” to continue with selecting the best way to measure if people can learn to reduce their anxiety through meditation.

Negative reinforcement strengthens a response by reducing or removing something negative. Taking aspirin may relieve your headache, and hitting snooze will silence your annoying alarm. These welcome results provide negative reinforcement and increase the odds that you will repeat these behaviors. For drug addicts, the negative reinforcement of ending withdrawal pangs can be a compelling reason to resume using, according to a study from Baker and others, published in 2004. Note that negative reinforcement is not punishment. (Some friendly advice: Repeat that last sentence in your mind.) Rather, negative reinforcement—psychology’s most misunderstood concept—removes a punishing (aversive) event. Think of negative reinforcement as something that provides relief—from that bad headache or annoying alarm. Sometimes negative and positive reinforcement coincide. Imagine a worried student who, after goofing off and getting a bad exam grade, studies harder for the next exam. This increased effort may be negatively reinforced by reducing anxiety, and positively reinforced by a better grade. We reap the rewards of escaping the aversive stimulus, which increases the chances that we will repeat our behavior. The point to remember: Whether it works by reducing something aversive, or by providing something desirable, reinforcement is any consequence that strengthens behavior. Here are definitions: negative reinforcement means increasing behaviors by stopping or reducing negative stimuli. A negative reinforcer is any stimulus that, when removed after a response, strengthens the response. positive reinforcement means increasing behaviors by presenting positive reinforcers. A positive reinforcer is any stimulus that, when presented after a response, strengthens the response.
This is a cartoon with two panels. In the first panel we see a smiling baby girl lying comfortably on her back with hands behind her head in a big bed with her thought bubble saying, This is great! In the second panel we see a very tired-looking, sleeping father to the left of the baby, and a very tired-looking, sleeping mother to the right of the baby. The baby’s thought bubble now reads: I’ll have to wake up crying in the middle of the night more often
This is a table with three columns and two rows. The first column heading is Operant Conditioning Term. The second column heading is Description. The third column heading is Examples. The first Operant Conditioning Term is Positive Reinforcement, which has this Description: Add a desirable stimulus, and these Examples: Pet a dog that comes when you call it; pay the person who paints your house. The second Operant Conditioning Term is Negative Reinforcement, which has this Description: Remove an aversive stimulus, and these Examples: Take painkillers to end pain; fasten seatbelt to end loud beeping.

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Question

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Incorrect.
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You chose to ask your participants this question: When you feel anxious, how likely are you to read books about meditation?, but that is NOT CORRECT.

This option would tell you something about whether people feel interested in learning about meditation, but it would not give you information about whether people can learn to meditate to reduce their experience of anxiety. To know whether people can learn to reduce anxiety, it is necessary to measure their actual meditation behavior.

Click “Next” to try again to select the best way to measure whether people can learn to reduce anxiety.

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You chose to ask your participants this question: When you feel anxious, how likely are you to talk to other people about meditation?, but that is NOT CORRECT.

Knowing whether people talk to others when they feel anxious does not tell us anything about their meditation behavior. To know whether people can learn to use meditation to reduce anxiety, you need to measure whether they meditate when they experience anxiety.

Click “Next” to try again to select the best way to measure whether people can learn to reduce anxiety.

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You chose to ask your participants this question: When you feel anxious, how likely are you to think about meditating?, but that is NOT CORRECT.

This option would tell us how much anxiety relates to thinking about meditating, but it would not tell us whether people actually learn to meditate when they feel anxious.

Click “Next” to try again to select the best way to measure whether people can learn to reduce anxiety.

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Nice work! You chose an Experimental design, in which you randomly assigned participants either to meditate when feeling anxious, or not to meditate, in order to determine whether people can learn to meditate to reduce anxiety. You also chose an effective way to measure whether people can learn to reduce anxiety, which in this case is how likely people are to meditate when they experience anxiety. You chose to ask participants this question: When you feel anxious, how likely are you to use meditation to reduce your anxiety? (1=not at all likely to 7=very likely).”

Numerous studies have confirmed that people can indeed learn to use meditation to reduce anxiety (Goyal et al., 2014; Sedlmeier et al., 2012). As noted earlier, this type of learning is negative reinforcement, which strengthens a response (meditation) by reducing or removing something aversive, which in this case was anxiety.

Knowing this, you need to consider how you can apply what you’ve learned to the larger population—beyond the people you’ve studied. Consider where you might encounter roadblocks to confidence in your results. What factors might keep you from being able to apply what you’ve learned in a broader context?

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You tested whether people can learn to reduce anxiety through meditation. You instructed some people to meditate when they felt anxious and others not to meditate when they felt anxious. There are many factors that could affect whether your participants learn to reduce anxiety, and these factors may have little to do with the meditation instructions you gave them! Factors that could interfere with your INTERPRETATION of results are called confounding variables.

Question

Select all of the factors that could affect your confidence in the results of your study:

ZycNTMvpRoSnXPUZl8FiVl5s+iDEL2Bo Whether the experimenter makes people feel anxious

ZycNTMvpRoSnXPUZl8FiVl5s+iDEL2Bo Learning disability in the participant

3jskoxIwaHnoYr4Fsi2l/v3etGMIufia How many times participants have watched movies that make people anxious

ZycNTMvpRoSnXPUZl8FiVl5s+iDEL2Bo Personality traits related to experiencing anxiety

3jskoxIwaHnoYr4Fsi2l/v3etGMIufia Knowledge of the Tibetan culture

3jskoxIwaHnoYr4Fsi2l/v3etGMIufia Interest in physical activities, such as running

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Confounding Variables:

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The confounding variables for your study would include those highlighted below:

The highlighted confounding variables might influence your participants in several ways. Some people make others feel anxious. If an experimenter makes study participants feel anxious, those participants might have difficulty learning how to meditate. They might even learn to associate the study with feeling anxious! To reduce this confound, you would need to ensure that the experimenter makes study participants feel comfortable.

You should also determine whether study participants have a learning disability. People who have a learning disability may have difficulty learning to meditate. By keeping track of whether people have a learning disability, you can work to ensure that your participants all have approximately the same learning ability.

The third confounding variable relates to personality traits that might predispose people to experience anxiety. If some of the participants enter your study with significantly higher levels of anxiety than others, that might change your results. You would want to have participants complete a personality test before they enter the study. This way you could be sure that all of your participants have approximately the same levels of anxiety at the start.

Knowing whether people watch anxiety-producing movies, have knowledge about Tibetan culture, or have an interest in physical activities, such as running, does not tell you anything about whether they can learn to reduce their anxiety.

Note that by randomly assigning participants to either the meditation or no meditation condition, you control for many other possible confounding variables. With random assignment, each participant has the same chance of being assigned to each group. This should give each of your groups a balanced number of participants expressing these variations.

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Random Assignment:

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You may do better on the Quiz if you take notes while watching this video. Feel free to pause the video or re-watch it as often as you like.

REFERENCES

Goyal, M., Singh, S., Sibinga, E. S., et al. (2014). Meditation programs for psychological stress and well-being: A systematic review and meta-analysis. JAMA Internal Medicine, 174, 357–368.

Hofmann, S. G., Sawyer, A. T., Witt, A. A., & Oh, D. (2010). The effect of mindfulness-based therapy on anxiety and depression: A meta-analytic review. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology,78, 169.

Piet, J., Würtzen, H., & Zachariae, R. (2012). The effect of mindfulness-based therapy on symptoms of anxiety and depression in adult cancer patients and survivors: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 80, 1007.

Sedlmeier, P. Eberth, J., Schwarz, M., Zimmermann, D., Haarig, F., Jaeger, S., & Kunze, S. (2012). The psychological effects of meditation: A meta-analysis. Psychological Bulletin, 138, 1139–1171.

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QUIZ

QUIZ: NOW WHAT DO YOU KNOW?

Question

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People can indeed learn to meditate to reduce their anxiety. We learned the importance of identifying and controlling for confounding variables, such as whether the experimenter might make participants feel anxious, or the participants might have learning disabilities, and we were reminded that using random assignment would help control for other confounding variables and increase confidence in our study results.
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