Moray

Question 1

Define cocktail party effect.

Answer 1

The concept originally suggested by Cherry in which we would hear it when our own name is said within a crowded room.

Question 2

Define dichotic listening.

Answer 2

Where headphones are worn by a participant and a different message is played to each ear at the same time.

Question 3

Define shadowing.

Answer 3

When a participant is told to focus on a passage of text and repeat it out loud as they hear it.

Question 4

Define affective instructions.

Answer 4

When a person is asked to do something, preceded by their name being said.

Question 5

Define non-affective instructions.

Answer 5

When a person is asked to do something, but their name is not used.

Question 6

Define inattentional barrier.

Answer 6

This is where you only listen to the conversation you’re participating in and not the conversations around you.

Question 7

What is the background to Moray’s study?

Answer 7

• Colin Cherry (1953) was interested in how people put up an inattentional barrier at a party with multiple conversations going on.
• Cherry created a dichotic listening task and asked participants to shadow one message and found that participants failed to notice details of the unattended message.

Question 8

What was the overall aim of Moray’s study?

Answer 8

To test Cherry’s findings on the inattentional barrier more thoroughly and scientifically.

Question 9

What was the common apparatus used in all three experiments?

Answer 9

• Brenell Mark IV stereophonic tape recorder
• Headphones

Question 10

What was the research method used in Moray’s study?

Question 11

What was the experimental design used in Moray’s study?

Question 12

Sampling method?

Question 13

What was the sample in experiment 1 of Moray’s study?

Answer 13

• Undergraduate students and staff
• Males and females
• From Oxford University

Question 14

What was the independent variable in experiment 1 of Moray’s study?

Answer 14

The attended message (shadowed passage) vs the rejected message (word list).

Question 15

What was the dependent variable in experiment 1 of Moray’s study?

Answer 15

Number of words recognised from the word list.

Question 16

What was the procedure in experiment 1 of Moray’s study?

Answer 16

• Participants had to shadow on a piece of prose that they could hear in the right ear check which was the attended message.
• A shirt list of simple words was spoken 35 times as the rejected message.
• At the end of the task, participants were asked to recall all they could remember of the rejected message. check
• Then, approximately 30 seconds after the completion of the shadowing tasks, participants were given a recognition test consisting of 21 words - 7 from the shadowed passage, 7 from the rejected passage and 7 similar words not present in either passage - and participants were asked to choose which words they recognised.

Question 17

What were the results of experiment 1 of Moray’s study?

Answer 17

• 4.9 out of 7 words were recognised from the shadowed passage on average.
• 1.9 out of 7 words were recognised from the rejected passage on average.
• 2.6 out of 7 words were recognised from the similar words list (neither passage) on average.

Question 18

What were the conclusions made from experiment 1 of Moray’s study?

Answer 18

Participants are much more able to recognise words from the shadowed passage. Almost none of the words from the rejected message are able to break the ‘inattentional barrier’.

Question 19

What was the aim in experiment 2 of Moray’s study?

Answer 19

To find out if an affective cue (their name) would break the inattentional barrier.

Question 20

What was the sample in experiment 2 of Moray’s study?

Answer 20

• 12 students /research workers check
• Makes and females
• From Oxford University

Question 21

What was the independent variable in experiment 2 of Moray’s study?

Answer 21

Whether the instructions were affective or non-affective

Question 22

What was the dependent variable in experiment 2 of Moray’s study?

Answer 22

Whether participants reported hearing the instruction (or followed the instruction) or not.

OR CHECK

Whether participants were more likely to heaven an instruction in a message they weren’t paying attention to if it is preceded by their name. This was operationalised by whether participants reported hearing the instruction (or followed the instruction) or not.

Question 23

What was the procedure in experiment 2 of Moray’s study?

Answer 23

• Participants heard two passage of light fiction - one in each ear.
• In all cases the passages began with an instruction to listen to the right ear.
• Some passages contained instructions within them (3 had affective instructions within and 3 had non-affective instructions within).
• Both passages were read in a steady monotone male voice at a pace of about 130 words per minutes.
• All participants shadowed all 10 passages (repeated measures design).

Question 24

What were the results of experiment 2 of Moray’s study?

Answer 24

• 20 out of 39 affective instructions were heard or followed.
• 4 out of 36 non-affective instructions were heard or followed.

Question 25

What were the conclusions made from experiment 2 of Moray’s study?

Answer 25

Affective messages (such as names) are able to break the ‘inattentional barrier’.

Question 26

What was the aim in experiment 3 of Moray’s study?

Answer 26

To find out if pre-warning would help neutral material break the inattentional barrier.

Question 27

What was the sample in experiment 3 of Moray’s study?

Answer 27

- 28 undergraduate students from Oxford University - Split into 2 groups of 14 - Males and Females

Question 28

What was the independent variable in experiment 3 in Moray’s study?

Answer 28

Whether participants were given a warning or not.

Question 29

What was the dependent variable in experiment 3 in Moray’s study?

Answer 29

How many digits the participants were able to recall from the rejected message.

Question 30

What was the procedure in experiment 3 of Moray’s study?

Answer 30

- Some participants were given a warning about the digits. - Participants were asked to shadow one message. - The message sometimes contained digits towards the end. - The digits were sometimes only in the shadowed passage, sometime only in the rejected passage, sometimes in both and sometimes there were no digits (control). - Participants were asked to recall any digits they had heard.

Question 31

What were the results in experiment 3 in Moray’s study?

Answer 31

They was no significant difference between the groups in how many digits they were able to recall from the rejected passage.

Question 32

What were the conclusions made from experiment 3 in Moray’s study?

Answer 32

- Warnings do not help neutral information break the inattentional barrie. - The information must be meaningful in order to do this.