ILLUSTRATIVE ARTICLE: GENERALIZING RESULTS
Driving around in a 4,000-pound automobile is a dangerous thing. Motor vehicle accidents are among the leading preventable causes of death in the United States every year. Distraction is one of the most common causes of automobile accidents, and talking to another person is a very common distraction. In an effort to observe the impact of conversation on driving, Drews, Pasupathi, and Strayer (2008) conducted a study using a driving simulator that tracks errors committed by drivers. The researchers varied the type of conversation. In one condition, participants had a conversation with a passenger; in another condition, participants talked on a cell phone. There was also a no conversation, control condition. As you would expect, having any conversation resulted in more driving errors. However, the number of driving errors was highest in the cell phone condition.
For this exercise, acquire and read the article:
After reading the article, consider the following:
1. Describe how well you think the sample of participants in this study generalizes to other groups of people. What about age? What about sex?
2. In this study, participants were told to have a conversation about a time when "their lives were threatened." Do you think that the results of this study would be different if the conversation were about something else? How so? Why?
3. Do you think that the findings from this study would generalize to other cultures? Do you think that a sample of college students in Mexico, Italy, and Germany would generate similar results? Why or why not?
4. How well do you think the driving simulator generalizes to real-world driving? What would you change to improve the generalizability of the simulator?
5. Evaluate the internal validity of this study. Explain your answer.
6. Evaluate the external validity of this study. Explain your answer.