RESEARCH PROJECT

SPRING 2010
PSY 310

Instructor: John F. Dumont

Topic: EXPERIMENTAL PROPOSAL

by

Mayowa Aderinto and Lousine Saakian

May 4, 2010
Dependent variable: Sexism

Independent variable: Exposure to women struggle against sexism and

their contribution to society

Since the beginning of history, sexism has always been a prominent barrier

between sexes. The notion that women are not on the same level as men has always

been in existence. It continues occur in our own environment to this day. Sexism has

been described as the practice of domination of women. It is a practice that is

supported in many different ways that are critical to our socialization into our sex

roles, and therefore makes this domination acceptable in society—through language,

visual association, media representation, and stereotyping, especially on the basis of

the mothering/caring role of women. Sexism is important also because all women

experience it in different ways, depending upon their social and economic situation—

within the family and in jobs—and it limits the ways in which women seek to

actualize their potential.

Hypothesis

Our hypothesis is that sexism depends, in part, on the lack of knowledge of women

contribution in society and their struggle against men’s oppression throughout time.

The purpose of the experiment is to test the validity of this hypothesis by presenting

some subjects with an appropriate stimulus, such as documentary film.

Randomization

We will recruit the subjects randomly from business and assign those subjects to
either the experimental group or the control group. The subjects will be males, from
the age of 25-45.

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 The experiment will be conducted in a laboratory; in our experiment, we will have

two groups of subjects, 20 men in each group. We will observe an experimental group,

to which we will show them the documentary and a control group, which no

documentary will be shown to. Before exposing our subjects (experimental group) to

an appropriate stimulus, we will begin by pretesting the extent of sexism among both

subjects (experimental and control group) by giving them a questionnaire asking them

about what they think about women and what is their opinion (if they consider women

to be inferior and do not contribute anything to the society). The questions in our

questionnaire will deal with the attitudes towards women and we will include an open

question, so they can express their opinion freely. By using this questionnaire we will

measure the extent of sexism displayed by each individual and the average sexism

level of the group. Moreover, we will show our subjects (experimental group) a

documentary that depicts clearly the effective role of women in society and how

talented women are as well as the struggles they face in the work place in order to

prove that they are competent and that they can be as good as men are. In addition, the

documentary will include some knowledgeable women that have prospered and have

been awarded for the contribution in science. After our subjects (experimental group)

have watched the documentary, we will administer the same questionnaire again to

both groups. The responses given in the posttest would allow us to measure the later

extent of sexism for each individual subjects and the average sexism level of the

group as a whole in the experimental group. Therefore, we will compare the results of

the pretest and the posttest in both groups and by doing so we will be able to prove

that our hypothesis is accurate.

By using a control group, we will be able to spot any effects of experiment itself.

For instance, if the posttest shows that the overall level of sexism demonstrated by the

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control has dropped as that of the experimental group, then the reduction in sexism

must be the function of experiment or of some external factor rather than the function

of the documentary. If sexism reduction occurs in the experimental group only, that

means that the reduction would as a result of the subjects’ exposure to the

documentary film.

Strengths and Weaknesses

Our experiment has both strengths and weaknesses.

An advantage of the controlled experiment rests in the isolation of the experimental

variable and its impact over time. Because of the fact that subjects have experienced

no other stimuli, we may conclude that the change of characteristics is caused by the

experimental stimulus.

A weakness is that social process that occurs in a laboratory setting might not

necessarily occur in more natural settings. For instance, a film concerning women

contribution in society might reduce sexism among the experimental subjects. This

would not necessarily imply, however, that same film shown in another country in a

movie theatre would reduce sexism.