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The effects of musical and vocal distraction on quantitative skills. Amy Aitken Carolyn Birnie. Topic: music and speech as distractors on quantitative skills Research Question: effect of combination of music and speech distraction on mathematical abilities. Independent variable
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The effects of musical and vocal distraction on quantitative skills Amy Aitken Carolyn Birnie
Topic: • music and speech as distractors on quantitative skills • Research Question: • effect of combination of music and speech • distraction on mathematical abilities
Independent variable type of distraction: lyrical music non-lyrical music speech silence (control) Dependent variable scores on test time to write test Variables...
Hypotheses... • distraction from lyrical music will result in lower mean test scores on a math test than will non-lyrical music or speech • distraction from speech will result in lower mean test scores than non-lyrical music • distraction from lyrical music will result in higher mean test times for a math test than will non-lyrical music or speech • distraction from speech will result in higher mean test times than non-lyrical music.
Design multivariate between-subjects method Measure 12 questions from GRE Scores test score test time Analysis 2 One-Way ANOVAs t-tests Testing the hypotheses...
Our results... • ANOVAs • Score not significant • F(3,39)=.795, p>.05 • Time significant • F(3,39)=3.733, p<.05 • T-tests • Significant: Speech and Silence • t(18)=-2.977, p<.05
What our results mean... • Distraction affected quantitative skills • affected time, not score • Speech most distracting for time • Results in right direction: didn’t achieve significance • lyrical most distracting for score • Implications and Importance of our results • distraction affects how long, but not how well • music not found to be distracting
How our results relate to literature... • Uhrbrock (1961): Youth prefer working to music • Freeburne & Fleisher (1952): Music can affect speed • Henderson, Crews & Barlow (1945): Used to radio or not • Kirkpatrick (1943): Music affects complex tasks • Beentjes & van der Voort (1997): Must process words
Limitations... • participants used to working with music, not speech • spoken words different from sung words • human error - recorded times • participants could have been cheating • no motivation - test didn’t count for anything • convenient sample - friends have similar abilities
Future Study... • Different age groups, more diverse participants • will music be more distracting in adults than college students? • Vary content of speech • will speech still be distracting if nonsense?