PSY 395 Lab Report 3 – Personality and risky decision making study
Due: Must be uploaded to Angel by the start of Lab during the week of October 28th
As Terracciano and Costa (2004) point out, as well as many others, personality traits have
been and continue to be a major explanatory variable in psychology. One popular model of
personality is known as the five-factor model of personality (Goldberg, 1990; John, 1990). This
model posits that there are five stable general personality traits:
I. Openness: Curious about intellectual and artistic matters, Values artistic
experiences, has an active imagination.
II. Conscientiousness: Reliable, hardworking, dependable.
III. Extraversion: Talkative, energetic, outgoing
IV. Agreeableness: Helpful, trusting, cooperative
V. Neuroticism: Anxious, tense, moody.
In this lab, we are going to complete a correlational or relational study (a study that tries to
determine how two or more observations are related) to examine how psychologists typically
measure personality. We will also learn the core set of statistical analyses used in this domain.
Finally, we will examine the degree to which personality is related to risky decision making.
As a measure of risky decision making, we will use Lejuez et al.’s (2002) Balloon Analogue
Risk Task. This task is interesting because it allows us to get a measure of risky decision making
via a controlled laboratory task rather than, for example, asking someone how many risks they
take in life. It is widely used in the clinical and cognitive sciences. During the BART,
participants are presented with a computerized balloon and two response buttons. One button
inflates the balloon by a small amount and puts money in a temporary bank, while the other
button ends the trial and transfers any money earned during that trial from the temporary bank to
a permanent bank. Like an actual balloon, this one will eventually explode if pumped too many
times.1 When an explosion occurs, it terminates the trial and all money in the temporary bank is
lost.
Which personality traits do you think will be related to risk taking in the BART? Let’s find out.
Below are the questions you need to answer in your lab report. Please answer every question.
1.) (15 total points) On Angel (Lessons  Labs  “Personality & Risk taking lab – things
you will need”) there you are provided two articles. In Terracciano and Costa’s (2004)
paper, the relationship between the five factor model of personality and smoking (arguably
a risky behavior) is investigated. Lejuez et al. (2002) describes how the adjusted BART
score from the BART (the average number of pumps taken on non-exploding balloons) is
related to self-reported risky behavior and other measures like Sensation Seeking.
1
The BART is programmed so that on each balloon trial the computer selects a random number
between 1 and 128. This number determines how many successful pumps can be made before the
balloon explodes. Thus, the optimal policy assuming a person is fully informed about the
statistical structure of the BART is to take between 64 and 65 pumps (Pleskac, Wallsten, Wang,
& Lejuez, 2008).
Come up with your own hypothesis regarding which personality factor(s) will be related to
risk taking in the BART. For example, do you think extraverts are more likely to take more
risks in the BART? Why? To support your hypothesis conduct a literature search (see Lab
3 slides for instructions) and identify three peer-reviewed journal articles (besides
the two papers given to you) that help support your hypothesis. These references must
come from established scholarly journals – NOT from the Internet, television, radio, a
magazine, or a podcast.
a.) (5 points) Give the full reference for all five articles (the 2 provided and the 3 you found)
in APA format.
For example, if the article is a journal article your reference should look something like this:
Ariely, D., & Zakay, D. (2001). A timely account of the role of duration in decision making. Acta
Psychologica, 108, 187-207. doi:10.1016/S0001-6918(01)00034-8
Some useful search terms might be the following:
-Balloon analogue risk task and risk taking
-Personality and balloon analogue risk task
-BART and smokers
-gambling task and personality
-extraversion and risk taking
-openness and risk taking
-neuroticism and risk taking
-risky decision making and personality
b.) (10 points) Pick just one of the three articles you found to help support your hypothesis
and write a four or five sentence brief summary of the article where you state the
following:
I. (3 points) The main hypothesis of the study.
II. (3 points) How the study was conducted (e.g., survey, experiment).
III. (4 points) The main results and conclusion of the study.
2.) (50 total points) I would like you to write an Introduction section in APA format.
Remember your introduction should state what you plan to do and why. I assume that this
will take about 2 to 3 pages. You will be graded according to the following criteria:
Overall formatting (15 points)
-Double spaced
-Times New Roman
-12 point font
-Proper formatting of headers, title, and page numbers
-Overall adherence to APA style
(First Paragraph) A statement of the problem and why it is important. (5 points)
(3 points) Is the research question stated in such a way that it has specific
implications for observable events in the natural world?
(2 points) Is the question clear and concise?
(Middle Paragraphs) A review of related research literature. (15 points)
(8 points)You should cite (a) the given articles (Terracciano and Costa (2004) and
Lejuez et al. (2002)) and (b) the three articles you found for question 1.
*The citations should make logical sense. For example, Tarracciano and Costa
(2004) should not be cited in reference to the BART.
*The citations should be in correct APA style.
(7 points) The review of the related research should be in correct and logical
progression to the predictions or hypotheses.
(Final Paragraph) A clear and succinct statement of the prediction(s) and
hypothesis(es) (15 points)
(5 points) The prediction or hypothesis should have a logical connection from
your question and your brief review of the literature.
(5 points). The prediction should predict a specific set of events you can observe
in the study.
(5 points). The prediction or hypothesis should be clear and succinct.
3.) (10 total points) Report in a correlation table the inter-correlations between the
personality scales (openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and
neuroticism) and the adjusted BART score from the BART. List the inter-correlations
below the diagonal. List the reliability of the scales in the diagonal. Identify the intercorrelations that are significant (p < .05) with a star. The table should be in APA format.
Because this can be kind of tricky, a template for the table is provided on the next page.
You should replace the r(X,Y)s in the template on the next page with the inter-correlations you
calculated with SPSS. Replace the s along the diagonal with the Cronbach Alphas you
calculated with SPSS. Note there is no Cronbach Alpha for the proportion of the Adj. BART.
You will be graded according to the following criteria:
-Correct formatting of the table
(3 points) APA format,
(2 points) Values in the correct format (e.g., rounded to the hundredths [that’s two
decimal places], if the number cannot go above 1 or below -1 there is no 0 before the
decimal).
(1 points) Variables and their values are in the correct location.
-Values are correct as determined by the final dataset posted on the Angel website.
(2 points) Correct Pearson r values are listed in the lower diagonal of the table
(2 points) Correct Cronbach Alphas are listed along the diagonal of the table.
Table XX.
Table Title Describing the Contents of the Table.
1
2
3
4
5
6
α
-
-
-
-
-
2. Conscientiousness
r(2,1)
α
-
-
-
-
3. Extraversion
r(3,1)
r(3,2)
α
-
-
-
4. Agreeableness
r(4,1)
r(4,2)
r(4,3)
α
-
-
5. Neuroticism
r(5,1)
r(5,2)
r(5,3)
r(5,4)
α
-
6. Adj. BART Score
r(6,1)
r(6,2)
r(6,3)
r(6,4)
r(6,5)
-
1. Openness
Note. * p < .05