From Theory to Design: The Role of Creativity in Designing Experiments

Appendix 1. Survey of self-efficacy given to participants.

1. Define key variables.
   1. Create an operational definition (i.e., a clear description of exactly what a researcher means by a concept) of self-expanding activity.
      1. For the purposes of this experiment, a self-expanding activity is any activity that is novel, challenging, and interesting.
      2. Identifying an activity that meets all three criteria requires the researcher to be creative. In the video, the researcher will manipulate self-expansion by having participants transport several objects (e.g., table tennis balls, paper clips, and rubber bands) across a room using only chopsticks. 
      3. Due to the unique nature of the task, the researcher can assure that the task is novel (i.e., something participants have never done), challenging (i.e., picking up and moving a ping pong ball with chopsticks is difficult), and interesting (i.e., this task it out of the ordinary which makes it intriguing). 
   2. Create an operational definition of self-efficacy.
      1. For purposes of this experiment, self-efficacy is defined as the participant’s perception of his or her ability to successfully complete a series of everyday tasks (e.g., getting directions when lost, dealing with an overcharge from the cell phone company, etc.).
2. Conduct the study.
   1. Meet student/participant at the lab.
   2. Provide participant with informed consent, i.e., a brief description of the research, a sense of the procedure, an indication of potential risks/benefits, the right to withdraw at any time, and a manner to get help if he or she experiences discomfort.
   3. Run the self-expanding condition 
      1. Instruct the participant: “For this activity, you need to carry these objects (a ping pong ball, a key, a rubber band, and a paper clip) over to the other side of the room and drop each in the basket. To move the objects you may only use these chopsticks. You have 5 minutes to complete this task.”
      2. The researcher should have the items on the table for the participant to see and the basket set up. Give the participant the chopsticks, start a timer, and say “You may begin.” 
   4. Give the participant the dependent variable.
      1. The researcher will give the participant an 8-item measure that asks him or her to indicate self-efficacy (Appendix 1).
3. Debrief.
   1.  Tell participant about the nature of the study.
      1. “Thank you for participating. In this study, I was trying to determine if engaging in self-expanding activities that are novel, challenging and interesting would increase a person’s self-efficacy, i.e., his or her perception of being able to successfully accomplish several common goals. There were two conditions. Everyone carried the objects from one side of the room to the other within 5 minutes, but one group did so using chopsticks, while the other group used their hands. The idea is that using chopsticks for this purpose is a new and interesting, yet difficult activity, especially when compared to doing the same thing simply using one’s hand. According to the self-expansion theory, engaging in these self-expanding activities that are novel, challenging, and interesting increases a person’s self-efficacy, or one’s confidence in successfully accomplishing other tasks.”
   2. Explain why the researcher could not reveal the study’s true purpose. 
      1. “We purposefully did not tell you the true purpose of the study ahead of time. If participants were to know the true reasoning and hypothesis behind the study, they may perform in an unnatural way by trying to purposefully disprove the experimenter’s hypothesis.”
4. Run the procedure one additional time for the non-self-expanding condition. 
   1. Everything is identical except for the part where the researcher describes the study during debriefing. It should instead read “For this activity, you need to carry these objects (a ping pong ball, a key, a rubber band, and a paper clip) over to the other side of the room and drop each in the basket. To move the objects, you may only use your hands. You have 5 minutes to complete this task.”