Hits and Being Hit On: The Effects of Sensitivity and Bias on Sexual Communication
Jadyn Pohlman & Jordann L. Brandner- Kansas State University
Faculty Sponsor: Dr. Gary Brase
The tendency for men to overperceive women’s friendliness as sexual interest is typically studied through Error Management Theory. However, more general forms of studying bias exist, such as Signal Detection Theory, which can incorporate sensitivity to cues as well as bias. The present project examined sexual interest perception using signal detection theory methods to find that there were no sex differences in perceptions of sexual interest, and participants were actually underperceiving sexual interest overall. Additionally, sensitivity to cues of interest/disinterest were driving participants’ perceptions, not a bias to perceive interest rather than disinterest.
Nice presentation! Could describe your “attention check” method?
We have two attention check questions for participants at the end of the survey which were “I have been in an accident that has resulted in my death.” and “I have never been in an accident that has resulted in my death.” and participants were asked to answer the question using a 7 point scale ranging from “completely false” to “completely true.
Hope that answers your question, if you would like me to expand further please let me know!
I really appreciated you mentioning some examples of the vignettes that were utilized in this study. Were these self-compiled by researchers or derived from a previous study? Also, I caught that your female group of participants was almost double the male group… do you think if you had more equal groups the outcome of your results would have been different? I’m also curious to know if reported sexuality would have an impact on your DV’s? Great study!
Our vignettes were self-compiled by Jordann Brandner who conducted the first part of this study. The gender disparity within participants we don’t believe that a more equal distribution would have changed the results because each gender’s data was analyzed separately and then compared to each other. Finally, I am unsure of how the reported sexuality would have impacted or DV’s, if you would like I can look a little more into this and get back to you if you would like to leave your contact information.
Thank you so much for your questions, if you have any more questions or if you would like me to expand any further on my explanations please let me know!
I just went through my data again to check on the impact of sexuality on the DVs and there was no impact. Just to be sure we ran it with only heterosexual individuals as well and there wasn’t a change in results.
Very interesting study, Jadyn! I really enjoyed this presentation. Regarding the demographic of your participants, I was curious what their average age was? Do you think the age of an individual could influence one’s perception bias and sensitivity?
That’s a great question! The average age of our participants was 44, however, part one of this study had an average age of 19 and we saw similar results in this study so I believe that if it does cause an effect it would not be a significant one.
Oh, interesting! That’s great to know, thank you for the quick response!!