Ling/Psych 371 Language and the Mind

Homework Assignment: Research Participation

One of the best ways to learn what psycholinguistics is about is to get exposure to ongoing research. You can do this in one of two ways: participating in a psycholinguistics experiment, or attending a talk given by a researcher who is investigating psycholinguistic issues.

For this assignment, please choose one of the following:

A) Experiment Participation:

Throughout the quarter, I will have researchers visit our class to let you know of ongoing experiments for which they need participants. You will have the opportunity to sign up to participate in these experiments, and after participating, the experimenter will give you a written explanation of the experiment. Your assignment will be to submit a brief (one page, double-spaced, typed) paper about this experience. Your paper should cover the following points:

1) Describe the task. (1 point)

2) State the hypothesis or purpose of the experiment (this can be in the form of a question, or a statement) and explain how the task was designed to elicit results that would either support or disprove the hypothesis (or answer the question). (3 points)

3) State one way the experimenter could improve the experiment, or state an extension of the experiment (i.e. if you donUt think the experiment can be improved, what further experiment could you do to answer another related question )? (1 point)

B) Attend a talk given by a researcher who is investigating psycholinguistic issues.

I will announce scheduled talks in class. Talks are posted to the internet at http://ling.ohio-state.edu/speakers/ before they take place. The talks usually last one hour. Your assignment is to write a brief reaction paper (one page, double-spaced, typed). Your paper should cover the following:

1) State what the talk was about, to the best of your ability (I realize that you may not understand all the details). This should include a hypothesis, in the form of a statement or a testable question (2 points) and one experiment (or two) designed to test it (2 points).

2) State one way that the talk could be improved (1 point).

Your paper should be handed in no later than one week after you participate in the experiment or attend the talk (the longer you wait, the harder it is to remember what you did/heard). Obviously, since all of you will do this assignment at various times throughout the quarter, you may turn in this assignment anytime throughout the quarter, but no later than Friday, June 2, 2000. If you find that you need more than one page to summarize things, see me.