Psychology Essay Essay Due 19th November 2007.
Describe and explain the key features and findings of this paper.
In order to answer this question we must first define the Theory of Planned Behaviour and then also show opposed views and opinions on the subject. In this essay I plan to discuss the key features and findings of this essay and pick out some weaknesses in the paper and discuss what could have been done instead. Some of the key features within this paper by Elliot, Armitage and Baughan are the use of the driving simulator along with the use of self reports these are also 2 of the main weaknesses within this paper.
The theory of planned behaviour is a model that provides a frame work for developing theory based interventions that aim to change behaviour. Icek Ajzen First proposed the Theory of Planned Behaviour as an extension of the Theory of Reasoned Action, this is was first propped by Ajzen and Fishbein and its components are 3 general constructs behavioural intention, attitude and subjective norm. However recent criticism highlighted the way in which the theory of planned behaviour is primarily concerned with intention as a motivation that causes behaviour whereas intention is commonly understood as a term a person uses to indicate what they will do. (Smith 1999, 2000 cited in Cook et al 2005). Whilst there is no clear evidence as to which is the preferred measure of control within the TPB evidence is accumulating to suggest that self-efficacy is not only an important addition to the theory, but it frequently emerges as the most significant predictor of both intention and behaviour (Armitage and Conner, 2001 cited in Giles et al 2004)
The theory of reasoned action suggests that a person’s behavioural intent depends on the person’s attitude about the behaviour and the subjective norms. However the theory of planned behaviour proposes that behaviour is codetermined by intention and perceived behavioural control. (Elliot et al. 2007) However Cook et al show in 2007 that a person centred alternative shows how a causal interpretation can be reinterpreted as actions of a person
According to Elliot, Armitage and Baughan intentions are the summaries of people’s motivation indicating the extent to which people want to perform a behaviour and how much effort they are prepared to exert in order to perform it. They also state that perceived behavioural control reflects the perceived ease or difficulty a person thinks they may have in performing this task. They hypothesise that by observing behaviours that are not one off occasions and that require moment by moment thought processes.
Attitude was measured in this experiment using self reports. Each participant was asked to complete the statement ‘For me, avoiding exceeding the speed limit while driving in the next week would be…’ they were then given a set of 5 adjectives for example wise, foolish and these adjectives were given a score and the mean of these score were then taken (Elliot et al 2007). The subjective norm was measured in much the same way. This time the participants were given 3 statements based on how people important to the participants would view their driving behaviour, this was then given a score from 1 -7 (Elliot et al. 2007). Intention was measured in almost exactly the same way the participants were given a set of statements and the answers from these statements were given a points value and the mean from these we then used to give the measurement of intention (Elliot et al 2007).
The paper states three aims which are as follows, to replicate previous research findings which have shown that attitudes, subjective norms and perceives behavioural control are predictors of self reported speeding behaviour. To test the predictive validity of the theory of planned behaviour with regard to prospective measures of observed behaviour, obtained from a driving simulator and to test whether the theory of planned behaviour can predict the timing of drivers breaches of the speed limit. The authors used self reports in this experiment however self reports can be extremely unreliable as there is a number of faults with them. Self reports are unmonitored and people are able to falsify answers in a way they would be unable to do in a one in one interview. Self reports are able to be falsified by answering questions that would show the participants in their best light or by answering the question by stating what they think the examiner wanted to hear. This can be combated using Triangulation. Triangulation is the application and combination of several methods, and it can be used to ensure validity within experiments. However most of their observational methods are credible. There is one aspect however that I think has not been taken into consideration and this is the Hawthorn Effect. The Hawthorn Effect is the affect of people knowing that they are being observed, they purposely do what they are doing to the best of their ability. In other words if people know their driving is being observed they are going to do everything in their power to drive properly and not go over the speed limit. The hawthorn effect shows that even although situations are replicated exactly in the simulator simply knowing that they are being observed is going to affect the behaviour of the participant. This perhaps is an unintentional effect of being observed. It can also be said that the fact the participants are being observed on speeding and how often they speed and when will often prevent participants from speeding completely.
The driving simulator that was used was based on a medium sized car and all operations worked as it ‘real life’. The car was surrounded by screens this allowed for there to be normal use of the car’s mirrors. The participants were played sounds such as engine noise and road tyre surface noise to increase validity and to make the experiment as near ‘real life’ as physically possible. (Elliot et al. 2007). However it is still believed that the use of a driving simulator will never be as reliable as driving in a real car or in the participants own car because in the participants own car there will be bad habits that will be slipped into that maybe would not occur through the use of a driving simulator as it is not a car they feel comfortable in and due to the fact that it is a simulator.
In reading through the paper’s methodology I found no real weaknesses, there was an almost exactly even split of male to female participants all from the south east of England. They were aged from 17 to75 with a mean age of 36.7 having done a mean mileage of 233.9 miles ranging from 10 to 2000 miles. All participants had been given experience on the driving simulator so to avoid any confusion during the experiment and the participants were also given a five minute practise on the simulator before the experiment began. This was to refresh their memories on how to work the simulator and again to avoid any sickness from the simulator. (Elliot et al 2007) Each participant were tested on 4 different road contexts these are as follows, urban roads with a 30 mile per hour speed limit, village through-roads with 30 mile per hour speed limit, rural single carriage ways with 60 miles per hour speed limits and motorway with a 70 miles an hour speed limit.
There were few weaknesses in this paper the two main ones that were found were the use of the driving simulator and the faults using self reports. The use of a driving simulator has its problems but also has some good points. The driving simulator will not replicate the conditions on the road exactly however it will allow the experimenters to control the conditions of the experiments and ensure that all the participants received the same sort of conditions for the experiment thus ensuring there would be no bias. The simulator will not however replicate the unpredictability of the roads and will not be as effective as actually driving while monitoring speeds. Using the simulator would also be more effective in the aspect of pedestrian safety. The use of self reports in the experiment is also a slight weakness as they are vulnerable to biases and falsifications of answers. People tend to answer questionnaires in such a way that show them in a better light and stop them from being viewed badly. People also tend to answer is ways that tell the examiner what they think they want to know rather than answering truthfully. This can be resolved by using triangulation. Triangulation is the method is which you ‘come at someone from all angles’ to ensure that the results given from self reports are 100% valid and not in anyway influenced by anything else.
The purpose of the design and procedures section of the paper is to let other replicate the experiment exactly as it was done the first time around by Elliot, Armitage and Baughan. On reading this it was found to be thorough and it would be considered that the experiment could be repeated without too much thought. Through reading this essay it was found that the information given by Elliot Armitage and Baughan the experiment would be able to be reproduced in almost exactly the same manor.
Overall the findings of this paper provide support for the theory of planned behaviour. The findings extend those of previous research showing that the theory of planned behaviour also predicted observed measures of speeding behaviour and that the results were generalised over the four different road contexts that each participant was tested on (Elliot et al 2007). In each of these contexts intention was the statistically significant predictor of behaviour (Elliot et al. 2007) Drivers that are motivated to comply with the speed limits are more likely to feel the need to speed less often than those who were not motivated to comply with the speed limits. This shows that in order for a participant to refrain from speeding they must first feel the need to comply with the speed limit this shows that they must be motivated to abide by the speed limit before they decide whether to speed or not.
To conclude, the main aims of this essay are to describe and explain the key findings and features of the Elliot, Armitage and Baughan paper on the theory of planned behaviour. This essay has discussed the theory of planned behaviour and how it responds to the theory of reasoned action. It has discussed how the driving simulator and the method of self reporting may cause trouble and may be unreliable. This essay discussed any weaknesses in methodology and the design and procedure section of this paper which was found to be effective as the experiment would be able to be replicated almost exactly as it was done by Elliot, Armitage and Baughan. Whilst there are several theoretical models that might offer a number of practical …one that shows much promise is the Theory of Reasoned Action/Theory of Planned Behaviour. In a review of studies applying the theory of planned behaviour in behavioural change interventions (Hardeman et al 2004 cited in Giles et al 2004).
Reference Page.
Elliot, M.A., Armitage, C.J., Baughan C.J., (2007), using the theory of planned behaviour to predict observed driving behaviour, Sheffield.
Cook, A.J., Moore, K., Steel, G.D., (2004), Taking a position: A Reinterpretation of the theory of planned behaviour, New Zealand.
Giles, M., McClenahan, C., Cairns, E., Mallet, J., (2004), An application of the Theory of Planned Behaviour to blood donation: the importance of self-efficacy, Coleraine.
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