For this experiment it would be wise to chose more introverted men for the experimental group and more extroverted men for the control. The groups could be chosen from a survey sent prior to men that could be generated from an alumni list from a university. It could be gathered that men who answer basic demographic questions in the survey stating their interests/hobbies and answer that they prefer such activities as athletics, “hanging out with friends”, and other socially enjoyable behaviors are extroverted.
It would then follow that this group would show emergent behavior during the experiment as leaders, managers, and excellent communicators. Men who do not seem to show as much interest in social activities and more interest in solitary/introverted behaviors may then present to the experiment lower participation in the authority structure of the experiment. All participants will receive numbers prior to their arrival at the testing site and their assignments into groups will appear random.
A suitable experiment might be that both the control group and the experimental group are told they are members of a school board committee and be presented with grievances from angry mothers, who have certain issues with their children in different capacities such as the alleged exclusion of girls from science and math clubs, supposed sexual harassment of boys by a female teacher, and issues that may basically make the men more uncomfortable with participating in finding solutions to these grievances.
The introverted/experimental group would most likely be less adept at communication skills while the control group would most likely communicate more effectively and find solutions to the grievances.Prior to the assignment of the men to their “committees” they might be queried as a whole group (experimental and control) by using a Likert scale if they strongly agree to strongly disagree that men as a whole are traditionally more adept at
- Reading maps,
- Diagnosing automobile malfunctions
- Interpreting quantum physics, among other similar questions.
There should be approximately 20 such questions and men who agree to strongly agree to 40% of these questions could be regarded as believing men were more adept at analytical skills.The women would be more successful in their solutions to solving grievances due to possible personal life experiences, their level of comfort with discussing these issues, and the level of discomfort and/or probable lack of communication with the more introverted experimental group.The post-test should include more Likert scale questions of the whole group (control and experimental) with questions that include women’s analytical abilities in relation to communication.
The group should be asked if they strongly agree to strongly disagree that women are more adept at
- Communicating complex ideas to a group,
- Processing information for later use in a memo or report
- Persuading others to agree with their ideas.
Again 20 such questions should be part of the posttest with men agreeing to strongly agreeing to 40% or more questions again should be regarded with attitudes leaning toward their gender being more adept at analytical problems.Most likely the experiment would prove the hypothesis.
The control group would be more comfortable and more communicative, so there would be little or no change in their percentages of answers to both scales. The experimental group, having grappled with the difficulty of their task and seeing the women communicate and analyze the grievances more easily would most likely agree or be “unsure” to many of these questions, therefore proving the hypothesis.
