Story completion is a method used or qualitative research, wherein participants express their views on a topic by completing a story normally started by the researcher. This post will give you an overview of the method, including some tips and practicalities to think about when designing a research study that uses story completion.
Most of the images you find on the web will have some sort of copyright or ownership rights that will prevent you using them in lectures, posters or as dissertation stimuli for example. There are a number of free sources of images, and here they are! If you find any more please let Joe the psychology technician know.
https://pixabay.com and https://unsplash.com are searchable sources for free images.
You can also use search.creativecommons.org to search Flickr for images that are licensed for reuse. It allows you to filter by commericial/non-commercial reuse so it is very helpful.
You can also try:
http://www.pics4learning.com https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Main_Page
More guidance for University of Brighton students using images
The lab is home to a range of eye tracking and psychophysiology monitoring kit that can be used by staff and dissertation students.
As part of the strategic research development of the School of Applied Social Science, the lab is very interested in making innovative partnerships with other Schools in the University of Brighton using the cutting edge research grade equipment equipment outlined below.
Read more about the eye-tracking and psychophysiology equipment.
Here is more information on the specific equipment:
| Mobile eye tracker (SMI RED250 mobile) | This is a screen-based laptop sized eye tracker capable of measuring eye movements, fixation duration and pupilometry. |
| Eye tracking glasses (SMI ETG) | This is a wearable and totally mobile eye tracker capable of measuring the scene viewed by the participant, the participant’s gaze within the scene and the audio present at the time. |
| Psychophysiology monitoring equipment (BioPac MP160 with BioNomadix wireless recorders) | This allows static measurement of blood pressure and response monitoring, and wireless monitoring of EEG, ECG, EMG, Pulse Rate and EDA (see presentation above for more info. |
If you are a researcher from another School in the University of Brighton and would like to explore using the equipment in a partnership please note that any partnership must meet the following criteria:
External partners will be allocated a member of SASS research staff who will work with the external partner to take the work forwards. Please note that the equipment, lab and psychology technician are provided primarily for psychology students and staff, and that equipment and support can only be accessed between May and November (when the lab is not being used for dissertation data collection).
Please speak to Jay or Martina if you want to explore using this equipment.
See below for a 30 minute virtual lab tour showcasing the support, spaces and equipment we can offer those embarking on their dissertations.
Download the slides here.
PLEASE NOTE THE LAB IS CURRENTLY CLOSED DUE TO THE COVID-RELATED RESTRICTIONS. THE ABILITY TO CARRY OUT FACE TO FACE RESEARCH SET OUT IN THE PRESENTATION IS SUBJECT TO THE LIFTING OF RESTRICTIONS ON SOCIAL CONTACT. WE ARE IN THE PROCESS OF DEVELOPING NEW WAYS TO CARRY OUT RESEARCH ONLINE AS A CONTINGENCY AND WILL SHARE THESE IF THEY BECOME NECCESSARY.
(accessible guide for qualitative dissertations)
(accessible guide for quantitative dissertations)
We’re very happy to chat about specific issues, the earlier the better in your thinking! Please contact a psychology technician today!
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The psychology lab and the computers in the Falmer Library all have Microsoft Publisher, which is an easy way to quickly create professional looking academic posters like the one above, which was created by one of our Level 6 students for the 2016 BUDS conference. If you would like a demo of Microsoft Publisher, please ask the psychology technicians. The lab has produced a short guide which can be used to set up Microsoft Publisher for producing an academic poster and helps you understand some of the key features which also contains links to further information.
Further support on Microsoft Publisher can be found on Microsoft’s website.
The lab has a number of Olympus VN-712PC voice recorders which can be borrowed. They are very simple to use and give good quality recordings for interviews and focus groups.
They run on AAA batteries which we supply you with (battery life is around 70 hours). We can supply you with additional memory, but most people find the built in memory is fine – allowing between 131 and 823 hours depending on the quality setting. We can provide you with a USB cable that you can use to download your recordings to your computer, or Joe the psychology technician can put your recordings onto a USB stick if you’d prefer.
Download the user manual here.
If you would like to book one please speak to Joe the psychology technician, who will also make sure you are comfortable using it before booking it out to you.
Don’t worry if you’re stuck! I’ll be posting some guides before term starts about what the psychology lab can offer you in terms of dissertation support (stats support, equipment and facilities) which will also aim to give you an idea of the types of dissertations this will help you to think up.
In the meantime one suggestion I’d make if you’re stuck for inspiration is to go over the BPS Research Digest with a fine tooth comb, and subscribe to the newsletter! This is a really excellent resource with interesting cutting-edge research which you could think about developing further or taking in a new direction. If you scroll to the bottom of the screen in the BPS Research Digest, the categories allow you to select your area of interest. There are also links to more blogs with lots of ideas. Good luck!
BUDS is the Brighton Undergraduate Dissertation Showcase, an annual conference open to all Level 5 and 6 students in SASS. Final year students get to experience presenting their findings to a large audience and fielding questions, other level 6 students get to experience an academic conference first hand and ask questions, and level 5 students get to learn about what a dissertation entails, from those with the most up-to-date experience!
This year, BUDS 2015 is on Wednesday 20th May 2015. We’ve got a record number of 18 fabulous speakers, covering a huge range of different topics! The conference will be in three parts with three sessions running in parallel during each part.
If you are a Level 5 or Level 6 SASS student, and even if you are presenting, you must register for BUDS 2015. Firstly, please take a look at the conference abstracts by clicking here. Choose one session from the red part, one sessionfrom the blue part and one session from the green part and then click here to register your details and session choices. You can also tell us about any specific dietary needs you have, as food and drink will be laid on too!
We hope to see you there!
Do you want to present images, text or video to participants, and measure their responses and reaction times accurately, easily and automatically? If so you need to check out the Psychology lab’s SuperLab software, which is installed on the computers in the lab’s soundproof testing booths. We also have a number of response pads, which can be easily configured to allow participants to quickly and easily interact with your experiments.
You can create whatever experiments you desire. We have pre-programmed the Stroop task and the Implicit association test. Other examples of experiments include tasks relating to perception and attention, memory, perceptual representation, representation of meaning and reasoning. We can help you with programming your own experiment, whether by providing training or by helping you build the experiment from scratch.
If you are interested in running any of these pre-programmed experiments, creating your own experiment, or just having a look at what SuperLab entails please speak to the psychology technicians. If you would like to have a read about SuperLab and how easy it is to present an experiment, please take a look at the SuperLab manual.
