Investigating the Matching Hypothesis Essay Example

Investigating the Matching Hypothesis Essay Example Investigating the Matching Hypothesis Essay Investigating the Matching Hypothesis Essay For my research I will be investigating the matching hypothesis theory, first proposed by Goffman. He suggested that people chose partners who were of a similar level of attractiveness as themselves.  This was not further researched until Walster et al. in 1966 devised a Computer Dance. Over 700 student participants were involved in the study. They were first rated on attractiveness by 4 independent judges and then given a questionnaire, which to their knowledge was to match them to a partner similar to them. However, it had no relevance to the study, and the participants were paired randomly, with the only exception being that no man was paired to a woman taller than them. During the dance the participants were asked to rate their date. It was found the more attractive students (according to the independent judges) were rated more favourably.  This did not validly support the hypothesis as the meeting was only brief and therefore the participants could only be rated on superficial characteristics. It also gave no example of a correlation between male and female attractiveness.  Therefore a follow-up study was conducted 6 months later. This gave more evidence to support the hypothesis, as it was found that the dates who had become couples after the dance were highly likely to be of a similar level of attractiveness (according to the ratings given to them previously by the independent judges). In 1969 Walster and Walster conducted a similar study, but this time where the participants met each other first. This gave them time to interact more, learn about each other and therefore assess their dates other characteristics, such as intelligence, sense of humour and general personality. This study had greater ecological validity than the original, and the results also supported the hypothesis partners that were similar in terms of physical attractiveness expressed the most liking for each other. One reason for this was proposed by Huston. He suggested that people were more likely to favour those of the same level of attractiveness as themselves because of a fear of rejection and a need for companionship. This need for companionship has been supported by a lot of research so may be a reasonable suggestion, but does not take into account self-concept as people may rate themselves differently than impartial judges. Brown then argued in favour of the matching hypothesis, but only because we learn what is fitting. This means that we learn our place in society and what we have to give others, and then adjust our rating of potential partners accordingly. This seems to be a more comprehensive explanation, eliminating criticisms of Hustons theory, as often our self-concept is influenced by society. In my research I will be conducting a similar study to Murstein, who asked impartial participants to rate photos of both men and women, all of whom were in a couple with someone else in the photos. His research also supported the matching hypothesis as partners were rated similarly on attractiveness.  He concluded that: Individuals with an equal market value for physical attractiveness are more likely to associate in an intimate relationship such as premarital engagement than individuals with disparate values. My method of research will be a correlation study. The difference between an experiment and a correlation study is that an experiment measures the difference between two variables, while a correlation study measures the relationship between two variables. This is advantageous because I do not have to manipulate anything within the study. However, one problem with a correlation study is that it cannot infer that any relationship shown in the study is a cause-and-effect relationship. As I will be conducting a correlation study and not a traditional experiment, I will not be studying an IV and DV. This is because I am simply studying a relationship between two variables, and not cause and effect. Instead I will be observing two variables: the attractiveness of the male in a married couple, and the attractiveness of the female in a married couple.  My hypotheses are as follows, with my experimental hypothesis (H1) being one-tailed (meaning I expect a direction of correlation).  My experimental hypothesis (H1) is:  It is predicted that there will be a positive correlation between the male and female in a couple, when rated by participants on physical attractiveness. My null hypothesis (H0) is:  It is predicted that there will be no correlation between the attractiveness of males and females in couples as rated by participants.  Method  Design and Overview  My investigation will be a correlation study. I chose this method of study because it is the best method of examining a relationship between two variables (in this case males and females in couples.) I chose to carry out the correlation study through surveying participants as I thought this would be the most efficient way of obtaining accurate results.  My method of research means I do not have a participants design e.g. as I am not conducting an experiment, I do not need a design such as repeated measures or independent groups. I will simply have one set of participants who I will ask questions to. I do also not need an IV and DV, simply the aforementioned two variables to be measures: the attractiveness of the male in a couple, and the attractiveness of the female in a couple. I will be conducting the experiment in the following way. I will be asking 10 female participants to rate 10 male photos on physical attractiveness, on a scale of 1 to 9 (1 being lowest, 9 being highest, 5 being average). The scores will be given independently for each photo, e.g. the scores for the photos do not have to be ordered. I will then ask the male participants to do the same but for the females. I will need to brief each participant first and gain their consent before conducting the study. I will make sure that the conditions of the experiment are controlled, by ensuring all participants take part on their own so there is no influence from other people.  Subjects and Participants  My target population was the students at Exeter College. I checked the participants were not psychology students, to make sure they did not know the extent of the study (therefore eliminating demand characteristics). I also checked that they were in the age bracket 16-19. This applies to the majority of students at college, but I checked because to have 1 or 2 mature student participants could greatly alter the results as these students may have a very different perspective. From this I used opportunity sampling to find 20 participants 10 male and 10 female. For this I stood in the main college building and found people available and willing to partake at the time. Opportunity sampling is the quickest and easiest way to find participants from my target population, although can be seen to be biased as participants often have the same sort of qualities. However, as my college caters for a large range of people with a large range of interests, I did not think my results would be too greatly influenced. I did not ask for any personal information from my participants e.g. name as I didnt think this was relevant to my research. Therefore my participants were anonymous. I also separated consent forms so that no other participants could see the signatures of those who had taken part before them.