Wall, Matthew (2021) Examining the Utility of the Function Acquisition Speed Test (FAST) for Assessing Social Biases. Masters thesis, National University of Ireland Maynooth.
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Abstract
The current research was focused on assessing the utility of a new behaviour-analytic implicit
Function Acquisition Speed Test (FAST), for the proxy measurement of real-world social
attitudes. In Experiment 1, the FAST was administered to a sample of men and women to
assess the strength of verbal relations (attitudes) regarding gender biases. An explicit measure
of attitudes towards gender was also administered as part of a strategy to establish
preliminary convergent validity for the FAST. In the domain of gender attitudes, the FAST
scores for gender bias converged with those of the explicit measure. However, while male
participants self-reported a greater level of gender bias than the females, the cohort as a
whole was not found to be gender-biased using the implicit measure, nor were the females
when considered alone. This finding was interpreted in terms of System Justification Theory
(SJT) as part of a conceptual bridge building exercise between behaviour analysis and
mainstream social psychology. The predictions of this theory were also employed to
rationalise the need for Experiment 2. Experiment 2 was a replication of Experiment 1 within
the context of racial bias amongst a sample of White and Non-White adult participants. The
results showed that the cohort as a whole showed a significant implicit pro-White bias, in line
with the predictions of SJT, as did the Non-White cohort when considered alone. This
provided the FAST with a degree of predictive validity against conceptual frameworks within
the literature. In addition, divergent validity was established through the expected lack of
correlation between self-reports of racial bias and FAST scores. It was concluded that the
FAST may represent an acceptable behaviour-analytic alternative to social cognitive implicit
test methods and may be useful in sensitive research contexts in which self-reports are likely
to be unreliable.
Item Type: | Thesis (Masters) |
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Keywords: | Function Acquisition Speed Test; FAST; Assessing Social Biases; |
Academic Unit: | Faculty of Science and Engineering > Psychology |
Item ID: | 16799 |
Depositing User: | IR eTheses |
Date Deposited: | 03 Jan 2023 14:55 |
URI: | https://mural.maynoothuniversity.ie/id/eprint/16799 |
Use Licence: | This item is available under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial Share Alike Licence (CC BY-NC-SA). Details of this licence are available here |
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