Protocol and Procedures ---------- **update 10-01-2015** In analyzing the Relative-Absolute length task, we discovered that some participants hadn't followed directions: They adjusted the line length away from the response box, resulting in a negative length. Others did not adjust the length at all, resulting in a 0 response length. Given that these participants produced nonsensical responses, we excluded from analysis any participants with 0 or negative responses on any trial in this task . Note that we only detected this failure to follow instructions after plotting the data. **update 9-29-2014**: We introduced a change in our code (but not our procedures) due to a discovery during debriefing following the first 4 participants, we found that some participants might not have realized that the scale changed between the Big5 Inventory and the Collectivism/Individualism questionnaires. One uses a 1-5 scale and the other uses 1-9. At least one participant reported that they continued using a 1-9 scale for the 1-5 measure. To avoid this problem, we changed from an open-response text box to a scale with fixed options. For those first four participants, we will discard their data for that questionnaire if they entered any values >5 when it was supposed to be a 1-5 measure. For all future participants, we will use updated code (see the uploaded code) that uses fixed response options. **update 7-13-2015**: we added a sample of 100 Asian participants living in China who completed the same tasks as the American participants. Subjects ----- Participants in this study will be recruited from the psychology subject pool at the University of Illinois. To recruit roughly equal numbers of East Asian and American participants, we will use two separate study numbers and will specify restrictions in the SONA system. Participants in the subject pool only see study options for which they meet all recruiting criteria, and country of origin is part of the pre-screening information they complete at the start of the semester. For each testing session, we will make roughly equal numbers of slots available to each study number. However, it is possible that one of the subgroups will sign up a at a faster rate than the other. If that is the case, we will try to adjust the number of available slots in each testing session so that we reach our target sample size in each group at approximately the same time. In addition to the cultural background requirement, all participants will have reported having normal or corrected-to-normal vision and normal color vision in their pre-screening for the subject pool. In the fall semester, a total of 91 students in the subject pool fit all of the criteria for Asian participants in our study, so we will aim to test as many of those 91 participants as possible, along with a roughly equal number of American participants. Some of these participants may have already participated in the pilot testing (to check the duration of the tasks and ensure the integrity of our data collection procedures). If those participants re-register for the study, their data will be excluded from the analysis. At the start of the semester, all students in the psychology subject pool answer a set of prescreening questions. These include the ones we will use for determining eligibility in our two groups. The Asian participants are eligible for the study if they respond as follows to the following questions: 1. Which of the following best describes your racial or ethnic ancestry? - Chinese - Filipino/a - Japanese - Korean - Vietnamese - Cambodian - Lao - Other Asian - Taiwanese - Indonesian Note: With the following responses making the participants ineligible for the study: - Asian Indian - Pakistani - Mexican - Puerto Rican - Cuban - Central American - South American - Arab - Persian/Iranian - Turkish - Irish - German - English - Italian - French - Polish - None of the Above 2. How long have you lived in the U.S.? Please select the amount of time that you have lived in the US. - Less than a year Note: With the following responses making them ineligible for the study: - More than 1 year but less than 3 years - More than 3 years but less than 6 years - More than 6 years but less than 9 years - More than 9 years but less than 12 years - More than 12 years The American participants are eligible for the study if they respond as follows to the following questions: 1. What is your place of birth? Choices: - United States, 3rd generation and above (at least both sets of your grandparents were born in the U.S.) - United States, 2nd generation (both of your parents, but not your grandparents were born in the U.S.) Note: With the following responses making them ineligible for the study: - United States, 1st generation (one or both of your parents was born outside the U.S.) - African Country - Caribbean Country - Hong Kong - Korea - Mainland China - Macau - Taiwan - Other 2. Are you an international student or an exchange student from a foreign country? Choices: - Yes Note: With the following responses making them ineligible for the study: - No The largest sample from the three original versions of our tasks included 28 participants in each group. There are far more possible participants for our American group than the Asian group, so our total sample will be limited by the availability of Asian participants, and we will test a roughly comparable number of American participants. Participants will be tested in small groups of up to 8 participants at a time in the Visual Cognition lab. Computers in the lab are separated by dividers and participants wear headphones so that they cannot see each other's display or hear each other during testing. Data will be excluded for the following reasons - A failure to follow or understand instructions - A failure to complete all tasks during the 1 hour testing session - Falling asleep or appearing to be in an altered state (drunk) during the session - American participants who were not born and raised in the United States and whose parents were not raised in the United States - Asian participants who were not born and raised in Asia - Asian participants who have lived in the United States for longer than one year, though we may look at these data separately to determine whether there are any differences between those Asian participants who have lived in the United States for over a year and those Asian participants who have lived in the United States for less than one year and the American participants. All exclusion decisions will be made prior to examining the data. Experimenters will maintain a log of each session and will note at the time whether any participant was incapacitated at the time of testing. If we must exclude data from more than 5 participants in either condition, we will recruit additional participants to replace those whose data were excluded to the extent possible given the limited populations in the subject pool. If we must exclude fewer than 5 participants from a condition for any of the above reasons, we will not recruit additional participants for that condition. Data lost due to experimenter or computer error will automatically be replaced by recruiting another participant for that condition. Testing Environment ----- The testing room B consists of 8 testing machines and two experimenter workstations. Testing stations are separated by dividers so that participants cannot see other during testing. Each testing station has a custom-built, adjustable chin rest that positions the participant 57cm from the display. Participants will wear headphones during the tasks to dampen ambient noise and prevent communication with other participants. All participants will be required to turn off their cell phones before the start of testing. **Computers** - Apple Macintosh Mini computers running MacOS 10.8. - 2.5Ghz Dual Core i5 processor - 4GB RAM - 500MB Hard Drive - Intel HD Graphics 4000 **Monitors** - 24" widescreen BenQ 2420T - 1920 x 1080 resolution - Connected via DisplayPort to Apple mini-DisplayPort - 100Hz refresh rate via that connection Procedure ----- After signing a consent form, participants will be seated at a computer and the chin rest will be adjusted to a comfortable height. The tasks will be presented in the following fixed order (each task is described in more detail below): - Color change detection - Global/Local processing - Framed line task - Individualism/Collectivism Questionnaire - Big 5 Personality questionnaire - Demographic questions about cultural background The tasks are computer presented, and instructions are provided before each. Prior to the primary trials on each task, participants complete practice trials and the experimenter answers any questions they might have. The program waits for computer input before proceeding to the next task so that the experimenter can verbally provide instructions and answer questions. Following all of the tasks, the experimenter verbally debriefs all participants and provides a written debriefing as well. Tasks ----- All tasks are written in PsychoPy and presented on the computer display described above. Responses are collected via keyboard or mouse. Each task is described in more detail below. Data analyses for the individual tasks are provided with each task description. Correlational analyses between these measures and the demographic and personality measures are described after the individual task measures. Those additional measures are exploratory. ---------- **1. Color Change Detection** - 20 practice trials - 144 experimental trials - 164 total trials In this task, observers try to detect whether or not there was a change to the color of one of four squares arranged equidistant from fixation in the four quadrants of the display. Displays appear briefly, followed by a blank interval, and then by a second display of squares. The second display either does or does not include a color change (50% of trials for each, with changes equally likely in each location). On half of the trials, the array of 4 squares shifted in position away from the center of the display by a factor of 1.7, preserving the configuration but not the actual positions of the four squares (the *expand* condition). In the other half, they squares shift in position toward fixation by a factor of 1.7 (the *contract* condition). Expand and contract trials were the reverse of each other. That is the starting positions in the contract condition were the end positions in the expand condition (and vice versa). Trial types were randomly intermixed. Participants responded by pressing the "up" arrow if they thought there was a color change and the "down" arrow if they thought there was no change. *Trial Sequence*: 1. Ready prompt until subject presses "space" to start the trial 2. Black fixation cross for 507 ms (participants asked to maintain fixation throughout the trial) 3. Cross becomes dim (greyscale 150, 18cm x 18cm) and remains visible throughout the trial. Four (0.8cm x 0.8cm) differently colored squares (selected from the following options without replacement: red, green, blue, purple, cyan, yellow, magenta, white, black) appear against a grey background for 150ms. 5. The colored squares disappear and the screen remains blank gray for 907ms. 6. A second set of four colored squares appear (either expanded or contracted in position). 7. Participant reports whether or not one of the squares changed color. The second display remains visible until the participant responds. *Data Analysis*: The central analysis explores whether American and East Asian participants differ in their change detection performance in the Expand and Contract conditions. The original study included three conditions x two cultural groups. We replaced two of their conditions (same and random) with the expand condition from a different experiment. So, our study has a 2 (contract/expand) x 2 (Asian/American) design. In the original article, in the contract condition, Americans outperformed East Asians (d = .73). In the expand condition, East Asians outperformed Americans (d=.6). As in the original study, we will adopt a signal detection approach, measuring sensitivity and bias in each condition and computing the difference in sensitivity and bias between the Expand and Contract condition. To assess cultural differences, we will compare the difference in performance across conditions between the American and East Asian participants. For each participant, we will calculate Hits, Misses, False Alarms and Correct Rejections separately for Expand and Contract trials. We will then compute d' and C for each participant for each trial type. Finally, we will compute a difference score (Expand - Contract) and the average score [(Expand + Contract)/2] in the d' scores for each participant. The difference score is the primary dependent measure, and it reflects the difference in change detection sensitivity for expanding and contracting displays. We will compare those difference scores across cultures. The average d' across conditions provides a measure of overall sensitivity. We will use that to assess whether East Asian or American participants were more sensitive to change in general. The difference between East Asian and American participants on each of these measures effectively constitutes an effect size measure. We will adopt an estimation approach to data analysis rather than a null-hypothesis-significance-testing (NHST). For each of the following dependent measures, we will report the difference between the two groups and the confidence interval around that difference. - Difference between East Asian and American participants in the relative d' advantage for Expanding displays - Difference between East Asian and American participants in the average d' across Expand and Contract displays We will also calculate the difference between East Asians and Americans in d' within the Expand condition and within the Extract condition, plotting the effect size and confidence intervals. This analysis matches that in the original study. Further exploratory analyses will report the same effect sizes and confidence intervals for C (i.e., the relative difference in bias between the two conditions across cultures and the overall difference in bias across cultures). ---------- **2. Global/Local Procesing** - 48 practice trials - 240 experimental trials - 288 total trials In this task, observers respond to whether they detected either of the target letters (E and H) as being present in the Navon figure displayed on the computer screen. The target letters (E and H) could be present as small local letters (0.4 degrees x 0.5 degrees), as large global letters (2.3 degrees x 3.9 degrees), or not present at all. A brief fixation cross is shown on the screen, followed by the presentation of one of the following Navon figures:Et Ev Hx Hl Xt Xv Lt Tx Tl Vx Vl Lh Te Xh Ve (GLOBAL local), presented in a random order. The Navon figure remains on screen until the participant responds to whether they think one of the target letters is present in the display. If the participant thought that a target letter (E or H) was present either globally or locally, the participant responded by clicking the "up" arrow on the keyboard. If the participant thought that a target letter (E or H) was not present globally nor locally, then the participant responded by clicking the "down" arrow. Their reaction time is recorded for every trial. *Trial Sequence:* 1. Ready prompt until subject presses "space" to start the trial 2. Black fixation cross for 500 ms 3. The Navon figure appears on screen 4. Participant reports whether or not one of the target letters (E or H) was present in the display, either globally or locally. The Navon figure remains visible until the participant responds. *Data Analysis:* The original study included a manipulation of visual field of presentation that we did not include. It also included three cultural groups, but we include just East Asian and American. Dependent measures include the speed to report the presence of a target and errors when people fail to report a target. From these, we will code three measures for analysis, and for each, we will report the effect size and a confidence interval around it. First, we will compute the difference in response time to local and global targets (local - global) and the error rate difference (local rate - global rate). From these, we will compute the difference in RT and Error rates between the two cultural groups and the confidence interval around those differences. We also will compute the overall RT and Error rate, averaged across global and local, and will compare them across the cultural groups. ---------- **3. Framed Line Task** - 6 experimental absolute trials - 6 experimental relative trials - 12 total trials In this task, observers try to adjust the length of a line drawn inside a circle either to the absolute length of a line shown in a previous image or to the relative length of a line in comparison to the size of a square shown in a previous image. The absolute and the relative conditions were displayed in random order, with all 6 trials of one condition occuring together. An original stimulus with a square with a line drawn inside of it from the top center of the square is shown until the participant clicks "return". Once the participant clicks the "return" key, a mask made up of random lines is displayed for a short amount of time. After this, a square of a certain size is displayed randomly in one of the four quadrents of the computer screen. The size of this square is determined based on the size of the original square/line combination as follows (all measurements are in millimeters): - Height of square: 81, Length of line: 68, Height of second frame: 162 - Height of square: 108, Length of line: 22, Height of second frame: 162 - Height of square: 101, Length of line: 28, Height of second frame: 101 - Height of square: 141, Length of line: 102, Height of second frame: 141 - Height of square: 108, Length of line: 73, Height of second frame: 81 - Height of square: 162, Length of line: 30, Height of second frame: 81 Each combination was shown in a random order. The participant then adjusts the length of a line that is drawn from the top center of the new square. The length of this line begins at zero pixels and the participant must adjust the length of the line accordingly. The participant can increase the length of the line by clicking either the "down" arrow button, which corresponded to an increase in the length of the line by 1 pixel, or the "right" arrow button, which correspondes to an increase in the length of the line by 10 pixels. The participant can decrease the length of the line by clicking either the "up" arrow button, which correspondes to a decrease in the length of the line by 1 pixel, or the "left" arrow button, which corresponded to a decrease in the length of the line by 10 pixels. Once the participant is satisfied with how they have adjusted the line, they click the "return" button, which is followed by a 500 ms blank screen. The amount that the participant adjusted the line, their absolute error, and their relative error are all recorded. *Trial Sequence:* 1. A ready prompt and a set of instructions for either the absolute or relative condition are displayed until the "space" bar is pressed to start the trial 2. One square/line combination is shown drawn in black on a white screen and is shown until the "return" key is pressed 3. Participant clicks "return" key once they are ready to view the second display 4. Mask is shown for 500 ms 5. Second square is displayed randomly in one of the four quadrants 6. Participant is asked to adjust the length of the line drawn from the top center of the square and then click the "return" key once they have adjusted the line accordingly 7. This display remains visible until the participant clicks the "return" key. 8. Blank white screen is shown for 500 ms 9. Participant completes 6 trials of either the absolute or relative condition and then is shown the instructions for the other condition and completes the 6 trials that correspond to that condition. *Data Analysis:* The original study tested participants in both Japan and the United States, but we are testing only in the USA. Moreover, we included the same testing sizes, but will not analyze the differences among them because we have no theoretical reason to predict any differences (and the original study found no meaningful differences). We included the different sizes as a way to prevent people from memorizing one size. The original study asked participants to move from one area of the room to another between study and test. We instead randomly repositioned the display between study and test (to a different quadrant of the screen). Consequently, our study involves two critical factors: Relative/Absolute and Asian/American. The primary dependent measure for both the Relative and Absolute conditions is the deviation of the adjusted line from the appropriate/correct length for that judgment (in pixels). We will measure the difference between the performance of American and Asian participants on the following four outcomes (along with confidence intervals): - The difference between Asian and American participants on Relative judgment errors - The difference between Asian and American participants on Absolute judgment errors - The difference between Asian and American participants on the difference between Relative and Absolute judgment errors - The difference between Asian and American participants on the average of the Relative and Absolute judgment errors ---------- Personality and Demographic Questions ------- At the end of the experiment, each participant will be asked a series of questions in order to determine their level of individualism/collectivism, personality based on the Big Five Inventory (John & Srivastava, 1999), and their cultural background. ---------- **Individualism and collectivism** The participants respond to the following questions on a scale of 1 (“never or definitely no”) to 9 (“always or definitely yes”). The responses in each category are summed to give a score for that dimension. For presentation, all items are intermixed. We will explore whether scores on individualism and collectivism within the Asian and American subsamples are associated with any of the other measures we specified for the primary tasks. We will report a correlation matrix with measured correlations and confidence intervals. Any results from this analysis should be treated as exploratory rather than confirmatory -- we are interested in exploring whether any patterns seen across cultures are mirrored by individual differences in collectivism/individualism within a culture. *Horizontal individualism items* 1. I'd rather depend on myself than others. 2. I rely on myself most of the time; I rarely rely on others. 3. I often do "my own thing." 4. My personal identity, independent of others, is very important to me. *Vertical individualism items* 1. It is important that I do my job better than others. 2. Winning is everything. 3. Competition is the law of nature. 4. When another person does better than I do, I get tense and aroused. *Horizontal collectivism items* 1. If a coworker gets a prize, I would feel proud. 2. The well-being of my coworkers is important to me. 3. To me, pleasure is spending time with others. 4. I feel good when I cooperate with others. *Vertical collectivism items* 1. Parents and children must stay together as much as possible. 2. It is my duty to take care of my family, even when 1 have to sacrifice what I want. 3. Family members should stick together, no matter what sacrifices are required. 4. It is important to me that I respect the decisions made by my groups. ---------- **Big 5 Personality Inventory** This questionnaire comes from John & Srivastava (1999). Participants respond to the following questions on a scale of 1 to 5 (1 being "agree completely" 5 being "disagree completely'). These questions will be summed for each of the Big 5 personality dimensions, and we will explore whether any of these factors predict performance on the primary measures. As for the individualism/collectivism survey, these analyses will be exploratory and we will present correlations and confidence intervals around them rather than conducting significance tests on any analyses including these measures. We do not have any a-prior predictions about the relationship between these measures and cultural differences on the primary tasks, so any relationships observed in our data would only be suggestive and would require further confirmatory research to verify their accuracy and reliability. *I see Myself as Someone Who…* - Is talkative - Tends to find fault with others - Does a thorough job - Is depressed, blue - Is original, comes up with new ideas - Is reserved - Is helpful and unselfish with others - Can be somewhat careless - Is relaxed, handles stress well - Is curious about many different things - Is full of energy - Starts quarrels with others - Is a reliable worker - Can be tense - Is ingenious, a deep thinker - Generates a lot of enthusiasm - Has a forgiving nature - Tends to be disorganized - Worries a lot - Has an active imagination - Tends to be quiet - Is generally trusting - Tends to be lazy - Is emotionally stable, not easily upset - Is inventive - Has an assertive personality - Can be cold and aloof - Perseveres until the task is finished - Can be moody - Values artistic, aesthetic experiences - Is sometimes shy, inhibited - Is considerate and kind to almost everyone - Does things efficiently - Remains calm in tense situations - Prefers work that is routine - Is outgoing, sociable - Is sometimes rude to others - Makes plans and follows through with them - Gets nervous easily - Likes to reflect, play with ideas - Has few artistic interests - Likes to cooperate with others - Is easily distracted - Is sophisticated in art, music, or literature ---------- **Cultural background questions** For the following questions, the participants are asked to type a response to the questions. We will use these background responses to verify that our Asian participants self-identify as Asian and have not spent extensive time in Western cultures. Similarly, we will use these questions to verify that American participants had not spent extensive time in Asia and had parents who also were from America. We will use this information as well as the information from the Subject Pool data to determine which data will be excluded from the analysis. The American participants must be born and raised in the United States, and their parents must be, at the least, raised in the United States. The Asian participants must be born and raised in Asia, and their parents must be born and raised in Asia as well. We will also exclude any Asian participants who have lived in the United States for over one year, but we may look separately at these data to determine if there are any differences between those Asian participants who have lived in the United States for over a year and those Asian participants who have lived in the United States for less than one year and the American participants. - What country do you consider to be your home country? - Where did you grow up? - Were you born and raised in the United States? - In total, how much time have you spent in the United States or other Western countries? - In total, how much time have you spent in countries in Asia? - Over the course of your life, how much time have you spent in each of the following countries/regions? - In the home that you were raised in, were any of the people from different countries? If so, please list their countries of origin. Citations -------- Boduroglu, A., Shah, P., & Nisbett, R. (2010) Cultural Differences in Allocation of Attention in Visual Information Processing. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 40(3), 349-360. John, O. P., & Srivastava, S. (1999). The Big Five trait taxonomy: History, measurement, and theoretical perspectives. In L. A. Pervin, & O. P. John (Eds.), Handbook of personality: Theory and research (2nd ed., pp. 102-138). New York: Guilford. Kitayama, S., Duffy, S., Kawamura, T., & Larsen, J. (2003) Perceiving an Object and its Context in Different Cultures: A cultural look at the new look. PsychologicalScience, 14(3), 201-206. McKone, E., Davies, A., Fernando, D., Aalders, R., Leung, H., Wickramariyaratne, T., & Platow, M. (2010) Asia has the global advantage: Race and visual attention. Vision Research, 50: 1540-1549. Triandis, H. C. & Gelfland, M. J. (1998). Converging measurement of horizontal and vertical individualism and collectivism. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 74, 118-128.