Second Life Research Study - Participants Requested

[Madelaine McMasters]

22 minutes ago, Selene Gregoire said:

We had piglets for the final. I forget how I managed to get out of doing the frog. That's how I found out I wasn't going to be a veterinarian in 8th grade.

I dissected a few animals in my youth. Though roadkills effectively address the moral issue, they can also give you a fairly two-dimensional view of anatomy.

[Scylla Rhiadra]

1 minute ago, Madelaine McMasters said:

I dissected a few animals in my youth. Though roadkills effectively address the moral issue, they can also give you a fairly two-dimensional view of anatomy.

Ewwwwwwwwwwwww

And groan.

[Maitimo]

I didn't fill it in as I am also not in the US but I did look at the questions and it is clear to me that the OP has either never shopped in SL or has not done so since before the creation of the Marketplace (or X-Street or whatever it used to be called).

I am also curious as to why the survey is restricted to US only, I could find no questions that were US specific.

Pity because I would have liked to give my opinions and I doubt the OP will come back here to read comments. 

Edited September 18, 2019 by Matty Luminos

[Selene Gregoire]

27 minutes ago, Madelaine McMasters said:

I dissected a few animals in my youth. Though roadkills effectively address the moral issue, they can also give you a fairly two-dimensional view of anatomy.

I just studied the drawings and pictures in the text books. 

[Tari Landar]

Never underestimate the sheer ignorance of those around you.

This is a life lesson I sometimes need beat upside my head in order for it to sink in, apparently.

I have no idea if this survey you all took asks you for any amount of information, I didn't bother taking it, because I think intentionally giving someone else a lowered grade simply because you're too lazy to bother doing your own work is...I can't finish that sentence and pretend to be a lady.  But, kinda disappointed in people today  

[Madelaine McMasters]

Just now, Tari Landar said:

Never underestimate the sheer ignorance of those around you.

This is a life lesson I sometimes need beat upside my head in order for it to sink in, apparently.

You do make me smile, Tari.

[Jameson2001]

Wow another survey request!  I was relaxing at home near the Blake Sea when a census bureau worker knocked on my door, whew that was a lot of questions too😋

[Love Zhaoying]

3 hours ago, Madelaine McMasters said:

I dissected a few animals in my youth. Though roadkills effectively address the moral issue, they can also give you a fairly two-dimensional view of anatomy.

That joke left me kinda flat.

[Selene Gregoire]

1 minute ago, Love Zhaoying said:

That joke left me kinda flat.

/me considers posting something about pancakes, dough and runny pancake dough

...sets you on fire instead

[Love Zhaoying]

3 minutes ago, Selene Gregoire said:

/me considers posting something about pancakes, dough and runny pancake dough

...sets you on fire instead

Hmm all mush..smush..smashed flat!

[LittleMe Jewell]

1 hour ago, Tari Landar said:

Never underestimate the sheer ignorance of those around you.

This is a life lesson I sometimes need beat upside my head in order for it to sink in, apparently.

I have no idea if this survey you all took asks you for any amount of information, I didn't bother taking it, because I think intentionally giving someone else a lowered grade simply because you're too lazy to bother doing your own work is...I can't finish that sentence and pretend to be a lady.  But, kinda disappointed in people today  

I didn't answer any of the questions, but since you can leave any answer blank, I did click through the pages.  It asks for Gender, Age, Highest level of education, Ethnicity, and How long you've been in SL.  Then a page of 5 questions about RL shopping and then a page of the exact same questions but related to SL shopping.  That is pretty much it, other than some question about whether you had any issues with the survey.

Edited September 18, 2019 by LittleMe Jewell

[Scylla Rhiadra]

On 9/17/2019 at 2:08 AM, Tari Landar said:

Ftr. anyone wondering...this particular University does not accept "studies" done in second life, at all, ever. It is not a valid subject matter and can't even be used as reference material because you all can't be referenced.

I am confused, Tari. Are you suggesting that the University of Phoenix has an actual university-wide policy against studies of Second Life?

Really? That would be extremely odd, to put it mildly. I've been associated with universities in one capacity or another my entire adult life, and I've never heard of such a thing.

[Love Zhaoying]

18 hours ago, Tari Landar said:

I didn't bother taking it, because I think intentionally giving someone else a lowered grade simply because you're too lazy to bother doing your own work is.

I dun understand. Are you suggesting the survey format is a form of cheating?

[Scylla Rhiadra]

6 minutes ago, Love Zhaoying said:

I dun understand. Are you suggesting the survey format is a form of cheating?

Maybe this is a variation of the "Go in-world and do your own research first-hand" response that students so often get here?

Which is, of course, valid: you can't write about SL without being reasonably familiar with it yourself. But the social sciences (and I am pretty sure that our OP here is working in psychology) rely upon data from surveys of this sort. Understanding how the MP works, or the function of things like groups, group gifts, demos, etc., etc, etc., is of course a necessary first step, but you can't establish the larger patterns that may govern things like consumer habits without relying on that kind of data. The problem being, as Maddy notes, that the sample size is going to far too small to conclude anything very useful from it. And it's going to be difficult, too, to get a really broad cross-section.

[Selene Gregoire]

1 hour ago, Scylla Rhiadra said:

Maybe this is a variation of the "Go in-world and do your own research first-hand" response that students so often get here?

Which is, of course, valid: you can't write about SL without being reasonably familiar with it yourself. But the social sciences (and I am pretty sure that our OP here is working in psychology) rely upon data from surveys of this sort. Understanding how the MP works, or the function of things like groups, group gifts, demos, etc., etc, etc., is of course a necessary first step, but you can't establish the larger patterns that may govern things like consumer habits without relying on that kind of data. The problem being, as Maddy notes, that the sample size is going to far too small to conclude anything very useful from it. And it's going to be difficult, too, to get a really broad cross-section.

Not difficult, impossible. People are not completely honest in answering surveys. If you've ever worked for a research company and had to do them over the phone, you'd know, too. Of course, any results are going to be skewed and conclusions are not going to reflect the actuality.

 

[Scylla Rhiadra]

1 minute ago, Selene Gregoire said:

Not difficult, impossible. People are not completely honest in answering surveys. If you've ever worked for a research company and had to do them over the phone, you'd know, too. Of course, any results are going to be skewed and conclusions are not going to reflect the actuality.

 

I suspect that's a problem with social science methodologies generally. I wonder if there is any way to know if SL results are more skewed? For instance, how do people answer questions about their personal identity? Do they use SL identity, or RL?

[Selene Gregoire]

2 minutes ago, Scylla Rhiadra said:

I suspect that's a problem with social science methodologies generally. I wonder if there is any way to know if SL results are more skewed? For instance, how do people answer questions about their personal identity? Do they use SL identity, or RL?

Yes. Both. And some will flipflop between SL and RL. Like fish out of water.

[Love Zhaoying]

17 minutes ago, Selene Gregoire said:

Not difficult, impossible. People are not completely honest in answering surveys. If you've ever worked for a research company and had to do them over the phone, you'd know, too. Of course, any results are going to be skewed and conclusions are not going to reflect the actuality.

 

I suppose an alternative would be to go in-world and annoy people there. Maybe offer 1L$ per participant. 

[Madelaine McMasters]

20 hours ago, Tari Landar said:

I think intentionally giving someone else a lowered grade simply because you're too lazy to bother doing your own work is...I can't finish that sentence and pretend to be a lady.

 

2 hours ago, Love Zhaoying said:

I dun understand. Are you suggesting the survey format is a form of cheating?

I had an engineering professor for two courses spanning a year. In the first semester, he informed us that exams would be open book, open note, open neighbor, graded on a curve, with grades posted on his office door. It wasn't until mid-terms that we fully comprehended the challenge that presented. It was virtually impossible to get an "A" by cooperating.

In the second semester, all of our "exams" were group projects. We now had no choice but to cooperate and we all knew each others grades from the first semester. That was no less challenging, particularly on our personal relationships. I had classmates in my group who were not pulling their own weight and dealing with them was more stressful than just covering their work.

Though I understand Tari's point, I don't know how anyone could rise to the level of PhD candidate through laziness.

The entire thing feels off to me.

[Syo Emerald]

45 minutes ago, Selene Gregoire said:

Not difficult, impossible. People are not completely honest in answering surveys. If you've ever worked for a research company and had to do them over the phone, you'd know, too. Of course, any results are going to be skewed and conclusions are not going to reflect the actuality.

 

If the classes a student has on surveys are any good, they are going to adress the various problems a survey can have and how to work with the data you recieve. For instance, those surveys over the phone suffer from two problems: A motivation problem (participants may not be motivated enough to give good answers) and a privacy problem (people are less honest the less anonym a survey is).

Considering that this is just student homework, its most important to just make your questions good ones. Like, clear instructions, simple and neutral questions, that are suitable for easy, software based evalution.

[Love Zhaoying]

2 hours ago, Madelaine McMasters said:

open book, open note, open neighbor, graded on a curve

The engineering courses I took were the same, but not necessarily group efforts.

[Tari Landar]

I am not *suggesting anything, I am flat out telling you that you're contributing to the lowered grade of other students, because the OP is behaving like a lazy knob that can't follow instruction.

Yes UOPX has a rule against these surveys, and using the "data" collected as reference material is impossible, because your avatars are not identifiable humans and cannot be used as an actual reference that can be checked (required, even more so if you're assuming this student is in psychology courses, which is actually rather doubtful, because the subject matter of this survey indicates the student is likely very early on in his/her education and going through the course they consider orientation-which is one of the only courses wherein you're asked to actually ask others about {insert whatever the subject is you've been assigned}, in other courses/programs you ma be asked to survey but there are very specific rules about it and this one follows absolutely zero).

Yes, these surveys are cheating, but not in the way you assume I meant. It's cheating, because if this person is on a learning team or even tries to use ANYTHING gathered through the survey for a learning team assignment at any point-for any course- the team will take a hit in grade (a full letter grade, minimum, more likely 2-3,) and for any student that may struggle, it could be make or break...yes it actually CAN be that dramatic for some students, don't judge them.  Instructors  have very specific guidelines set up, and surveys like this are very specifically spelled out-including why, when, where and how one can use them while still being able to reference. Again,references are a must, for everything-and that's not a joke or exaggeration, it's spelled out for us for good reason-students have to reference EVERYTHING. 

I bet a lot of you didn't know that most of these surveys we've seen in the last, oh, 6-ish years, have actually shown up at UOPX, I've seen them, I've graded  assignments based on, or that were using, them (F every time, btw, in case you were wondering). Of course all of them haven't shown up, but a huge lot of them have(even ones I didn't expect), in fact there are enough of them that they have these damn policies now, lol. It wasn't my favorite university, not that it matters, it has plenty of flaws, but I can see precisely why the rules surrounding this matter are as strict as they are, especially in the case where learning teams may suffer because of one person's laziness. It may seem unfair to you, and trust me I have been there myself, but the whole learning team dynamic is a bit strange-and not something I think most college students will ever have to deal with (I don't know why it is actually helpful, albeit it, difficult). If this person uses any of the information from the "survey"(it's not a study, don't treat it like one, lol) for ANY assignment, especially LT, all of the info is invalid (re:references) and the LT will be expected to properly ensure that all reference material can actually be checked. How is an instructor supposed to come find you all, or find the survey results if no one knows who or what any of you are (or even if you fall under the very specific requirements we have for when we *are allowed to use surveys)? How is the learning team supposed to check up on this person's contribution to the assignment, if no one knows who you are, there are no checks to ensure you're even partially honest. The fact that you can be dishonest, or even anonymous,  should be enough to tell all of you, who I consider quite intelligent, that this is a crock of manure, lol. A lot of people sneak the info they gather from these things into assignments, without stating they used a survey, and they often conveniently forget the references that would go with this (but make sure to include references of anything else they've used, or plagiarized, so it won't look suspicious) so folks on the LT won't even know this was used until it's too late. Ftr, you can't appeal, again, rules are specific for a reason, they really are spelled out in their entirety for us, there is ZERO confusion. It's not odd that the university put the rules in at all. You might think so, but if you saw what these things produce, you wouldn't question them. 

Yes that's my long winded way of saying...YES there are policies, YES we do have rules, YES you all probably contributed to the lowering of a bunch of other students' grades, and YES that makes me....unhappy. 

 

[Lindal Kidd]

3 hours ago, Love Zhaoying said:

I suppose an alternative would be to go in-world and annoy people there. Maybe offer 1L$ per participant. 

Awww, $L1 isn't enough to do any shopping worth mentioning.

[Rolig Loon]

On 9/18/2019 at 11:46 AM, Madelaine McMasters said:

I dissected a few animals in my youth. Though roadkills effectively address the moral issue, they can also give you a fairly two-dimensional view of anatomy.

I suspect that you are already aware of the classic text in this field, which has been around since 1987.

[Madelaine McMasters]

2 minutes ago, Rolig Loon said:

I suspect that you are already aware of the classic text in this field, which has been around since 1987.

Yep, there's a copy in my RL library somewhere. It's truly amazing how flat the fauna can get out there on the I-system.

Edited September 19, 2019 by Madelaine McMasters