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In this assignment, I was able to get a real chance to be in the actual field making first hand observations. It was such an interesting activity to move around and watch natural behaviour in the field. During this time, my main objectives involved making observations of random people in their natural environment and how they behaved, how frequent they were into social media. Their frequency to social media usage was judged by how they were using their gadgets such as tablets and cell phones. Another objective involved getting close enough to hear their conversations and capture their attitude on some aspects. All this was done without their knowledge so as to ensure they had their natural behaviour free from influence.

Another phase of my activity involved asking some questions about their opinions on some issues such as social media usage. These questions were designed in such a way that a response/behaviour would follow soon enough. The reason for these mechanism was to compare their attitudes towards something and how they actually behaved in relation to their attitudes. Most of my questions were social media related so as to ensure I remained relevant to my research and social psychology.

The activity involved observation of ten random subjects and how they interacted with one another, how they behaved as a result of their peer surrounding since the experiment was conducted in a public setting. The observation occurred on two phases. Each phase taking approximately 20-30mins such that I had approximately two minutes for each person. The second phase was the most interesting since this is where I was asking the questions and observing whether the persons would behave in accord to their opinions and attitude. It should be noticed that, at times I would make the observation then pose the question about what I had observed just to see if their actions would match their opinions.

Their entire time in the field was really interesting and mind opening.

Ethical obligations and challenges

Every research will always have some challenges associated with it. The challenges are even more when the subjects under study are humans. This is because we humans have rights and freedoms which ought to be respected and upheld.

My study had several challenges. However, such challenges were tackled professionally such that my results were not biased and no violations of whatsoever kind were made. My first challenge was to target selection. With so many people in a public setting, it is difficult to select a fair sample that would be representative enough. In addition to this, gender and age representation was yet another challenge in selection of my subjects.

Another challenge that I had to deal with in the field was time factor. Since I had only around 20-30mins per session, I had to ensure time factored in my observations and interactions. With such limited time, it is somehow difficult to obtain 100% accurate results since observing and interviewing takes time. This challenge was overcome by maintaining a professional way conducting the research. By the fourth subject, it was almost becoming natural in how fast I could make accurate and timely observations.

The biggest of my challenges was the ethical obligation I had to uphold. I had to ensure that the candidates I interviewed were okay in participating in the research. It would take some time to explain to them that it was a research. In addition to this, explaining to people that I was conducting a research posed another challenge. Such knowledge, if not delivered in a good way would trigger behaviour chance hence affect the naturalistic behaviour. I was able to overcome this challenge by first making the observation before I approached the subjects for the questions.

Another ethical obligation I had to deal with was personal space and privacy. During my observations, which involved getting close enough to gather as much information as I could in my limited time, I had to ensure I didn’t violate their personal space.

Observations

Two major observations were dominant during the entire period. In most of the cases, I was able to observe that social media has played a very major role in influencing our day to day lives and interactions with others. For example, over 60% of all my subject would at one point refer to their gadgets, especially to their cell phones even amidst conversations with other persons. Such gadgets would really pose as a challenge and interruption in conversations. This trend triggered the subject I would choose to find their attitudes towards such behaviour.

In most of the cases, persons who I had observed use their cell phones amidst conversations would be against the idea of using such gadgets in between conversations with others. It should be noted that these same persons were not aware that I had been observing them the entire period hence were not consciously aware they had done it before the interview.

On another case, I would observe the reaction of the persons who had to hold on their conversations while the other person responded to their cell phones. Most of them would sub-consciously get annoyed by the way they changed their facial expressions. I would then wait to see if such persons would respond to their cell phones when a chance presented itself. On most cases, some would respond just like the other person. On interviewing such persons on their attitudes towards the behaviour, they would admit that they found it rude!

Lastly, I was able to observe that a small minority who were against the cell phone interruption actually respected conversations and ignored their gadgets when in conversation with their fellow peers.

Results and Analysis

From my observation, the theme of conflict was dominant. There exist and internal conflict between our opinions/ attitudes and our actions. What we are against does not necessarily mean we don’t practice it ourselves. A good example of this is the case of those majority who were against the idea of using their cell phones amidst conversations and yet used them when the chance presented itself. This mere contradiction can say a lot about human behaviour in general. Humans are creatures who are prone to change at any one given moment to something else in terms of opinions and action. This could hint something about the string of thoughts that run in our minds. What the mind has to offer may not necessarily be what we chose to act on. Our actions are sometimes, most of the times independent of our opinions and attitude towards something.

The main thing that was dominant from this observation was that attitude does not necessarily predict behaviour (Ajzen & Fishbein, 1977). Just because someone’s attitude is inclined towards something doesn’t mean they would act in favour of their inclination when the time to act comes. These results were first discovered by LaPiere, in 1934 who from his several researches on the relationship between attitude and behaviour discovered that attitude is not necessarily a predictor of behaviour. His best example was that, just because a person think smoking is a bad habit and can lead to cancer does not necessarily mean that the person in question does not smoke (LaPiere, 1934). Such discoveries have continued to manifest even in our modern society of advanced technology and social media.

At another level, I would still argue that attitude can predict behaviour, though the probability is very small. This would be backed up by the minority group who actually acted in favour of their attitudes. At the same time, I would argue that social media has really played a role in modifying these behaviours. Those that who behaved in accordance with their opinions and attitudes could be seen as a minority representative of the small portion left in society or are completely genuine with themselves. It takes genuineness and a lot of confidence for one’s inner to match their outer. These results could still be calibrated against confidence and a lot deduced from the results.

On the other hand, the argument that attitude does not necessarily predict behaviour could be used to explain the conflict in behaviour and conduct that exist between the real world and the virtual world. There is a very big difference between who we are and what we wish/want to be (Jones & Hofstetter, n.d.). Social media has rally played a role in magnifying these behaviour and results. By introduction of a virtual world to compare with a real world, the conflict between our inner selves and our outer selves has been magnified and exposed in a bigger and better dimension. The results can always be scaled down to confidence. Are we confident enough to express what we actually mean and feel?

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