BESC1437

What is this assignment about?

In this assignment you’ll be conducting your own factor analysis using a pool of items from a new, unpublished psychometric questionnaire looking at psychological adjustment to a coeliac disease diagnosis. Your aim will be to develop your own scale assessing psychological adjustment to coeliac disease by experimenting with different factor solutions until you find one that you believe best describes the data. This will then be written up in a similar fashion to if it were appearing in the results section of a lab report.

Why are we doing this?

Factor analysis is the core statistical skill that we are learning this semester. It has immediate applications to the personality, social, organisational, forensic, and clinical sub-disciplines of psychology, and together with related techniques component analysis, cluster analysis, and taxometric analysis, is useful across a range of corporate and industrial purposes as well. Data analysis is one of the primary skills that a person graduating from an undergraduate psychology degree can market to employers, so this assignment will boost your employability whilst training your decisiveness, clarity of communication, attention to detail, and time management.

Data: The SPSS data file for this assignment is PMP Assignment 1Data Coeliac.sav available on Canvas. You will find a list of the corresponding item content at the end of this document.

Due Date: For the due date of this assignment, please refer to the Syllabus or Assignments areas of the Canvas site.

Word Limit: 1,000 words excluding tables and references. Remember that being straightforward and concise is looked upon favourably in scientific writing.

Overall Weighting: This assignment is worth 45% of your final mark for the course. Your assignment mark will be provided to you as a percentage for clarity, and this will be converted to the appropriate weighting when your final mark is tallied at the end of the semester.

Instructions

Pretend that you’ve just collected this data as part of a project that you are running. You’re excited about finding out what factors are underlying the data! Nothing can stop you! Your next step is to conduct factor analysis on the data and write up your spectacular findings in a compelling report.

Your report will largely resemble the results section of a conventional lab report. Tables in the report can be presented in whatever font size and line-spacing you feel makes them most clear and readable (the rest of the assignment should be presented in 1.5 or double line-spacing, and of course Times New Roman font, Size 12). It is fine if you need to present larger tables on landscape-oriented pages, however the main text of the assignment should be in portrait orientation. In this assignment, it would be best to integrate the tables in with the text of your responses, just like in a printed journal article, rather than leaving them all until the end. You will find examples of the tables that you will need to present in the lecture slides for this course.

You will require SPSS for this assignment. You will have access to SPSS online through RMIT University’s myDesktop service, and therefore you should not need to purchase SPSS to complete this assignment. Note that to open the assignment data file in SPSS on myDesktop, you will need to transfer the data file itself to myDesktop first. There is no need to append any SPSS output to the end of your report, as your output should be reflected in your tables within the report. A handy tip for making sure that you can access your data output on a computer that does not have SPSS installed is to export your output to a .pdf file.

You may require references to support the choices that you make during your factor analysis. Include any references cited in-text in an APA-formatted reference list at the end of the assignment. Note that this assignment is not intended to be heavily research-intensive, so it is not expected that a large number of references will be used.

Marking Rubric

Your assignment will be marked by aggregating the following qualities, all equally weighted:

1. Structure (25%). Is all of the content that one would want to see in a comprehensive factor analysis report present, and is it being given to the reader in a logical order? Is the report concise and focused, or does it amble along and run off on tangents?
2. Data Presentation (25%). Is all of the necessary data, both in-text and tabulated, present and formatted correctly? Is your factor analysis replicable based on how you have described it within your report?
3. Statistical Knowledge (25%). Does your write-up demonstrate a sound understanding of the principles of factor analysis, including the justification of any choices that you make? Are the important elements of the output described and emphasised accurately?
4. Thoughtfulness and Expression (25%). Is your report interesting and compelling, showing that you are capable of thinking flexibly and evaluatively about the concepts and variables that you are working with?

The Coeliac Disease Comprehensive Psychological Management Scale (CD-CPMS)

Please read each statement and indicate from 1 to 5 the extent to which it applies to you. Please do not spend too much time on any one statement. The rating scale is as follows: 1 = Not at all                 2 = Slightly         3 = Moderately       4 = Quite a bit 5 = A great deal

1. I am always scared of cross-contamination
2. I won’t eat out because of the risk of cross-contamination
3. When I think about how many ways cross-contamination may occur, I feel unsafe
4. I feel like there is always a risk of cross-contamination when I eat out
5. I feel stressed at the thought of eating at a new restaurant or café
6. I feel like I have no control of cross-contamination when I eat out
7. After I eat at a restaurant/café, I monitor my body for symptoms of contamination
8. I feel stressed when I don’t know the venue I have planned to eat at
9. I never trust anyone except myself to ensure a dish is completely gluten free
10. I’m not too worried about cross-contamination
11. I will only ever buy gluten free cosmetic/beauty products
12. I have had nightmares about consuming gluten
13. I will only consume and purchase products that specifically state ‘gluten free’, irrespective of the ingredient list
14. I worry about the amount I spend on food
15. I spend too much money on food
16. The money I spend on food is reasonable
17. I feel like I need to spend a lot of money on food to ensure it is completely gluten free
18. I believe advertising a product as gluten free allows companies to significantly increase the price
19. I feel like I can affordably follow a gluten free diet
20. I never used to spend this much on food before I began a gluten free diet
21. I follow a strict gluten free diet to the best of my ability
22. I rarely/never get contaminated
23. If I believe my food has been contaminated I will not eat it
24. I follow strict precautions to ensure cross contamination does not occur
25. If it is labelled gluten free I trust that it is safe for me to eat
26. Even if a dish is labelled gluten free, I always ask questions to check for possible cross-contamination

• I eat foods that state they may contain traces of gluten
• I occasionally intentionally eat foods that contain gluten
• I feel isolated due to eating a gluten free diet
• I will eat food that I believe may have been contaminated to avoid being a bother to my company
• A gluten free diet has and continues to impact my social life
• I would kiss someone even if I knew they had recently consumed gluten
• It is important to me that people I am in romantic relationships with, take coeliac disease seriously
• I feel jealous that others do not have to worry about their diet
• I feel like I’m a nuisance by asking questions about cross-contamination
• I feel judged for following a gluten free diet
• Having coeliac disease not only affects me, but affects the people around me as well
• I feel like a burden to others due to my strict following of a gluten free diet
• Other people without CD have so many more opportunities than I do
• People think coeliac disease/following a gluten free diet is a choice
• Following a strict gluten free diet can result in awkward conversations
• I dislike people who do not take coeliac disease seriously
• I feel like people make judgements about me when I ask about gluten free options/ask for a gluten free menu/ discuss my dietary requirements with restaurant/café staff
• I can trust my friends and family to safely cook for me
• I feel like most people ensure the food I eat is safe
• I would prefer to eat food I have cooked and prepared myself than eat food my friends/family have cooked because I do not trust them
• I feel a burden bothering restaurant and café staff
• I am embarrassed to ask about gluten free options at cafes/restaurants
• I stop my friends/family eating what/where they want due to my condition
• I feel well informed about coeliac disease
• I have heard contradicting information about eating a GFD
• Learning about coeliac disease has been overwhelming
• I can read food labels and confidently identify if the food is safe to eat or not
• I know what raw products naturally contain gluten
• Some wheat products are safe to eat

Helpful Advice

Panic! How Do I Write This Assignment?

Hint: Stay cool, believe in yourself, and take things one step at a time. The lecture slides describe pretty much everything you would want to include in a factor analysis write-up, including the tables. Use this in favour of any examples drawn from journal articles, as these are often condensed and/or subject to the specific formatting requirements of the journal.

Avoid Making Major Errors

Copying and pasting output directly from SPSS will heavily impact your mark, as it shows an inability to work with data and a lack of consideration for formatting and professionalism. Similarly, conducting component analysis rather than factor analysis will also heavily impact your mark, as it shows a lack of understanding of the theoretical underpinnings of factor analysis. Avoid doing these two things.

Know When To Stop With The Factor Analysis

Factor analysis can be quite interpretive, and sometimes people can get hung up on finding a perfect and neat solution. This isn’t always likely with real data, so remember that at some point you will have to be content with one of the solutions that you have identified. Experiment a bit and find a solution that you think works for you, but remember to keep track of the time you have available.

Also, don’t panic if you think that your final factor solution is different to those of other people – there are a number of plausible solutions, although you will need to make sure that yours is well justified.

Manage Your Time Effectively

As mentioned earlier, factor analysis can be time-consuming at first – you’ll likely be running them slowly, step by step, and possibly will fall into the trap of overthinking where to go with your analysis (which is still probably better than underthinking, but everything in moderation). The expectation is that you will be working on this assignment over the few weeks that you have available, rather than trying to finish it all in one go on the day it is due. Manage your time effectively and you will find this assignment a lot less daunting.