University campuses can be the feeding grounds for researchers whose studies provide students with ways to earn an extra buck or class credit. 

Pitt students have three main options to participate in research nearby — through Pitt’s economics lab, Pitt’s psychology department and Carnegie Mellon’s Center for Behavioral and Decision Research. Many students don’t mind giving up their time for monetary compensation or will participate in social research for class credit or interest in a topic. But according to experts, some of these experiments may lack the validity of natural science studies.

The Pittsburgh Experimental Economics lab, which was established in 1988, conducts social-science decision-making experiments on Pitt undergraduates. The experiments are like those tested in game theory, which generally focuses on decisions made in social interactions

Students create accounts and sign up for the experiments online, and there are currently about 2,000 students in the participant pool. There is a guaranteed payment of between $5 and $10 for participants, but they can earn more money if they make the “correct decisions” in the respective study.

The Center for Behavioral and Decision Research at Carnegie Mellon University conducts research on decision-making, judgment and market research. Participants in the center’s research studies sign up online, and comprise both students and Pittsburgh residents.

Emily Chase, a sophomore rehabilitation sciences major, participates in research studies through the Pittsburgh Experimental Economics Lab and CMU’s Center for Behavioral and Decision Research. By participating in these research studies, she has added $200 to her pocket since last spring. She participates in two studies per month because she said they provide “an easy way to make money without actually getting a job.”

Ben Wahlberg, a junior psychology major, and Brenna Six, a junior communications and psychology major, also participated in studies, but, unlike Chase, they did so with no potential for cash payments. Instead, they participated to earn required credit for their Introduction to Psychology classes.

Undergraduate Motives

Though Wahlberg participated in studies to fulfill the requirement for his psychology class, he said that he does not have the time to participate for the sake of earning money or supporting research.

During the studies, Wahlberg was asked to do a variety of things. In one study, he filled out a questionnaire about his own long-term relationships. In another, he wrote a few paragraphs about the death penalty.  Other participants, like Six, have answered online surveys or played video games for credit.

For Wahlberg, participating in studies is important for psychology majors who will go on to graduate school, where they will be responsible for setting up their own research studies.

“I think it’s good to see how it feels to be a participant,” Wahlberg said.

Six agreed about the importance of undergraduate involvement. The studies provide “students [with] the opportunity to observe experimental research firsthand,” she said in an email.

Xiaofei Zhao, a junior communications major, has taken part in four studies through CMU’s center, earning almost $50. He also has participated in previous studies to fulfill a requirement in his Introduction to Psychology class.

Tess Bailie, a lab manager at CMU’s center, said that the participants are monetarily compensated at a rate of $10 to $20 per hour. On some occasions, CMU students are given extra credit in a class if they partake in an experiment.

Jonathan Vallano, a Pitt psychology professor at both the Oakland and Greensburg campuses, said utilizing student participants in studies to earn credit is not done at Greensburg. 

“It’s a pretty standard requirement for professors to get participants for their research. It’s been around quite a while,” he said.

However, he conducts studies in Oakland in which students receive credit for participating.  

“A lot of researchers don’t have the funds to pay participants. That’s when it gets tricky. [Researchers] have to find other ways to get students to participate,” Vallano said.

Validity in Question

Like all research, these studies aren’t fool-proof.

Wahlberg said that he felt he has participated in poorly-designed studies. For instance, one study tested a concept that he had just learned in a psychology course. In another, Wahlberg believed he had been assigned to the control group — the one that receives either the standard or no treatment.

“If you understand the construct that is being examined, then you can figure out what they expect you to do and make sure you don’t fall into that pitfall,” Wahlberg said.

Six agreed that there has been an artificial feel to the experiments in which she has participated.

“Experiments don’t ever feel natural,” Six said regarding the experiment in which she played a video game.

Nancy Pfenning, a statistics professor at Pitt, thinks that there are some problems with the research done on campus.

“The No. 1 possible weakness for many of their studies is a lack of realism,” Pfenning said.

Pfenning referenced the idea that studies conducted in a contained laboratory are not applicable to the real world, due to the constraints and restrictions contained within a study.

John Duffy, the lab director at Pitt’s economics lab, recently conducted a study on voters’ beliefs and their voting decisions. The researchers tested whether there was a correlation between the strength of an individual’s belief that his or her vote will be pivotal and the likelihood that person goes to the effort and costs of voting. Subjects were asked about their beliefs and then separately given the opportunity to purchase ‘tokens,’ which symbolized the cost of a vote. The protocol emphasized that the language used was neutral, so as not to cue the subjects into the social norms and expectations about voting behavior.

Pfenning referenced a lack of realism in Duffy’s study. She said that during a study in a group of 20, everyone’s vote matters.

She added that when you apply the situation to the real world, when there are thousands of voters, each individual vote doesn’t matter nearly as much.

Duffy had an opposing view on the realism of the undergraduate participant pool.

“As long as you’re 18 or older, you are qualified to vote, so undergrads are perfectly fine because they are voting-age people,” Duffy said.

He said that if inconsistent results surface in the lab after studying undergraduates, he will likely get inconsistent results after studying the general population.

“Undergrads are generally smarter than the person on the street, so by using undergrads, we are giving the theory its best chance,” Duffy said.

Wahlberg disagreed with Duffy’s views. He said that a study’s findings cannot be applied to a large population without a wide range of participants in the study.

“It’s hard to generalize results without a wide age range — that’s what I learned in my psych class, in research studies,” Wahlberg said.

Six said that she thinks using undergraduates in research studies is acceptable because researchers who use paid participants address their lack of a representative sample in their report about their findings.

Despite some poeple’s concerns, Duffy felt that research involving undergraduates can elucidate numerous types of research concepts, from fundraising methods to game theory.

“It is also possible to examine the impact of government policies in the laboratory prior to implementation to see whether they have intended effects on behavior,” Duffy said.

Duffy illustrated the importance of research studies by relating it to a more commercial idea: wind-tunnel testing of airplane jets.

“You don’t want to be testing the jet in the sky until it passes a test in the wind tunnel laboratory on the ground,” he said.

Psychology professors at Pitt believe that the usefulness of undergraduates in studies depends on what is being tested and the application of the results. Vallano does research on Pitt undergraduates regarding psychology and law. Recently, he has been researching if building rapport with witnesses of crimes helps eyewitness memory.

As a legal psychologist, Vallano works with trial attorneys to prepare cases for court. After submitting his studies’ findings to judges, he often finds himself under attack.

“We often hear from courts ‘You did this research with undergraduates, not real jurors. How is that representative?’” Vallano said.

Although that is is a valid question, Vallano cited research revealing that when mock jurors, such as undergraduates, and real jurors are given the same stimulant, they act the same way.

However, Vallano acknowledged that real jurors making an important court decision is different from undergraduates making a decision in a lab.

“If you are asking the question: ‘How do people make decisions in a death penalty case?’ actual jurors are making a decision where people live or die. With undergraduates, it is a simulated case and their decision will not impact a life,” Vallano said.

He said that whether his research is used in the court system depends on the judge. The courts prefer when studies have high ecological validity, meaning that a study accurately replicates real-world conditions such as population and environment.

“The lack of ecological validity makes it easy for judges to ignore psychological research or for expert testimony to be discredited by opposing counsel.” Vallano said in an email.

He said there is pressure in his field to start using real jurors as subjects in research studies instead of undergraduates.

Irene Frieze, a psychology professor at Pitt, does research on undergraduate participants.

“A recent study of mine asked about reasons students are or are not interested in exercise. Another asked about motives and how these related to interest in study abroad programs,” Frieze said.

She said that generalizing study results from research studies where the only participants are undergraduate students enrolled in Introduction to Psychology classes is only a problem in some cases.

Frieze said that because of this, using students in Introduction to Psychology classes as research subjects is acceptable because they have a variety of majors and different interests.

Wahlberg appreciates that he was required to participate in research studies for his psychology class. 

“It is good that students’ grades depend on participating in research,” Wahlberg said. Wahlberg added that without volunteers, the pool of potential participants would be much smaller..

Wahlberg acknowledged the importance of conducting research studies on campus.

“This research helps make [Pitt] one of the top research universities,” Wahlberg said.