Will Positive Subliminal Messages Placed in the Instruction of Learning Improve Test Scores?

Overview

Objectives/Goals The objective to my project is to determine if students exposed to positive subliminal messages in their instruction will show a higher growth in scores on timed multiplication tests. These students will be compared to a control group which will receive the same instruction without subliminal messages. Another group of students will be exposed to negative subliminal messages in their instruction to determine if this group has a lower growth in test scores than the control group. Methods/Materials Groups of students will be exposed to instruction using a School House Rock multiplication video segment from a DVD and then given a timed multiplication test. One group of students will view the video segment with positive subliminal messages imbedded into the video, a second group will view the video segment with negative subliminal messages imbedded into the video and a third group will view the video segment with no subliminal messages in the video. All groups will be measured on their growth to a baseline test. The baseline test will be a timed multiplication test prior to any video. My sample group consists of over 260 eighth grade students. Results When all growth measurements were averaged for the control group, they had a growth of answering 4.4 more questions correctly. Students that were exposed to positive subliminal messages had a growth of answering 6.7 more questions correctly. Students in this positive group were answering 2.3 more questions correctly than the control group. Students that were exposed to negative subliminal messages had a decrease in growth when compared to the control group. This negative group was answering 1.7 more questions correctly when compared to their baseline. If the 1.7 growth is compared to the control group's growth of 4.4 there is a decrease of 2.7 questions answered correctly. Conclusions/Discussion Positive subliminal messages shown in instruction resulted in a higher growth in test scores when compared to the control group. The data also showed that negative subliminal messages in instruction had a lower growth in test scores when compared to the control group. The growth for all test subjects was measured by comparing their baseline test score to each of the test scores they had for test 1 through test 5.

Awards (1)

• Third Place

Competition history

• CSEF 2012 Cognitive Science (Junior Division Only) · Entry J0715

Resources

• CSEF project summary ↗

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