Investigating Goal Setting and Batak Task Performance: PSY002-1 Report

This report details an experimental study investigating the impact of goal setting on performance in a 30-second Batak task. The study involved two groups: an experimental group that set goals and a control group that was instructed to do their best. The report includes an introduction to goal setting, a literature review examining previous research, and a discussion of the research design, participants, materials, and procedure. The results section presents the findings from frequency analysis, graphical analysis, and t-tests, revealing a significant difference in scores between the two groups. The report concludes with a discussion of the findings' implications and significance, including the relevance to academics, psychologists, and policymakers. The report follows the standard structure of a scientific report, including an abstract, introduction, methods, results, and discussion.

Running Head: PERFORMANCE ON BATAK TASK
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AN INVESTIGATION OF WHETHER SETTING A GOAL WOULD IMPACT
PERFORMANCE ON A THIRTY SECOND BATAK TASK
Name of Student:
Name of Institution:
Date of Submission:
Author Note:

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Abstract
The aim of this report is to provide the results of the analysis of the impacts of setting goals on
the performance on a thirty second BATAK task. The investigation involved an investigation of
two tow different groups of individuals. One group of individuals assumed the experimental role
while the other group was used as a control for the experiment. The group that was used for
experiment had to set a goal while the group that was used as a control for the experiment was
simply required to do their best in the task. The experiment was conducted for a duration of
thirty seconds during which the participants were required to hit the lights as many times as
possible. The hypothesis tested is that there is no significant difference in score between the
experimental group and the control group versus the alternative hypothesis that there is a
significant difference in score between the experimental group and the control group. The study
has applied the experimental study design. The participants included both males and female. The
analysis that have been conducted include: Frequency analysis, graphical analysis and t- test. The
findings reveals that there is indeed a significance difference in the score between the control
group and the goal setting group
Contents

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Contents.......................................................................................................................................................3
Introduction.................................................................................................................................................4
Literature Review....................................................................................................................................4
Significance of the Research....................................................................................................................6
Hypothesis...............................................................................................................................................6
Participants..............................................................................................................................................7
Method........................................................................................................................................................7
Research Design......................................................................................................................................7
Participants..............................................................................................................................................9
Materials..................................................................................................................................................9
Procedure.................................................................................................................................................9
Results.........................................................................................................................................................9
Discussion.................................................................................................................................................11
References.................................................................................................................................................13

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Introduction
This chapter discusses the concept of goal setting and the literature review. The focus of
literature review is to point out what other researchers have experimented and discussed about
goal setting as well as identify the gap in the subject matter. Other sections discuss the relevance
of the study and the hypotheses.
Goal setting is a technique of putting down action plans that are meant to enhance motivation
and guidance to participants in a game (Corder, Gregory, & Foreman, 2009). The motivation and
guidance are meant to help the participants in achieving the goal or the objective of the game.
There are different types of gaol setting in psychology (Pande, Hemlata, Dhami, & H, 2014). The
major types of goal setting are: Time goals, focus goals and topic-based goals (Wang, Tao, Li, &
Zhonghua, 2016).
Goal setting is linked to higher achievements in psychology. Goal setting leads to higher
achievements because it enhances focus on the task (Corder, Gregory, & Foreman, 2009). Goal
setting is also important in persuading the participants to achieve better results. Goal setting in
psychology is also used to persuade the participants to put more efforts in their tasks (Cox,
2009). Gaol setting in psychology is also used to enhance commitment of the participants in the
tasks that they are doing.
Literature Review
There are several research that have been done on goal setting. For example, a research by
(Abdolmaleki, Hossein , Bahador , & Seyyed, 2016) on The Role of Goal Setting, Collectivism,
and Task Orientation on Iranian Wrestling Teams Performance. The study provides the findings

PERFORMANCE ON A BATAK TASK
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of a cross-sectional study with 11 elite sports teams examining the influence of these two
constructs and goal setting in team performance. The results from this research indicates that
“preference” and “goal priority” from psychological collectivism in association with goal setting
would contribute to superior team performance. The research also found that the importance of a
team’s task orientation to goal setting and team performance.
Another research by (Gary, 2016) on goal setting and the casual relationship between mediators
and moderators indicates that when an individual consciously set specific, challenging and
difficult goals, they end up realizing higher performance. The study further indicates that the
choice of focusing on a specific task prevents a participant from being distracted by other tasks
that are unnecessary hence realizing higher results. Similarly, the article reveals that people tend
to apply more effort on the goals hence leading to realization of higher performance. The
research further reveals that goal setting leads to persistence to achieve the goals hence leading
to higher performance by the individuals.
The other research about goal setting is an article by (Marieke, Sandra , & Ben , 2016). The
research is focused on the clarity of setting a goal and the performance of a team. The
researchers examined whether and under what team conditions clear goals contribute to team
performance in the Dutch public sector. The researchers revealed that the effects of goal clarity is
not related to team performance. The researchers noticed that participating as a team does not
necessarily mean that the goal will be achieved.
The literatures reveal that goal setting is a very important element of achieving an objective.
Infect, the studies support the fact that goal setting enhances focus towards achieving the task.

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The studies also indicate that goal setting enhances development of strategies to achieve the
goals.
However, all the studies did not use a control experiment. The studies focused on a group of
participants with set goals to achieve. Therefore, it would be difficult to ascertain whether it is
actually true that goal setting enhances performance in individuals. In this research, the focus is
to establish whether there is a difference between goal settings and non- goal setting in achieving
tasks. Therefore, the experiment involves a group of individuals with set goals and the other
group of individuals without any set goal.
Significance of the Research
This research is significant to a number of stakeholders in the society. The findings from this
research is relevant to academicians and researchers in this field, the psychologists, sports men
and women as well as the government. The findings from this study is relevant to the
academicians since they can use them as the basis for conducting further research on the subject
matter. Moreover, the article can be used as reference material when conducting a research. The
research is also significant to psychologist. The psychologists can use the findings from this
report to enhance their understanding of goal setting as well as improving their decision making
in goal setting situations. The findings from this study are also significant to the government in
setting important goals that are meant to enhance economic development.
Hypothesis
A hypothesis is a statement about a subject matter of which the truth is not known and can be
tested (Palinkas, et al., 2015). A hypothesis is fully stated when both the null and alternative
hypothesis are stated. A null hypothesis is stated first. A null hypothesis is always negatively

PERFORMANCE ON A BATAK TASK
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stated. A null hypothesis is represented by H0. On the other hand, an alternative hypothesis is
positively stated. An alternative hypothesis is represented by H1 (Nicenboim, Bruno, Vasishth,
& Shravan, 2016). The focus of this research is to determine whether there is any significant
difference in the task completion between the experimental group and the control group. The
hypothesis is as follows:
H0: There is no significant difference in score between the experimental group and the
control group.
H1: There is a significant difference in score between the experimental group and the
control group
Participants
The investigation involved an investigation of two tow different groups of individuals. One
group of individuals assumed the experimental role while the other group was used as a control
for the experiment. The group that was used for experiment had to set a goal while the group that
was used as a control for the experiment was simply required to do their best in the task. The
experiment involved both males and females.
Research Method
This chapter discusses the measures that were used in the experiment, the participants, the
materials and the procedure of the experiment.
Research Design
A research design is a technique that is used to conduct a research or study. There are several
research designs that a researcher may use. The common types of research designs are:

PERFORMANCE ON A BATAK TASK
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descriptive research design, correlational research design, quasi- experimental research design,
independent research design and experimental research design (Gary, 2016).
A descriptive research design is applicable in a case where the main aim of the study is to
provide a description of a situation or phenomena (Ryan & Thomas, 2013). A quasi-
experimental research design is applicable in a case where the objectives of the study are
partially fulfilled though an experiment (Greeen & Owen, 2016). On the other hand, an
experimental study design is applicable is a case where the objectives of the study are solely
achieved through conducting an experiment (Denise & Cheryl, 2010).
The measure of an experiment describes the frequency with which the experiment was
conducted. An independent measure is an experiment that is conducted once and the conclusions
drawn from the experiment (Lynch & Scott, 2013). On the other hand, a repeated measure
involves conducting several experiments at given intervals and drawing conclusions from the
findings (Fienberg & Stephen, 2014).
A variable can be dependent or independent. A dependent variable is called the predicted
variable. A dependent variable is the variable that is being predicted. On the other hand, an
independent variable is the variable that predicts the dependent variable (Narayan, Paresh, &
Popp, 2010). The dependent variable is goal setting score while the independent variable is the
control score (Iskandar, Ismed, Mohd, & Noraini, 2014).
Participants
The experiment involved an investigation of two tow different groups of individuals. One group
of individuals assumed the experimental role while the other group was used as a control for the
experiment. The group that was used for experiment had to set a goal while the group that was

PERFORMANCE ON A BATAK TASK
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used as a control for the experiment was simply required to do their best in the task. The
experiment involved both males and females. There were a total of 264 participants, 36 males
and 228 females.
Materials
The material that was used for conducting the experiment is the Batak Micro. The Batak Micro is
the smallest Batak machine that developer Quotronics produces. The face of the machine has 12
highly resistant illuminating target buttons and two digital displays for score and time. It is a
training tool used to measure and improve mobility, dexterity, agility and reaction times.
Procedure
The experiment used a 30 second accumulator program. In this sequence, individual targets light
up until hit by the participant, at which point another random target will illuminate. This lasts for
30 seconds, in which participants must hit as many targets as possible. Time remaining and score
are displayed at the top of the Batak.
Analysis Results
There were a total of 264 participants. The number of females were 228 while the number of
males were 36 indicating that there were more female participants than male participants. The
control of the experiment hand 136 participants (51.5%) while the goal setting group were 128
participants (48.5%). Therefore, it is clear that sample sizes of both groups (control group and
experiment group) were almost equal in number hence reducing the chances of biasedness in the
experiment. The youngest participant was 17 years old (minimum age) while the oldest
participant was 59 years old (the maximum age). Therefore, the sample of participants was quite
representative in terms of age brackets. The mean age of the participants was 24.5 years

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indicating that majority of the participants were youthful. The standard deviation of age of the
participants was 8.893.
The average score age for the control group was 44.95 while the average score for goal setting
group was 45.21. The average scores demonstrate that generally, goal setting group hand a
relatively higher score than the control group. The standard deviation of score for the control
group was 6.264 while the standard deviation of score for the goal setting group was 6.546.
An independent sample t test was conducted to investigate whether there was any significant
difference between the average scores of the control group and the average scores of the goal
setting group. The t- test revealed that the significance value was 0.974. This is the value of
significance at 95% confidence interval (5% confidence level). Since the significance value is
more than the level of significance, it was sufficient to conclude that there was a significant
difference between the average scores of the control group and the average scores of the goal
setting group. The results of average scores for the two groups (control group goal setting group)
are shown in the figure below.

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Discussion of Results
The hypothesis tested was to investigate whether there is no significant difference in score
between the experimental group and the control group versus an alternative hypothesis that there
is a significant difference in score between the experimental group and the control group. The
results indicate that the value of significance is 0.974 at 5% confidence level. The results clearly
demonstrate that the significance value is greater than the level of significance. Hence, the null
hypothesis that there is no significant difference in score between the experimental group and the
control group was not rejected. Therefore, it was concluded that there is indeed a significance
difference in the score between the control group and the goal setting group.
The results match the discussions in the introduction section. In the introduction, it has been
clearly pointed out the gaol setting enhances focus which leads to better or higher scores.
Therefore, it was sufficient to conclude that goal setting improves scores in a BATAK score,
thus casing the difference in the value of the score between the groups.

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The next course of action would be to conduct an experiment to investigate whether there is any
significant difference in goal setting among the males and females (based on gender). Similarly,
the next step would be to conduct an experiment to investigate whether there is any significant
difference in goal setting in terms of age.
References