A Study on the Effects of Images on Stress with Gender as a Factor

This quasi-experimental report investigates the impact of images (humorous vs. neutral) and gender on perceived stress levels. Using the Perceived Stress Scale questionnaire, 32 participants were recruited to view either humorous or neutral images before completing the questionnaire. The results of a Two-Way Unrelated ANOVA indicated non-significant effects of images on stress, non-significant effects of gender on stress, and no significant interaction effect between images and gender. The study discusses prior research linking media images to stress and anxiety, particularly in the context of disturbing visuals. While humorous visuals are generally associated with improved mood, the study's findings did not support the hypotheses that images or gender significantly impact stress levels. The discussion explores potential reasons for these non-significant results, such as the limited number of images used and the relevance of the humorous images selected. It also considers the decreasing gender gap in modern society as a factor. The report concludes by suggesting further research with more varied images and additional stress level questionnaires to explore these relationships more comprehensively. Desklib provides access to this and other solved assignments.

TITLE: The effects of Images on stress in Male and Female
Word count: 2200

Abstract
The goal of this Quasi Experiment was to look at the effects of Images (IV1) and gender (IV2) on perceived
stress (DV), as well as the interaction impact between these two independent variables.
Before the research was undertaken, past research on this issue area was considered [it's better to give a sent
ence or two of what previous research has found]. The perceived stress
scale Questionnaire was used to measure stress levels between male and females
and was used to recruit 32 individuals using a link provided by Qualtrics. Participants were instructed to
view either a humourus or neutral images before completing the perceived stress scale Questionnaire.
Following the completion of an Unrelated Two-Way ANOVA, the findings revealed a non-significant effect
of images on stress, and non-significant effect of images on sex, and a non-
significant interaction effect of the variables on stress.

Introduction
In research using self-report methodologies such as the perceived stress Scale, has been reported to be the
most reliable method to measure stress. Although there haven’t been evident researchers conducting this
form of questionnaire in images there have been some studies using other methods in the effects of images.
A study of a similar nature… on the effects of acute images from the media on the Iraq war and of 9/11
attack on mental and physical - health indicated that there was a link to stress on the images presented to
individuals. Some disturbing images were represented to a group of American individuals, and they reported
feelings of stress and anxiety with some individuals suffering with post traumatic stress disorder. With
participant taking a self reporting survey of the internet. In this case there was a significant finding. (Silver
et al., 2013)
Although such a study may not relate entirely to the study conducted in this report, however it does include
some relevant ideas. It would have been assumed that there would be significant findings in the effects of
images on stress. Humorous visuals have long been associated with raising people's spirits. "Human socio-
affective and cognitive functioning relies heavily on humour. Researchers have been able to investigate this
human trait in both toddlers and adults because to recent developments in neuroscience." It has been
associated to high self-esteem, reduced loneliness, and other depressed symptoms (Kuiper et al. as cited by
Bennett et al, 2006). Furthermore, in a study where participants saw either hilarious or neutral images to
determine the impact on 'positive psychological functioning,' laughter was linked to reducing depressive
symptoms and enhancing positive well-being (Lebowitz et al. 2010). (Lebowitz et al. 2010). These results
highlight the importance of humour imaging, as well as its impact on stress and psychological well-being. A
person's domain-specific stress levels is highly dependent on the reaction they receive in that domain. After
an analyses of the results of the study, this time the findings were non-significant on gender and stress.
Perhaps if the subjects were presented with videos rather than images of neutral and humorous content it
may have had an impact on the findings. There have been studies conducted on “Neural correlates of
laughter and humour’’ (Wild, Rodden, Grodd and Ruch, 2003). This study concluded that there was a
neurological impact on laughter and humour and its decreased stress and depression as a result. (Wild,
Rodden, Grodd and Ruch, 2003)
The present Quasi-Experiment will look into the impact of images on stress and how it differs by gender.
Half of the male and female participants will see a humourus or neutral images
and complete the perceived stress scale Questionnaire.
Three possibilities have been developed after reviewing previous literature.
H1: stress, as demonstrated by participants seeing the humour or neutral images, will impact the
participant’s stress over the past month.
H2: Gender will have an effect and measured by the perceived stress scale.

H3: humour and gender will have an interactional effect on stress.
Method
Design
A quasi experiment was conducted to initiate the effects of images on an
independent group design that looks at the influence of images (IV1) with two
conditions, seeing a humorous or neutral image on stress (DV) and gender differences within that (IV2)
Participants
32 participants were recruited as friends and family members of the two researchers.
There were 16 male participants (8 in the neutral condition and 8 in the humours condition), and 16 female p
articipants
(8 in the neutral condition and 8 in the humorous condition.) Although not all the subjects responded to the
link sent via Qualtrics, some participants opened the questionnaire but did not participate in the study. This
resulted in 4 participants being removed from the results collected on SPSS and only 28 participants data
was used to ensure a fair result, there was an equal number of participants.
The data was collected via Qualtrics were the participants received a link via text messages on their mobile
devices. The participants were all aged over 18 for ethical & consensual reasons. Found in Appenidix B. The
participants ages ranged between 18 - 36
Materials
The data was gathered collaboratively by the two researchers.
The data was collected using Qualtrics with a link sent to the participant’s mobile devices. The perceived
stress scale questionnaire, found in Appendix C was necessary for the study a mobile device and internet
connection was required to allow participants to complete the perceived stress scale questionnaire. The Two
questionnaires were created on Qualtrics, one containing two neutral images and two containing humours
images.
The perceived stress scale had 10 questions to which participants must react on a five-
point Likert Scale, with zero indicating " never" and four indicating "very often."
As a result, a high score on this Questionnaire denotes a high level of stress over the past
month. For instance, item 1 says, "In the last month, how often have you been upset
because of something that happened unexpectedly’’? However, four of the items are reversed scored to
prevent a response bias. A high score on these items will result in a high overall stress score.
Internal dependability is considered with the genders of the participants being split equally across the
factors.

Response bias is less likely with these items being reverse scored.
Gender and age were included in the Questionnaire.
Once the participants clicked on the link the participants were sent to a page where they accessed a debrief
sheet explaining the reason for research and providing them with a consent form which included contact
details for the researchers, module leader and organizations they could contact if they felt they needed to talk
to someone such as Samaritans and NHS helpline. The participants were then able to view the images then
click next to access the questionnaire.
Procedure
Initially, the Further Research Methods module team provided ethical permission for the material used.
Each participant was asked to give informed consent after the materials had been approved.
They were told they would view a series of images (two) and then complete a short questionnaire that would
take no longer than 10 minutes of their time, which would assess how their stress levels over the past month.
The participants were also told that the findings would be kept anonymous, that they were not compelled to
answer all of the questions, that they could stop the questionnaire at any moment.
Following that, the participants were shown either the humours or neutral images which consisted of two
images for each factor.
Before part taking in the questionnaire, the participants were debriefed and informed of the genuine purpose
of the study, which was to investigate the influence of images on gender variations in this area. The
participants were told that the purpose of the study was the effects of images to see how different people
would react to different images and it was part of a research training exercise which will form a final grade
for the module further research methods Both researchers' contact information was given to the subjects.
The data was then analysed using a Two-Way Unrelated ANOVA to see whether there was any correlation
in the effects of images on stress and gender.
Results
The goal of this quasi-experiment was to look at the effects of images on stress, as well as gender difference
s.
The findings were analysed using a Two-Way Unrelated ANOVA.
Table 1 shows the descriptive statistics for the data set.
Materials presented Gender Mean Std. D N

humorous Male 31.42 4.27 7
Female 36.14 10.82 7
Total 33.78 8.2 14
neutral Male 35.28 7.29 7
Female 38.42 6.94 7
Total 36.85 7.03 14
Total Male 33.35 6.08 14
Female 37.28 8.81 14
Total 35.32 7.69 28
Levenes test was significant indicating that Homogeneity of Variance can be assumed with the results
indicating a null hypothesis and a there is an equality of variance p=0.083 (p>.05).
The major effect of stress was non-significant.
There was no significant interaction of effect of images and gender on stress, F (1,25) =1.04 p>.05.
Although SD isn't mentioned, it's a well-written summary.
Homogeneity of Variance can be assumed because the Levenes test was not significant.
p=0.083 (p>.05). F (1,00) =4.08. The major effect of stress was non-significant.
There was no significant interaction in the effect of humorous and non-humorous
images and gender stress, F (1,00) =4.08 p>.05.
A standard deviation 7.69 and a means of 35.32

Figure 1: Mean of stress scores for Gender, neutral and humorous
There was not a substantial effect of stress on gender differences after viewing the humorous and neutral
images and no significant effect of stress or significant interaction and gender. In both circumstances. All
H1: There will be an effect of images on stress reported, as shown by participants watching the hilarious or
neutral film, and H2: There will be a gender influence on stress as measured by the perceived stress scale
has been rejected. H3: There will be an interaction effect between humorous and gender on stress, have been
rejected, with the nulls accepted.
Discussion
The current study's principal weaknesses can be several factors such as the is the limited images used and
limited questionnaire presented. And the relevance of humorous images used. This should be corrected if the
study is repeated. With more images presented to participants. And additional stress level questionnaires
such as the Life Event Stressful Success Questionnaire (LESSQ). Designed by Roger and Meadows. When
amusing and neutral images were shown to the participants in this study, there was no significant difference
in stress between males and females. This could be explained by the gender gap decreasing and gender
discrimination becoming less common in modern society. With challenges such as the gender wage gap, the
gap has narrowed in recent years. In 2020, the Office of National Statistics recorded a reduction of 7% from
the previous year's figure of 9%. (Office for National Statistics, 2021, Gender Pay Gap in the UK). Across
affective, behavioural, and physiological domains, imbalances in response to specifically calibrated imagery
of personal stressful circumstances were discovered as compared to neutral relaxing situations and alcohol-
cue situations. These distinctions could have ramifications for gender variations in stress-related illness risk.
Women reported and voiced more sad and worrisome mood after stress than men, while having bodily

arousal levels that were equal (for HR, SBP) or fewer (for DBP) than men. Furthermore, for males but not
for women, stress- and hard liquor alcohol appetite was linked to higher perceptual negative feeling.
Objective emotion was linked to behavioural activation and a marker of physiological arousal in both men
and women, while the latter was measured by HR in women and BP in males. This could be due to the fact
that women have a greater Efficacy and males have a higher BP at rest and after stresses, giving them wider
range and the potential to discern significance. Surprisingly, men and women had various types of subjective
emotions that exhibited links. Men's behavioural and physical responses were linked to subjectively anger
(but not women's) and women having perception fear (but not men).
The findings were more likely to contradict the findings. As the humorous material was chosen based on the
two researchers' sense of humour, the main effect of stress may have been determined to be insignificant
with the participant finding the content “not funny”. The images were from a popular meme page and
participants may have seen it before, thus potentially influencing their reaction.
The participants in this study were shown either a humorous or neutral images before answering a self-report
questionnaire, which can be compared to the work of M. Pilar Matud Gender differences in stress and
coping styles. Although in the case the researcher used a different approach to test the stress levels between
genders there is a remarkable resemblance in this study, the participants both participated in a self-reporting
questionnaire. The results of the study conducted by m. pilar matud “suggest that women suffer more stress
than men and their coping style is more emotion-focused than that of men.’’ (Matud, 2004). Although this
study took place in Spain and could potentially be insignificant to the current research of the effects of
images participants were located in the United Kingdom at the time of study. In conclusion the report’s
findings were no significant regardless of previous studies of a similar nature being conducted as mentioned
above.

References
Gentile B., Grabe S., Dolan- Pascoe B., Twenge J, M., Brooke, W. (2009), Gender Differences in Domaine-
Specific Self- Esteem: A Meta-Anaylsis. Review of General Psychology, Vol 13(1), pp. 34-45.
Lebowitz, K R., Diaz P T., Emery C F. (2010), Quality of Life Concerns of Patients with Cardiac and
Pulmonary Disorders. Effects of humor and laughter on psychological functioning, quality of life, health
status, and pulmonary functioning among patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease: A
preliminary investigation
Matud, M., 2004. Gender differences in stress and coping styles. Personality and Individual Differences,
37(7), pp.1401-1415.
Ons.gov.uk. 2021. Gender pay gap in the UK - Office for National Statistics. [online] Available at:
<https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peopleinwork/earningsandworkinghours/bulletins/
genderpaygapintheuk/2021> [Accessed 16 December 2021].
Ozyesil, Z (2012) The Prediction Level of Self-Esteem on Humor Style and Positive-Negative Affect,
Psychology 2012. Vol.3, No.8, 638-641
Silver, R., Holman, E., Andersen, J., Poulin, M., McIntosh, D. and Gil-Rivas, V., 2013. Mental- and
Physical-Health Effects of Acute Exposure to Media Images of the September 11, 2001, Attacks and the Iraq
War. Psychological Science, 24(9), pp.1623-1634.
Wild, B., Rodden, F., Grodd, W. and Ruch, W., 2003. Neural correlates of laughter and humour. Brain,
126(10), pp.2121-2138.

APPENDICES
Appendix a

Appendix b
Appendix B

Appendix c