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Currently, almost one in every two Americans is overweight and one…
Currently, almost one in every two Americans is overweight and one in every five is obese. These individuals face discrimination on a daily basis in employment, education, and relationship contexts. They are viewed as having a physical, moral and emotional impairment and there is a tendency for others to hold them responsible for their condition. Physicians — people who are trained to treat all their patients warmly and have access to literature suggesting uncontrollable and hereditary aspects of obesity — also believe obese individuals are undisciplined and suffer from controllability issues. The current research, conducted by Mikki Hebl and Jingping Xu, examines physicians’ treatment of obesity in their patients more systematically by extending past research to look at physicians’ behavioral intentions as well as their expressed attitudes toward male and female patients who are of average weight, overweight, or obese. Although past studies tend to compare only overweight and average-weight individuals, this study provides a novel look at multiple increments of overweight by including both overweight and obesity. However, to simplify the presentation of this case study, only the average and overweight conditions will be presented.
Experimental Design
A total of 122 primary care physicians affiliated with one of three major hospitals in the Texas Medical Center of Houston participated in the study. These physicians were sent a packet containing a medical chart similar to the one they view upon seeing a patient. This chart portrayed a patient who was displaying symptoms of a migraine headache but was otherwise healthy. Two variables (the gender and the weight of the patient) were manipulated across six different versions of the medical charts. The weight of the patient, described in terms of Body Mass Index (BMI), was average (BMI = 23), overweight (BMI = 30), or obese (BMI = 36). Physicians were randomly assigned to receive one of the six charts, were asked to look over the chart carefully, and then complete two medical forms. The first form asked physicians which of 42 tests that they would recommend giving to the patient (see materials section for a copy of the medical form). The second form asked physicians to indicate how much time they believed they would spend with the patient, and to describe the reactions that they would have toward this patient.
In this presentation, only the question on how much time the physicians believed they would spend with the patient is analyzed. Although three patient weight conditions were used in the study (average, overweight, and obese) only the average and overweight conditions will be analyzed. Therefore, there are two levels of patient weight (average and overweight) and one dependent variable (time spent).
Raw Data
1=average weight; 2=overweight
WEIGHT TIME
1 15
1 15
1 45
1 40
1 45
1 20
1 40
1 30
1 40
1 30
1 30
1 50
1 30
1 45
1 45
1 30
1 50
1 30
1 30
1 20
1 30
1 20
1 30
1 20
1 20
1 30
1 25
1 20
1 40
1 30
1 30
1 30
1 30
2 20
2 30
2 30
2 20
2 25
2 20
2 20
2 30
2 30
2 15
2 30
2 20
2 5
2 20
2 15
2 30
2 25
2 30
2 30
2 20
2 15
2 15
2 20
2 45
2 15
2 60
2 15
2 15
2 20
2 15
2 30
2 30
2 30
2 30
2 30
2 30
2 30
2 30
Descriptive and Inferential Statistics
What is the N for each group
Calculate the mean, medium and mode
Create two histograms for time expected to be spent on average versus overweight patients
Was the Expected time spent was generally higher for the average-weight patients or overweight patients?
The highest expected time was for a patient in the average-weight patients or overweight patients was?
Approximately what proportion of the average weight patients had higher scores than the median for the overweight patients? 25%, 50%, 75%, 90%
The difference between means is approximately
1/10 Of a standard deviation
¼ Of a standard deviation
2/3 of a standard deviation
3 standard deviations
What is the P value?
Conduct a T test (Inferential Statistics)
What is your conclusion?
