The Emerging Adulthood Measured at Multiple Institutions As a Set of Classroom Tools
Jon Grahe, Caitlin Faas, Scott Hall, Matthew Schmolesky, Holly Chalk, Leslie D. Cramblet Alvarez
Pacific Lutheran University, Mt. St. Mary’s University, Ball State University, Georgia Gwinnett College, McDaniel College, Adams State University
Background and Purpose
Most psychology majors are required to complete research
methods and capstone courses as part of their degree requirements
(Perlmann & McCaan, 2005). Recently there have been calls to increase
the meaningfulness of the associated course research projects by
coordinating students across many institutions to all employ the same
research protocol (Grahe, et al. 2012; Grahe, 2017). The Emerging
Adulthood Measured at Multiple Institutions 2: The Next Generation
(EAMMi2; https://osf.io/te54b) project is a response to that call and
partially replicated a simlar project conducted in 2004 (Reifman &
Grahe, 2016).
Emerging Adulthood (EA) researchers proposed additional items
for a survey that included standard EA measures (Markers of Adulthood
Items; the IDEA-8) and U.S. presidential election questions yielding a
survey took approximately 30 minutes to complete. Contributors
included EA researchers and instructors incorporating the project into
courses. Contributors who collected data from more than 80 participants
earned the privilege to access the data after initial cleaning (January 10th,
2017) and could submit a preregistered report manuscript to a special
Issue in the Emerging Adulthood journal. Partially funded by an APS
Teaching Fund grant, this project is intended to advance science while
simultaneously benefitting the education of psychology students.
This poster describes project outcomes and highlights ways that
instructors could use this in various classes.
Method
Participants. Contributors from 33 locations; Nstarted = 4091, Ncleandata =
3153, Sex (774 men; 2296 women; 53 other); Age (between 18-61, M =
21.09, SD = 4.805), Income (N = 3106; Median = 40-59,999), Residency
(2727 US Residents; 392 non-US Residents).
Pedagogical Materials and Uses
Statistics Courses: Examples with Authentic data; Warts and All.
Enough Variables for individual or groups of students work independent
Basic to Advance Statistics Exercises
Methods Courses: Scaffolded Assignments for Intro Courses
Work from Past Project (practice measurement development)
Work toward the Future (EAMMi2 continued or EAMMi3)
Advanced Methods/Capstone: Past and Future
Students can answer old or new questions using existing data
Further Opportunities --Psi Chi’s NICE (https://osf.io/juupx/)
Activities Developed
Course
Procedure. After receiving local IRB approval, contributors received a
location specific survey so that recruitment numbers could be tracked.
Each EAMMi2 contributor provided a description of recruiting methods
which ranged between in-lab data collection, random sampling of social
media contacts, and emails to students at the host institution
(https://osf.io/5pdvy). Participants completed a Qualtrics survey requiring
approximately 30 minutes of their time.
Topic
Type of Activity
Statistics
Multiple Regression
Advanced
Homework
Statistics
Regressions w/interaction
Advanced
Homework
Research Methods
Data Collection Worksheet
Introductory
Homework/in-class
Capstone/advanced
Research methods
Research Process StartFinish
Advanced
Semester-based
Stats/Research Methods
Sampling Strategies
Introductory
In-class
Health Psych
Basic Research Activities
Introductory
In-class
Added Scale Items
Markers of Adulthood (MOA; Items Derived from
Arnett, 1997, 2001importance, 20; achieve 20)
Belonging (Leary, Kelly, Cottrell, and Schreindorfer,
2013; 10 items)
IDEA-8 (Baggio, Iglesias, Studer, & Gmel, 2014; 8
items)
Self-efficacy (Generalized Self-efficacy; Schwarzer
& Jerusalem, 1995; 10 items)
Subjective Well Being (Diener, 2000; 6 items)
Perceived Social Support (11)
Mindfulness (Brown & Ryan, 2003; 15 items)
Social Media Use (adapted from Yang and Brown,
2013, 2015; 11 items)
Political Affiliation (party identification, political
ideology; 2)
American Dream (importance of achieving, ability to
achieve; 2 items)
Open Ended Presidential Preference
Interpersonal Transgressions (adapted from
McCullough, Emmons, Kilpatrick, & Mooney, 2003;
12 items)
Demographics (service, income, residency)
Narcissistic Personality Inventory-13 (NPI-13;
Gentile et al., 2013; 13 items)
Demographics (edu, sex,
ethnicity, siblings)
Interpersonal Exploitiveness Scale (Brunell et al.,
2013; 3 items)
Age (added November, 2016) 
Disability Identity (Personal Opinions Questionnaire,
POQ; Bolton & Brookings, 1998; 15 items)
Patient Health Questionnaire ( Kroenke, et al., 2010;
13 items)
Perceived Stress Questionnaire (Cohen, Kamarch, &
Mermelstein, 1983; 10 items)
Marriage Opinions (9 items)
Data Set: 314 Variables including:
individual scale items and compiled constructs.
Variable Types:
Nominal, Ordinal, Interval, Ratio
Open Ended
Teaching Activities
EAMMi2 Pedagogical Advisors develop
activities using EAMMi2 Teaching
Demonstration Submission Template
Discussion
Level
EAMMi2 Scales
Development: Data Cleaning is Recorded https://osf.io/8uy4d/
Origin: Randomly selected 50 % respondents
Sample Characteristics: NTotal = 1519
Sex: Men = 386, Women= 1107, Other = 26,
Education: 1401 in college or attended college,
26 did not
Age: 1041 reporting
(Min=18, P25 = 19, Mdn = 20, P75 = 22 Max = 61)
Beyond Statistics and Methods: Other Courses and Opportunities can use the
project with known variables that are appealing to students to allow them to
explore their own questions or following practices examples. Current contributors
found developed examples in each of the following:
Marriage and Family Therapy
Lifespan Development
Health Psychology
Stem Questionnaire
Materials. The EAMMi2 planning committee reviewed proposals of
measures to add to the survey. After pilot testing, the survey included
over 200 items for 18 scales and demographics. The complete survey can
be reviewed at the EAMMi2 project page (https:osf.io/te54b).
EAMMi2 Teaching Data Set
EAMMi2 Contributors
Locations
EAMMi2 provides accessible project for students to access existing data or use survey
to generate new data.
Large data set with many types of variables for basic to advanced learning
Opportunities for Collaboration
EAMMi2: Teaching Exercises and Manual Development  https://osf.io/627qk/
EAMMi3: The International Edition  https://osf.io/jyz99/
Contact Information
Jon Grahe
[email protected]
For more information, please visit: http://osf.io/te54b
Acknowledgements and Funding
The EAMMi2 was partially supported by an APS Teaching Fund Grant and a
Pacific Lutheran University Regency Award to Jon Grahe. Please visit
https://osf.io/8dgaf/ for additional funding support.
The EAMMi2 included researchers from 33 institutions in the US, England,
Greece, and the Caribbean (see map). This research was not possible without
their contribution.