Chapter 1 - Universiteit Twente

Design and procedure
Stage One: Weakening the Ramparts
Thirty-five people (14 female, 21 male; mean age 44.46 years, SD = 18.21) participated
in a 2 (encounter: initial request vs. landmark) X 2 (number of requesters: one vs. two)
between-subjects factorial design.
Either one or two confederates (1 male, 1 female) randomly approached passers-by in
the centre of a large town. Participants were randomly assigned to the initial request
or landmark condition. Similar to Experiment 2.2, the confederate in the initial request
condition asked participants to answer eight open-ended questions about their
health behavior and lifestyle as part of a student project for the local university. In the
landmark condition, the confederate approached participants with a map of the city
and asked for directions. Next, based on a random schedule, either the same or a second
confederate told participants that there was a second purpose of his/her activities that
day, which was to study people’s responses when having an interaction on the street.
The confederate then asked participants to complete a questionnaire containing the
dependent measures. After having completed the questionnaire, participants were
thanked for their participation.
Dependent measures
Duration. Answering the series of questions in the initial request condition as well as
giving directions in the landmark condition lasted an average of 2.5 minutes (SD = 44.42
seconds), with no difference in duration, t < 1.
Affect. To measure whether the type of encounter would result in unintended (negative)
affect, we administered the Positive and Negative Affect Schedule (PANAS; Watson et al.,
1988), which includes 10 positive and 10 negative affect-items rated on 5-point scales
(1 = not at all feeling this way; 5 = extremely feeling this way). Sample items include:
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