I tried to be brief, but maybe ended up being too brief and did not fully explain. So, please feel free to add your own written thoughts to this.
Question #2: Select one construct from the following list: self-esteem, femininity/masculinity, creativity, hunger, motivation, fear.
I selected fear
Question #2 (continued): Briefly describe how fear might be measured using an operational definition based on 'self-report', 'behavioral', and 'physiological' (added by me) modalities.
Fear is an emotion resulting from perceived threat and can be associated with psychological phobias of many different kinds. Therefore, a defined construct of fear should be narrow enough in scope so that it can be measured. For this particular exercise, I will consider the 'fear of social situations', which is associated with 'social anxiety disorder' (pg 202 of DSM-5).
a. Self-Report: This can be measured with a questionaire that asks several questions related to the person's perceived fear. For example: What will people think about you at the movies? Although I could come up with my own, there are questionaires already used for this purpose (i.e. Brief Fear of Negative Evaluation scale or BFNE-S from Rodebaugh et al., 2004; Weeks et al., 2005).
b. Behavioral: This can be measured 24/7 for about 30 days using several, strategically placed motion sensor activated cameras (LOL). In addition, controlled stimulus (incentives) would have to be introduced at set intervals in order to elicit the need for the person to leave the house. For example, one can make being inside the house very unpleasant during the 30 days of observation. Note that when leaving the house, the person would have to be accompanied by an observer in order to monitor for physical signs of fear (i.e. posture, gaze, skin sweat, shaky hands, avoidance of conversation). A scale would also have to be used in order to quantify the observed behavior.
c. Physiological: Hair samples of the person can be collected at the end of the 30 days and analyzed for 'cortisol' concentration along the length of each hair strand. Since each hair strand grows about 1/2 inch per month, the cortisol concentration can be correlated to the 30-day observation period. Urine samples can also be collected each day and analysed for cortisol content. The urine measure can then be correlated to each of the times when the stimulus to leave the house was presented.
