Consent Requirements and Anxiety in University Undergraduate Students

Abstract

Four intact classes of undergraduate students (N = 276) in beginning psychology and sociology were administered the state anxiety questionnaire of the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory under one of the following conditions: (a) following the presentation of a brief consent form, (b) following a longer consent form, (c) prior to the administration of a consent form, or (d) following the reading of an irrelevant passage to control for experimenter contact time. A priori comparisons indicated that groups given the short consent form and the inventory prior to consent were more anxious than other groups. These results suggest that the consent procedure may be useful as a brief anxiety reducing introduction to the experimenter.