Possible Sources of Error

Since I've just completed the phase of my research involving data collection, I'm ready to move onto data analysis and working out any conclusions I may find evidence for. However, before posting all of the graphs, raw data, and conclusions I'm starting to form, I'd like to bring up some possible sources of error.

Sample Size: 

About ten students showed up in each group. Simply put, ten students in each sample is on the small end. Ideally, I would have had fifty or so in each group, and the more the better. Having groups as small as mine were can still yield accurate results, but the chance of error is much higher than it would be for larger groups. 

Musical Preference: 

The musical preference of subjects in psychological experiments has been known to influence the effect of music on cognition. For this reason, I did include a question in the survey given to subjects on whether they enjoyed the music or found it distracting, but I'm not sure if I will be able to separate groups into further categorizations based on this question because of the already small sample size. 

Moving Rooms: 

Unfortunately, for one of my trials, I had to use a different room than I used for the other two. Although the rooms' builds were the same, one was the Mandarin room while the other was for French. While this may or may not have had any impact on the participants, it is still worth noting. Perhaps the students who regularly had a class in one classroom unconsciously felt slightly more comfortable in it than those who didn't. 

My Interactions with Subjects: 

While I'd like to think I said all of the same things and spent about the same amount of time each day explaining the instructions to each group, I must consider the possibility that my interactions with the subjects influenced their moods or behavior. For example, I might have seemed more excited and encouraging on the day when I expected subjects to do best. 

Background Noise: 

During one of the silent periods, a teacher walked into the adjacent room, making some noise for about a minute. It wasn't loud, but it might have been a bit distracting to students who were completely focused on their task beforehand. 

The Group Dynamic:

Because I tested subjects in groups rather than as individuals, I should consider what effects this might have had. For example, students might have already felt motivated and competitive about finding as many words as possible simply because they were in groups. This is one of my main concerns about my procedure. 

So, as you can see, there are many, many different possible sources of error. When making my conclusions, the best thing I can do about this now is to give each some thought and discussion. The results of my study could be an accurate reflection of the independent variables I changed for each group, but if not, these sources of error are some possible reasons why.