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March 19, 2024, 08:24:06 pm

Author Topic: Psych Research Methods '19  (Read 5765 times)  Share 

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Bri MT

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Psych Research Methods '19
« on: December 21, 2018, 08:20:54 am »
+10

Hey everyone,

This is the new version of the psych research methods 2018 thread.

Simply put, here's what'll happen:
 - I'll post up a set of questions
 - You'll respond with suggested solutions
 - You'll give eachother feedback
 - I'll give you feedback (and maybe some of the other ex-psych students will chime in too)


In response to feedback from the 2018 cohort, I'll only be running this at the start of the year.


Research methods is one of the main areas that a) teachers might not cover as well b) is always on the exam c) can be assessed in every SAC you have d) the state performs poorly on
My hope is that through practicing and refining your answers here, you'll get an edge that helps you throughout the year.

Remember to provide feedback to your peers too, even if you aren't sure; having a 2nd perspective is useful.


The first question set has been provided :)

« Last Edit: February 22, 2019, 02:26:41 pm by miniturtle »

Bri MT

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Re: Psych Research Methods '19
« Reply #1 on: February 22, 2019, 02:27:48 pm »
+5
Hey all,

I’m hoping that you all would have a good grip on the nervous system now so it seems like a decent time to do a set of research method questions on this. Last year I did a set focused around the spinal reflex, so this time I’m going to focus on a different topic. Hope you find this useful, and let me know if there are particular topics you want to see 😊

Question Set 1

Ms Victoria Jones requires her class to participate in a range of experiments which they will record in a logbook and annotate for their SAC. The first of these experiments involves students pairing up with one student being monitored by a video recording. The other student is responsible for activating the sympathetic nervous system of their buddy by scaring them. First, they will attempt to scare them by slamming a heavy book on a table near them. Then, they will attempt to scare them by yelling. After each scaring attempt, the video recording will be used to measure the diameter of the scared student’s pupil. In the next class, the students swap roles.

1.  Would it be expected for the diameter of the pupils to be greater or smaller after a book has been slammed on the table? (2)
2. Name an ethical principle that has been breached in this experiment and describe why. (3)
3. How could the experiment be impacted if the next class is in a different classroom? (3)
4. What ethical principle would be breached if the teacher retained copies of the video recording for use by next year’s class? (1)
5. What might a control look like in this experiment and why would it be beneficial? (4)
6. Explain two improvements that could be made to this experiment, aside from using a control (4)
7. Write an appropriate label for the vertical axis of a graph included in the report for this experiment (2)

whys

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Re: Psych Research Methods '19
« Reply #2 on: February 22, 2019, 04:04:01 pm »
+3
1.  Would it be expected for the diameter of the pupils to be greater or smaller after a book has been slammed on the table? (2)
Spoiler
It would be expected for the diameter of the pupils to be greater (dilate) in response to the book being slammed on the table. This is because the sympathetic nervous system would activate the fight-flight-freeze response, which would cause the pupils to dilate to let in more light into the eye. This allows the individual to increase the quality of their eyesight and therefore increase their chance of survival, which is the goal of the fight-flight-freeze response.
2. Name an ethical principle that has been breached in this experiment and describe why. (3)
Spoiler
Voluntary participation. Ms Victoria Jones does not ask her class to choose whether or not they would like to participate in the experiment, and just requires them to participate. The students are not given the choice to participate, which is why voluntary participation is breached.
3. How could the experiment be impacted if the next class is in a different classroom? (3)
Spoiler
The environment of the next classroom could impact the results obtained. This is because another classroom could have noise distractions and different amount of lighting (which largely affects pupil size). This results in an unstandardised procedure which can cause discrepancies between the data collected in the two classrooms.
4. What ethical principle would be breached if the teacher retained copies of the video recording for use by next year’s class? (1)
Spoiler
Confidentiality.
5. What might a control look like in this experiment and why would it be beneficial? (4)
Spoiler
A possible control group for this experiment is a group of students monitored by a video recording who are not scared by a scare stimulus. If their pupil size is measured, it can be used as a standard to compare the results of the other two experimental groups to. In this way, the effect of the independent variable is more likely to be isolated and its effects can clearly be seen.
6. Explain two improvements that could be made to this experiment, aside from using a control (4)
Spoiler
Ms Victoria Jones could have minimised participant variables. A participant variable that could have acted as a confounding variable for this experiment is past experience with scary situations. Students who have been exposed to situations similar to the ones being used in the experiment may not react in the same way to those who do not have much past experience with being scared. This is because they may know when to anticipate the scare stimulus or because they know what to expect from this type of scare stimulus and have already prepared their body for the book to be slammed or the yelling to occur. To minimise this individual participant difference, a matched paricipants design could be used. The students could be matched according to the number of horror movies watched, or a pre-test could be conducted to determine how much their sympathetic nervous system is aroused.

Another improvement that could be made is using a random sample. As Ms Jones used her class which was readily available to her, convencience sampling was used. This means that the sample is unlikely to be representative of the population. Ms Jones could use a random sample by assigning each member of the population a number, and using a random number generator to choose members of the population to be in her sample. A random sample is likely to be representative of the population.
7. Write an appropriate label for the vertical axis of a graph included in the report for this experiment (2)
Spoiler
Pupil diameter, measured in millimetres.
« Last Edit: February 22, 2019, 04:06:04 pm by whys »
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cfalzon

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Re: Psych Research Methods '19
« Reply #3 on: March 03, 2019, 12:16:52 pm »
+2
1.  It would be expected that the diameter of the pupils would be greater due to them dilating in order to allow more light into the eyes in response to the threat of the loud noise

2. Voluntary participation has been breached. Mrs Jones requires her class to participate in the experiments for their SAC, and does not offer them a choice as to whether they will participate in the experiment. As the students were not given a choice, voluntary participation has been breached.

3. If the next class had their experiment in a different classroom, the environment of the experiment would change. This would result in unstandardised procedures, such as different amounts of lighting (which may influence the pupil size of participants), which could be a confounding variable.

4. Confidentiality would be breached, unless the students gave consent to have the videos retained for use by next year's class.

5. A control could be video recording a group of participants who are not exposed to the scare-inducing stimulus. These participants would have their normal pupil size recorded to be used as a standard to compare against the results of the experimental group. A control would be beneficial as it would isolate the effects of the IV, and help to determine whether the IV had an effect on the DV.

6. Mrs Jones has used a convenience sample, as her students are readily avaliable to her. She could improve her experiment by using a random sample, which would improve the representativeness of the sample. Mrs Jones could also have attempted to minimise participant variables. Some of the students may have prior experience with exposure to scare stimuli, which would influence the results. Mrs Jones could pre-test her students by asking them how many horror movies they have watched. She could then employ a matched-participants design by matching the student who has watched the most horror movies with the student who has watched the least horror movies, and so on.

7. Diameter of pupil


cfalzon

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Re: Psych Research Methods '19
« Reply #4 on: March 06, 2019, 09:41:29 pm »
0
Are these responses going to be marked? :)

Bri MT

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Re: Psych Research Methods '19
« Reply #5 on: March 06, 2019, 09:57:12 pm »
+2
Are these responses going to be marked? :)

Yep :)

I've been pretty busy but I'll definitely get around to it :)

Bri MT

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Re: Psych Research Methods '19
« Reply #6 on: March 10, 2019, 08:23:45 pm »
+3


It's clear you're familiar with the content; I think something for you to work on will be writing concisely to the marking scheme as (especially for the first part of your answer for 6) you sometimes waste time writing uneccessary information.

For 2, you've only given 2 points: that voluntary participation was breached (1) and that this is because the students did not have a choice (1). If you can't think of an additional point for voluntary participation maybe consider a different ethical principle and see if you have find 2 additional points related to that :)

For 3, you understand the idea but the wording in the 3rd sentence is a little off. Unstandardised procedure is a good starting point, but "discrepancies" is too general (we would expect the two datasets to have some differences even if using a standardised procedure) and might not lead the examiner to give you the 3rd mark - what type of variable would be introduced?

For 6, the original design was repeated measures (not independent groups) so participant variables were already minimised; if you want to swap to repeated measures you'll need to find a different advantage.

Your second part of the explanation uses phrases likely to be in the examiners report and connects them well - very easy to give marks too :)


For any questions I haven't commented on, I'd give you full marks





It's also clear that you have the background knowledge for answering these questions. Something I would suggest for you to work on is "certainty" in some of your statements - as depending on the examiner/question this could lose you marks. Eg. using "would" when "could" might be more appropriate

Your answers tended to be similar to whys so much of the same feedback applies, especially in regards to q2 & q6

For q1, it would be great to refer to sympathetic nervous system dominance to explain why the threat induces this response

For question 7 you need a unit - eg.  pupil diameter (mm)




Hope you've both found this useful - you've both showed a strong start & I hope you only build from here :)
Let me know if you have any questions, and definitely feel free to post again with fine-tuned answers :)

whys

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Re: Psych Research Methods '19
« Reply #7 on: March 11, 2019, 10:21:00 am »
+1
Thanks so much miniturtle! I’m not sure how I’d include 3 different points for question 2. If I used informed consent, would I get the following marks if I said informed consent was breached (1) as participants did not explicitly give consent to this experiment as their parent/guardian was not approached if under 18 or they did not give their own consent if they were over 18 (2) and were not informed of the study’s nature during the stage of the experiment where they should have given consent. (3)
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Bri MT

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Re: Psych Research Methods '19
« Reply #8 on: March 13, 2019, 02:45:16 pm »
+2
Thanks so much miniturtle! I’m not sure how I’d include 3 different points for question 2. If I used informed consent, would I get the following marks if I said informed consent was breached (1) as participants did not explicitly give consent to this experiment as their parent/guardian was not approached if under 18 or they did not give their own consent if they were over 18 (2) and were not informed of the study’s nature during the stage of the experiment where they should have given consent. (3)

Yeah in this context I'd give 3 marks for that. (Sometimes you might only get 2 for it in a different question though so I'd advise caution if there are other clear opportunities to get the marks)

No worries :) 

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Re: Psych Research Methods '19
« Reply #9 on: April 09, 2019, 10:14:14 pm »
+2
Just came across this, hopefully it’s not too late to comment,

1) the expected diameter of the pupils will increase as the individual is frightened, resulting In the sympathetic adrenomedullary response where sympathetic system is activated. This  activation results in a fight or flight response as the individual feels threatened. The release of adrenaline during this process produces symtoms including dialation of pupils to let more light in, acting as a survival mechanism.

2) beneficence was breached. No further advances to the research of science was made as the dialation of pupils following a frightful situation was expected. The individual did not gain any benefit from partaking in this experiment and rather experienced threat which may have negatively affected them psychologically,

3) If in a different classroom, the experiment would not have consistently carried out as the new environment may have different distractions, lighting and sounds that act as extraneous variables and affect the DV ( dilation of pupil ). Thus, this new environment makes this experiment unreliable and unable to generalise

4) Confidentiality would be breached if the student did not consent to have the videos be shared to the class for next year,

5) a control would include videoing a student that had not been scared. This control would be beneficial as the results of the dilation of pupils can be compared and contrasted between the control and experimental groups to establish that the IV has in fact directly impacted upon the DV. If the control group produce similar results to the experimental group, this suggests that extraneous variables would have been present. A control helps makes the experiment more reliable.

6) As thé teacher used his class as his sample, convenience sampling had taken place, resulting in selection bias. An improvement would be to use random sampling as well increase the sample size so that the selected sample would be more representative of the population.

Another improvement would be to use a control group in this experiment to control for the placebo effect and participant bias. Having a control group allows for the results to be compared and contrasted to establish that the IV impacted the DV, making the study more reliable

 ( I know it doesn’t need 4 points- just wanted feedback on these as well )
Another improvement would be to get informed consent from the participants or their parents if they are under 18, prior to the experiment so this particular ethical guideline was not breached and did not prevent the study from being reliable.

A fourth  improvement would be to use counterbalancing. As the experimental design was repeated measures, order effects would be present as the second partner filming would know what to expect before it’s their turn to be scared. Counterbalancing helps minimise such order effects

7) Diametre of pupils, measured in mm
« Last Edit: April 09, 2019, 10:16:48 pm by briv01 »

NomotivationF

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Re: Psych Research Methods '19
« Reply #10 on: April 28, 2019, 02:16:22 pm »
+1
Bit late, but might as well

1.  Would it be expected for the diameter of the pupils to be greater or smaller after a book has been slammed on the table? (2)
Spoiler
Yes, this is due to the expected activation of the sympathetic nervous system, which results in the dilation of the pupils to allow more light in for better vision
2. Name an ethical principle that has been breached in this experiment and describe why. (3)
Spoiler
Voluntary participation. This is due to the fact that Ms Jones 'required' her students to participate in the study, and the students did not choose to partake in the study
3. How could the experiment be impacted if the next class is in a different classroom? (3)
Spoiler
If the next class is in a different classroom this may act as an extraneous variable that would have an effect on the results of the experiment. This may be due to the fact that students may feel unfamiliar in certain environments, and may produce a greater fear response if they are in a classroom they are not comfortable with.
4. What ethical principle would be breached if the teacher retained copies of the video recording for use by next year’s class? (1)
Spoiler
Confidentiality
5. What might a control look like in this experiment and why would it be beneficial? (4)
Spoiler
A control for this experiment may be recording a student that does not produce a fear response to a 'scary' stimulus. This control could serve as a baseline to compare the experimental group to. It also further helps determine the effects of the IV on DV of the experiment, while also helping to determine if there were any Ev's or CV's present during the experiment.
6. Explain two improvements that could be made to this experiment, aside from using a control (4)

7. Write an appropriate label for the vertical axis of a graph included in the report for this experiment (2)
Spoiler
Pupil size (mm)
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