AQA (A) Research methods. Model exam answers

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1 AQA (A) Research methods Model exam answers These answers are not for you to copy or learn by heart, they are for you to see how to develop you answers to get the marks. They have been written according to the marking scheme and taking into account the examiner s comments. All the questions in these questions gain AO3 marks.

2 A researcher investigated whether memory for words presented with pictures was better than memory for words presented without pictures. The researcher used an independent groups design. In Condition 1, participants were given a limited time to learn a list of 20 words. They were then asked to recall the 20 words in any order. In Condition 2, participants were given the same time to learn the same 20 words, but this time each word was presented with a picture. For example, the word apple was presented alongside a picture of an apple. They were then asked to recall the 20 words in any order. A pilot study is a small-scale investigation carried out before the main study. a. Explain why it would be appropriate for this researcher to use a pilot study. In your answer you must refer to details of the experiment given above. A pilot study is carried out to check all the details of the procedure and correct the problems found if needed. So you need to identify potential problems in the study then state that correcting these problems before the main study would save time and money. A pilot study could be used to check whether the words were appropriate, for example make sure all the participants knew the words. / It could also be used to check that the participants were given enough time to learn the words/ but not so much that they were bored and got distracted. It could also be used to make sure the instructions were clear and easy to understand. / If needed could be made before carrying out the main study to avoid wasting time and money. / b. State a non-directional hypothesis for this experiment. You must operationalise (put them in a way that can be measured) the two variables to get the marks There will be a difference in the number of words correctly recalled when words are presented with pictures and without pictures. c. Explain two reasons why it was more appropriate to use an independent groups design than a repeated measures design. (2 marks + 2 marks) You need to link your answer to the study to get marks i.e. refer to the conditions, words, pictures... Reason 1 If a repeated groups design was used the same words could not be used in both conditions because the participants would remember them so the problem would be to find words just as difficult or easy for the second list. Reason 2 If the same participants did both conditions they would guess the aim of the study and could modify their behaviour accordingly, this is called demand characteristics.

3 Table 1: The range and median number of words correctly recalled for participants shown words without pictures and for participants shown words with pictures Condition 1 Words without pictures Condition 2 Words with pictures Median number of words correctly recalled Range d. What do the scores in Table 1 show? To get both marks you need to refer to both the median and the range and explain what they mean. The data shows that participants remembered more words when they were presented with pictures (mean=16) than when they were presented on their own (mean=13). / But pictures did not help all the participants in the same way as the spread of the results is larger in condition 2 (range=13) than in condition 1 (range=11). /

4 A researcher used content analysis to investigate how the behaviour of young children changed when they started day care. He identified a group of nine-month-old children who were about to start day care. He asked the mother of each child to keep a diary recording her child s behaviour every day for two weeks before and for two weeks after the child started day care. a. Explain how the researcher could have used content analysis to analyse what the mothers had written in their diaries. Link your answer to the study. The researcher should create behavioural categories / for example crying, having a tantrum. / Then read the mothers diary and tally the number of times these behaviour have occurred. / Then compare the number of times before the children started day care and after they started day care. / b. Explain one or more possible limitations of this investigation. There are many more possible limitations, the main thing is to link the limitations you use to the study, give examples taken from the study. One difficulty could be that the mothers could be very busy if they are going back to work so they might forget to complete the diary so the data might be inaccurate. / Also the mothers might drop out of the study because of lack of time so the smaple might end up very small so the researcher will not be able to generalise the results. / The researcher might not have suitable behavioural the categories for example the children might have nightmares or not want to eat so the results will not show all the changes in the children s behaviour. / There is also a lack of control for example the quality of the day care setting might influence the children s behaviour. /

5 Dave, a middle-aged male researcher, approached an adult in a busy street. He asked the adult for directions to the train station. He repeated this with 29 other adults. Each of the 30 adults was then approached by a second researcher, called Sam, who showed each of them 10 photographs of different middle-aged men, including a photograph of Dave. Sam asked the 30 adults to choose the photograph of the person who had asked them for directions to the train station. Sam estimated the age of each of the 30 adults and recorded whether each one had correctly chosen the photograph of Dave. a. Identify one aim of this experiment. The aim of the study is to find out if the age of participants affects their ability to identify a person. b. Suggest one reason why the researchers decided to use a field experiment rather than a laboratory experiment. It is not enough to say that the study has high ecological validity you need to explain why liking your explanation to this particular study. In the first part of the study the participants did not know that they are taking part in an experiment so they behaved normally, if they had known they might have tried to remember Dave, therefore the study has high ecological validity and the results can be applied to real life situations. c. Name the sampling technique used in this experiment. Evaluate the choice of this sampling technique in this experiment. (1 mark + 3 marks) Sampling technique: opportunity sample Evaluation It is not representative of the wider population because not everybody has a chance of being chosen therefore we cannot generalise the results, / however it is the most used sampling method because it is the most convenient as it would be impossible to have the names of all the people in the street at the time of the study so random sampling would not be possible. / If the researcher had advertised for volunteers the participants would have known that they were taking part in a study and might have been influenced by demand characteristics. / d. Identify one possible extraneous variable in this experiment. Explain how this extraneous variable could have affected the results of this experiment. (1 mark + 3 marks) Link your answer to the study and explain how the extraneous variable you have chosen might have influenced the results Extraneous variable: time of the day How this extraneous variable could have affected the results of this experiment: This could have influenced the results because if it was early in the morning the participants might have been rushing to work and would have spent less time to give directions / so when they were asked to identify Dave they would have made less accurate than people who did the task in the middle of the morning when they were in no hurry. / also if it was a dark morning they might not have seen Dave clearly so would have been less accurate in their identification. /

6 Research has shown that there is a relationship between stress and illness. Figure 1 below shows the number of days off work through illness in a year and scores on a stress questionnaire, where a high score indicates more stress. What does Figure 1 tell you about the relationship between stress and illness? You have to say two things about the graph: the strength and the direction of the relationship The graph shows a positive correlation between scores on a stress questionnaire and days off through illness. As the scores increased on the questionnaire so did the number of days off work. Outline one strength and one weakness of using correlations in stress research. You need to illustrate your point by giving an example taken from the study Strength: it allows us to study the relationship between two variables which occur naturally and that we could not create experimentally for example we could not create stressful conditions experimentally to see if it leads to illness. Weakness: we cannot establish a cause and effect relationship between the two covariables as other factors could be involved such as diet and exercise which could also affect health.

7 The following scattergram shows the relationship between the number of weeks of treatment with ECT and the score on the Self-Rating Depression Scale (on this scale, a high score indicates depression). Outline what the scattergram seems to show. To get 4 marks you have to make 4 points. When looking at a scattergram you always need to mention the direction and the strength and the strength, then you need to mention what is means then look closely at the graph and try to identify a fourth feature of the graph. The graph shows that there is a strong / negative correlation / between the score on the depression and the length of the treatment this means that the longer the treatment the lower the depression score. / However between 2.5 and 3.5 weeks the correlation is a weak positive correlation. / Both life changes and daily hassles are often measured using questionnaires. Give two limitations of using questionnaires. (2 marks + 2 marks) You need to describe briefly the limitations and explain why it is limitation (i.e. what are the consequences for the results) Limitation One One limitation of using questionnaires is that people might be influenced by social desirability; they might not want to reveal that they have been in prison for example which is a life event. / So the results will lack validity as the data does not reflect the truth. / Limitation Two Another limitation is that questionnaires on life events use retrospective data i.e. life events during the past year; people might have forgotten some events / so the data will not be accurate, it will lack validity as it will not reflect what is really happening. /