Internal assessment

1. Internal assessment Experimental research jette hannibal

2. Considerations in experimental research • What is the aim of the experiment? • What studies and theories are considered in your research? • How do you plan to manipulate and measure variables? • How will you select participants? • Can the effect of confounding variables be minimized? - for example: How will you control for demand characteristics, order effects and participant variables? • Which experimental design will you use? • How will you deal with ethical issues? • How will you reference your sources? jette hannibal

3. Non-human animals must not be used No deception No harm done to participants (physical or psychological) Briefing Debriefing Right to withdraw Confidentiality Informed consent Children: parental consent Ethical considerations jette hannibal

4. Consent form Consent Form. ·I have been informed about the nature of the experiment ·I understand that I have the right to withdraw from the experiment at any time, and that any information/data about me will remain confidential ·My anonymity will be protected as my name will not be identifiable. ·The experiment will be conducted so that I will not be demeaned in any way. ·I will be debriefed at the end, and have the opportunity to find out the results. I give my informed consent to participating in this experiment NAME and date____________________________________________ Contact number_____________________________________________ jette hannibal

5. Table of contents • Table of contents follows the abstract. • All pages must be numbered. jette hannibal

6. Introduction: Background literature and justification of your own research • General introduction to the psychological subject area under investigation • Summary and analysis of key theories and previous research studies in the area including references, e.g. Stroop (1935) • Theories and studies must be analysed in sufficient detail – especially the replicated study • 2 studies • Rationale and justification of your experiment • The aim jette hannibal

7. Introduction (Coolican, 1994) jette hannibal

8. Aim of study • Topic under investigation (e.g. Memory) and expected results • What you intended to find out in the study (e.g. to investigate whether using imagery or rehearsal will result in higher recall of words) • Aim introduces operationalised research hypothesis and null hypothesis (HL) Ex: The aim of the study was to investigate whether imagery or rehearsal resulted in the highest mean recall of words from a word-list. jette hannibal

9. Method consists of 4 sections • Design • type and justification of design (repeated measures/independent design), controls, ethical considerations, identification of variables (IV and DV) • Participants • Relevant characteristics of sample, target population, sampling techniques (justified) • Apparatus/Materials • list of materials used, reference to copies in appendices • Procedure • Must be written in so much detail that it can be replicated. Reference to appendices for a copy of the material used. jette hannibal

10. Designs – consider strengths and limitations in each design • Design must be justified (relate to why you choose a specific design and refer to strengths) • Independent design: each participant participates in only one condition (random allocation of participants to conditions e.g. drawing names out of a hat decides who goes in which condition) • Larger sample needed so more time consuming • No order effect but problem with participant variables. This is controlled for by random allocation of participants to the experimental conditions. • Repeated measures design: each participant participates in both conditions • Easier to get a smaller sample • Order effects but counter-balancing possible • No participant variables • Account of controls in the experiment (what you did in order to control for confounding variables) jette hannibal

11. IV and DV • Must be operationalised (what is being measured) and clear • Must reflect aim • Stated at the end of the design section • The IV in this experiment was whether participants used rehearsal or imagery • The DV was amount of words correctly recalled from the wordlist jette hannibal

12. Selection of participants • 20 participants in an IB experiment • Justify your sampling method • In principle good to have a represenative sample but nor really possible in IA. Ask the following questions: • What is the target population? (the population you are interested in) What are relevant characteristics of your sample? your target population? Does your sample represent them? • In IB exp.: Opportunity sample: you take what is available because it is the most convenient and easiest • Easy and not time consuming (strenght) • Not a representative sample (weakness) jette hannibal

13. Procedure • Clear description of what you did and in what order • Written in words (see samples) • Must be so clear that it can be replicated by another researcher • Refer to materials used in the experiment (and make a reference to an example of it in the appendices) • Use past tense, the third person and the passive voice: The participants were asked to ....... jette hannibal

14. Appendices • Supplementary information • One copy of the materials(s) used • Copy of standardized instructions and debriefing notes • Copy of informed consent paper (including parental consent if participants are children) jette hannibal