Clarifications to the new IB Psychology guide (first exams May 2019) has said that students might be asked specifically about twin and/or kinship studies to discuss “genetic similarities.” This blog post can be used as supplementary information if required. How and why twin studies are used in psychology Twin studies gather groups of monozygotic (MZ – identical) and dizygotic (DZ – …
Lesson Idea – Understanding Etiologies With a Case Study
This lesson is designed to help students understand how reduced function in the vmPFC might be connected with symptoms of PTSD. As with other similar lesson ideas, it tries to make the abstract more concrete by giving real-life examples. The Activity Students are to read the following summary of Due, a fictionary Vietnamese War vetern. After reading the summary, they …
How to explain the use of a research method
In both the “old” and “new” IB Psychology syllabi, students have to be able to discuss the use of research methods (and brain imaging techniques). Before we see how to do this, it’s important to make one clarification first: the IB considers the following to be research methods: Experiments (including true, natural, quasi and field experiments) Case studies Correlational studies Interviews …
The MAOA (“Warrior”) Gene and Violence
In IB Psychology you need to be able to explain at least one example of how behaviour could be influenced by genetic factors. In this post, we’ll look at why a variation of the MAOA gene (a.k.a the “warrior gene”) could be linked with antisocial behaviours like aggression. There are two explanations: a simple one and a complex one. We’ll …
When drug trials go wrong…
When testing a new drug there always has to be volunteers for the first human participants to take the drug. But what happens if the trial fails. Like, fails really badly? This is what happened in 2006 when eight male volunteers signed up to be participants in a “first in humans” study. The treatment was a proposed cancer treatment, but …
Clinical Drug Trials, PTSD and SSRIs
This post is designed to be used in lesson 4.6 in the PTSD unit plan. In order to evaluate the effectiveness of drug therapy using selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) to treat PTSD, we need to consult the research. The most common way the effectiveness of drugs are tested is through a carefully controlled experiments. These experiments are also known …
Key Studies: Dopamine and Love (Fisher et al. 2005)What happens in the brains of people in love?
What happens in our brain when we see the person we love? Why do we fall in love and stay with one person? What is the relationship between love and dopamine? These are some of the questions Helen Fisher and her colleagues set about asking in their 2005 fMRI study, “Romantic Love: An fMRI Study of a Neural Mechanism for …
Key Study: Cortisol and Memory (Buchanan and Lovallo, 2001)
This study can be found in Chapter 4 of the Student’s Guide. Background Studies conducted before this experiment in 2001 showed that cortisol can have a detrimental effect on memory. Animal studies, however, had shown the opposite: stress can improve memory. This was the first study (at the time) that investigated the influence of cortisol on emotional memory in humans. …
Lesson Idea: Neuroplasticity
This activity is designed to accompany the Criminology lesson 2.7b: Childhood and Brain Development. A good way to learn about neuroplasticity is to compare your performance on something you’re a master at, with something with which you’re a novice. Find someone in your class with whom you can share talents – they’ll try to teach you something you’ve never tried …
How does testosterone influence aggression?
Understanding how testosterone can influence aggression can be a little tricky, so this post is designed to provide extra help. This post is designed to support the materials in Topic 2.4 of our textbook, IB Psychology: A Student’s Guide. Common Errors Here is what an over-simplified (and incorrect) explanation for testosterone and aggression might look like: So in writing, this …