Memory is a reconstructive process, which means memories are actively and consciously rebuilt when we are trying to remember certain things. Elizabeth Loftus, her colleagues and others studying this cognitive phenomenon have shown that during the reconstruction phase our memories can be distorted if we are given false information about the event – this is called the misinformation effect. Background Information …
IA Tip: How to begin your report…
Sometimes the hardest part about writing a good Internal Assessment report in IB Psychology is knowing how to begin. With this simple exercise, students can (hopefully) figure out how to write a great opening couple of lines and really get their introduction off to a flying start. Students can read the following examples and see if they can come up …
IA: Final Submission Guidelines
This post is designed to help you make sure that you’re following the basic IA requirements before submitting your final draft. The following guidelines come from the e-coursework handbook from the IB. This information is relevant as of March, 2018. Please always refer to official IB documentation and ask your DP Co-ordinator for the latest updates. Formatting Guidance The following …
Lesson Idea: Experimental Designs
The purpose of this activity is to help you learn about design choices experimenters have and to think about the benefits and limitations of using each design. You will also learn about terminology for extraneous variables and other controls. It is designed to be studied during the Quantitative Methods unit (Chapter 6, 6.1b). It should take about 15-20 minutes. Key …
Demand characteristics: What are they REALLY?
I was reading another research methods chapter in a new psychology textbook the other day and despite it’s excellent content in research methodology, it still (I think) mis-defined demand characteristics. The most common definition of demand characteristics out there goes something like, “demand characteristics are when participants are aware of the aim of the research and change their behaviour in a …
Internal Validity: And why I don’t teach it…
I’d love to hear how you feel about my rationale for not teaching students how to evaluate studies based on internal validity. There is one exception, however: their IA. I only introduce the concept of internal validity during the analysis of their IA results and procedures, as this is the only study I expect them to be able to make …
What are the design types in experiments?
Choosing the best research design for your experiment is an important part of the planning process. When conducting an experiment for the IB Psychology IA, you must think very carefully about which design is best for your purposes. Experimental Designs (MP, IS, RM) There are three design types of experiments: Independent Samples Repeated Measures Matched Pairs Independent Samples is when the …
What is a “controlled variable?”
A controlled variable is a variable that’s kept constant between the conditions of the experiment so that the only difference between the groups is the independent variable. Imagine you’re doing an experiment on yourself to see if drinking coffee in the morning gives you energy. On Monday you wake up, do yoga and then have a cup of coffee. At …
Operational DefinitionsHow to operationally define IVs and DVs
Updated May 2020 Operational definitions became important in Psychology when psychologists wanted to establish that psychological experimentation is truly scientific in nature. In this blog post, we’ll look at exactly what is an operational definition is and how to do it. This is a common error in IB Psychology IAs. Hopefully after reading this post, students will be able to …
Hypotheses
Updated June 2020 Writing good hypotheses in IB Psychology IAs is something many students find challenging. After moderating another 175+ IA’s this year I could see some common errors students were making. This post hopes to give a clear explanation with examples to help with this tricky task. Null and Alternative Hypotheses Null Hypothesis (H0) The term “null” means having …
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