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Psychology G543 exam- June 2012!

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Reply 100
Original post by asaaal
whats the difference between suicide, misadventure and self0inflicted injury - they're all types of deaths according to my booklet but i don't understand the difference :frown:


Suicide is an intention to kill yourself.
Consciously self-inflicted injury is essentially self harm. So you might kill yourself by self harm without actually intending to kill yourself.
Death by misadventure is an accidental death where no law has been broken. For example drowning in the sea.
Reply 101
Original post by -Haz-
Oh yeah I saw that ages ago.. it’s quite helpful. Only thing that confused me was when he said we should be writing about 2-3 studies in the part A question. I was under the impression we only need to include one study in part A :confused:


Yeah A is just one study.. guess he made a mistake between the A and B question.
in january, questions from all topics came up for Forensic, so I have a feeling there'll only be 3 topic questions in the summer (cuz that's what happened last time - last time all 4 topics came up, the next sitting only 3 topics).

And you can never really predict what questions will come up... :/ sadly. I hope something on reductionist/usefulness will come up!
Reply 103
Original post by -Haz-
Oh yeah I saw that ages ago.. it’s quite helpful. Only thing that confused me was when he said we should be writing about 2-3 studies in the part A question. I was under the impression we only need to include one study in part A :confused:


It depends on how specific the question is. You can use one or more study but it's not required. Using more than one means you don't need to go into as much depth in regards to describing the research.
Reply 104
hi guys i cannot seem to take this, i cannot seem to understand anything
i only need 64.5 ums in g543 and g544 to get a B overall but i am so scared for g543, cannot seem to reemmber ANYTHING. i know structure but if i cant remember stuff ill just sit there and get a U in the exam. need soem major help please. thankyou
So jealous of you guys doing Health...my teachers a guy and thought it would be a good idea to make us all do sport, SPORT. You have no idea how much I have no interest in any of the studies to do with sport - they're just all basically theories. At least the other topic is forensic.
Health is gay. the only good topic is healthy living... stress, dysfunctional behaviour & disorders are horrible.
Reply 107
so scared for this paper!
im doing health and forensic too and my brain does not have the capacity to remember the details of all these studies :')
timing is an issue as well for me! :frown: xxxxx
Reply 108
i really cant get my head around how ocr expects us to learn 52 studies! its so much to write aswell and the worst thing is that you only need to answer 4 questions out of all the topics that you have learnt!

anyway, im doing forensic and health, we havent been taught healthy living and after a guilty verdict

but i was looking at the turning to crime section in forensic and the whole biology section has come up in past questions e.g. brain dysfunction, genes and serotonin and gender does that mean we can say that it is likely the biology section of turning to crime wont come up?

Thanksss :smile:
Reply 109
June 2010 section B
To what extent does the cognitive approach provide an explanation of criminal behaviour?

The cognitive approach is concerned with the mind and mental processes of how we think (rationally or irrationally), how we solve problems, perceive and make sense of the world around us. The main assumption of this approach is that how we think is central to explaining how we behave and how we respond to different people and different situations. This approach tries to understand criminal behaviour by looking at how criminals thought patterns make someone behave like a criminal. The assumption here would be that criminals have a different thought process which is faulty compared to non-criminals hence why they behave like a criminal.
The cognitive approach tries to infer behaviour by asking people what they’re thinking by either observation or self report. This is a threat to validity. For example if we take self report (interview for example) the main implication would be social desirability. This is because offenders will not want to look ‘bad or ‘evil’ as this is not how society would expect people to act. This means people may decide to lie in order to present themselves in a good light. However Interviews allow people to express their reasons and feelings for their behaviours which can be very useful as it is only when we know why criminals acted the way they did that we have a chance to solve the issues properly and prevent criminal behaviour. For example, a study conducted by 2 doctors Yochelson and Somehow on criminal thinking patterns involved interviewing offenders who were in a secure mental hospital as they had been found guilty but due to reason of insanity they were not imprisoned, instead they were put in a secure mental hospital. They interviewed these pps with pps who were in prison as they had not made the plea. As you can see the pps may lie, perhaps to even help their case if not for social desirability! This means that the cognitive approach may not explain criminality very well due to the poor methodology of self-report such as interviews which lowers validity.
The cognitive approach is less reductionist that many other approaches. This is because this approach takes into consideration other approaches such as the social approach and how other factors such as ‘other people’ can influence our cognition and hence our behaviour. For example a study by Gudjohnson and Bowes investigated whether we believe we, personally are the cause of behaviour- internal attribution or whether the cause of our behaviour is from external factors-external attributions. An example of how our mental thought process may be influenced by the people around us is when someone may perhaps blame their life in crime to having a poor upbringing- This would be an example of external attribution as a person would be blaming their childhood to why they are leading a life in crime. This study found that different types of criminals blame their criminal behaviour of different attributes. For example violent offenders showed the greatest external attribution out of violent, sexual and property offenders. Sexual offenders showed the most internal attribution out of violent, sexual and property offenders. As you can these results show that our cognitions are affected by other people in some crimes more than others giving us a less reductionist explanation of criminal behaviour.


Evaluate the methodology used in research into witness appeal.
Reaching a verdict is life changing to both the victim and the defendant so it is crucial to investigate in the factors that will influence the outcome of a verdict. Factors such as the ‘confidence of a victim’- as it has been said if the eye witness is confident then the jury gain confidence in what they are saying, the attractiveness of a victim’ (by castellow et al)hence why lawyers advise clean smart appearances and clothing in court as many psychologists such as Asch who proposed the Halo effect believe that attractive people are seen to have attractive personalities. and finally ‘effects of shields and video links’ by ross et al
However there is a major issue with methodology in this area of crime as court rooms are a private matter and psychologist are not allowed to conduct their studies during a real court case. Not only that but the jury is sworn to secrecy so they are not allowed to tell anyone about how they came to a guilty or not guilty verdict. This means court cases need to be re-constructed with mock trials meaning this is a threat to ecological validity. For example in the study for eye witness confidence a video mock trial of a robber caught on CCTV carrying a knife was used and the lady who was an eye-witness had to state whether she was 80% or 100% sure she had identified the robber. As you can see this is a video and not like a real court case where someone’s life could effectively be changed if given a guilty verdict. This will therefore mean that pps may not get as involved as they don’t feel the same pressures and responsibility as they would in a real court case. This would therefore give us results that do not reflect real life situations hence why the methodology can be said to be limitation. However counter to this, it must be pointed out that although the results may not be 100% valid they still provide an insight to ‘private’ court room cases which is very useful in indentifying factors that influence a jury.
However, on the other hand this means that as psychologists need to ‘reinvent’ the trial they can choose what research method they use. Many use lab experiments. This is because it allows the psychologist to manipulate the independent variable while controlling all other confounding variables in order to see what effect the independent variable has on the dependant variable. This allows the researcher to see the cause-and-effect relationship which cannot be established using other methodologies. For example in Ross et al.s study on the effect of shields and videotapes on child witnesses allowed the investigator to have 2 experimental conditions- the child spoke with the use of a shield inside the court room and the child spoke outside the courtroom via a video link. There was also a control group where no protection was used. In all of the conditions the case was EXACTLY the same court case and everything was except the same apart for the use of the protective shielding which was the independent variable. This allowed the investigator to keep the story under question exactly the same for all the conditions (the case was about father bathing his daughter in the bath and touching her but the question is, was it an innocent touch or was it done consciously?). However, this highly lacked ecological validity as the case outcome did not depend on the jury’s verdict hence why the pps my not have given it much thought when giving a guilty or not guilty verdict making the results invalid. But the use of the lab experiment allowed the investigator to conclude that the use of effective shielding had no effect on the defender being found guilty or not –hence no cause and effect.

Guys what would you grade this essay :frown:. i done it under timed conditions and stuff but my teacher is SO slow in marking anything .. she said shell get it done 2 weeks ago..
btw i know its two section b's but i struggle on them hence ive done 2 and no a :frown:
(edited 11 years ago)
Reply 110
Does anyone know what came up in the jan exam for health and forensics?
Reply 111
Original post by sasha165
Does anyone know what came up in the jan exam for health and forensics?


The topics that came up were:

Forensic
1) turning to crime- biology- genes
2) making a case- interviewing suspects- interrogation techniques
3) reaching a verdict- witness appeal- effects of shields and videotape on children giving evidence
4) after a guilty verdict- treatment programmes- ear acupuncture

Health and clinical
1) healthy living- features of adherence- reasons for non-adherence
2) stress- techniques for managing stress- social approach
3) dysfunctional behaviour- diagnosis- biases in diagnosis
4) dysfunctional behaviour- treatments- behavioural

If you want the full questions, let me know :smile:


This was posted from The Student Room's iPhone/iPad App
Reply 112
Original post by al_miller
The topics that came up were:

Forensic
1) turning to crime- biology- genes
2) making a case- interviewing suspects- interrogation techniques
3) reaching a verdict- witness appeal- effects of shields and videotape on children giving evidence
4) after a guilty verdict- treatment programmes- ear acupuncture

Health and clinical
1) healthy living- features of adherence- reasons for non-adherence
2) stress- techniques for managing stress- social approach
3) dysfunctional behaviour- diagnosis- biases in diagnosis
4) dysfunctional behaviour- treatments- behavioural

If you want the full questions, let me know :smile:


This was posted from The Student Room's iPhone/iPad App

Thank you so much!!!!! Can I have the full questions please? :smile:
Did you the paper in january? :smile:
Reply 113
how are people revising for this exam? i've learnt the studies as well as i can but learning evaluation points on top of that seems impossible
Could people have a read of these i just wrote i didnt do them in timmed conditions but its the first time iv tried answering questions without the help of our workbooks thanks :biggrin:

June 2011
How might the view of the majority influence a jury when reaching a verdict (10)
Much research has been done into how a jury reach verdicts when deliberating a case. Much of this research looks into how jurors can be subconsciously influenced by others within the group. It is possible that if the majority of jurors within a case have came to one decision that differs from the minority they could perhaps 'cave' into the majority.
There could be many possible reasons for this including the need to belong as part of the group, the need to be right and perhaps even to hurry the process along and not delay others.
A piece of research that tested this was that by Asch into how the minority conform to the majority. He set up a lab experiment of which small groups of around 6 pp's took part. However in each group only one participant was truly naive. They were shown a set of 3 lines and were told to match them to the stimulus. The other pp's all gave wrong answers. The results showed that there was a 32% conformity rate among pp's however it was noted that individual characteristics played a part to.
This has potential repercussions for the jury room because the minority could infact be wrong in thier decision and jurors should stick to thier initial thoughts in order to ensure that justice is served correctly.

Evaluate the application of research into what influences reaching a verdict in court. (15)
If research is applicable it means that it can be applied to the courtroom and real life situations.
Methodology is an issue that reduces the applicability of research into reaching a verdict. This is because of its use of lab experiments in research such as that of Nemeth and Wachtler's study into minority influence. Lab experiments reduce the ecological validity of a piece of research because they are conducted in usually controlled and highly artificial situations, meaning they are very unlike a real jurors deliberation and therefore they cannot be applied.
However lab experiments are a crucial part of research into reaching a verdict because of laws meaning we cannot have a real insight into a court case and how verdicts are reached therefore situations have to be made up.
The validity of research into reaching a verdict can also reduce how applicable it is. Research such as Asch's majority influence are low in validity as a result of the tasks used e.g his task of matching lines to a stimulus. This task greatly lacks mundane realism because It’s nowhere near the same as deliberating a case and therefore it cannot be applied to a courtroom.
Nevertheless his experiment was high in reliability due to a standardised procedure ensuring extraneous variables are controlled. This ensures that the research is replicable hence similar results would be obtained if carried out by a different researcher. Therefore in this sense results gained in research into reaching a verdict can be seen as applicable to court room situations.
Overall it’s difficult to apply research into reaching a verdict to actual jury deliberations because of strict laws in place denying us the chance to gain a proper insight.


Honest opinions is much appreciated!
this exam is going to be a straight fail hahahahahaha life.
does anyone else not know how on earth you can write 10 marks worth for a cognitive treatment or cognitive explanation for disorders? (preferably SZ) what is a cognitive explanation and treatment for it?
Original post by zahra_xo
i really cant get my head around how ocr expects us to learn 52 studies! its so much to write aswell and the worst thing is that you only need to answer 4 questions out of all the topics that you have learnt!

anyway, im doing forensic and health, we havent been taught healthy living and after a guilty verdict

but i was looking at the turning to crime section in forensic and the whole biology section has come up in past questions e.g. brain dysfunction, genes and serotonin and gender does that mean we can say that it is likely the biology section of turning to crime wont come up?

Thanksss :smile:


I really hope the biology section doesn't because we haven't really been taught it :tongue: I doubt it will if the whole section has turned up.
Reply 118
Original post by zahra_xo
i really cant get my head around how ocr expects us to learn 52 studies! its so much to write aswell and the worst thing is that you only need to answer 4 questions out of all the topics that you have learnt!

anyway, im doing forensic and health, we havent been taught healthy living and after a guilty verdict

but i was looking at the turning to crime section in forensic and the whole biology section has come up in past questions e.g. brain dysfunction, genes and serotonin and gender does that mean we can say that it is likely the biology section of turning to crime wont come up?

Thanksss :smile:


Asif you haven't been taught those!! Healthy living is the easiest one in heath and after a guilty verdict is my favourite one for crime!
I think it is ridiculous how they expect us to learn so much considering we are only answering 4 questions. Ugh. Goodluck!!!
Reply 119
Original post by stressedoutbadly247
does anyone else not know how on earth you can write 10 marks worth for a cognitive treatment or cognitive explanation for disorders? (preferably SZ) what is a cognitive explanation and treatment for it?


Have you not been taught this or looked in the textbook? The cognitive explanation and treatment are actually quite long.

For the explanation you can talk about traditionally cognitive psychology was thought to have little use in explaining/treating schizophrenia because of its emphasis on logical thinking, and then talk about how it has changed with research discovering that their thoughts are logical to them but not to us. Then talk about how they believe that disturbed thinking processes are said to be the cause of schizophrenia by cognitive psychologists (defective mechanisms that filter and process info, so let in too much relevant information) Then talk about the study Hemsley (failure to activate schemas which is basically just a theory)

Then for the treatment talk about the same thing how it has changed - a schizophrenics perception is distorted so use cognitive treatment to reconstruct it. Then talk about CBT and why it is used for schizphrenia (change their faulty way of thinking). Then talk about the study Sensky et al (CBT for persistent schizophrenic symptoms which compares CBT with befriending)

I hope that helps!

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