The Student Room Group

A2 - Edexcel Psychology June 2016

Scroll to see replies

When evaluating ethical guidelines, is it just things like "to get valid results, some researchers have to deceive participants so they do not guess what the aim is" etc...?
Sorry for all the questions :colondollar: I just want to make sure I'm right
Original post by EmilyPlatypus
Can someone help with what you need to know for cultural issues in diagnosis?
I have some notes on issues with the diagnosis of schizophrenia across cultures, evaluation for this, and examples of culture bound syndromes. Is that all we need to know? :smile:

You need about 4-5 marks worth. There's culture bound syndromes (Kuru in Papau New Guinea), language barriers (schizophrenia translates to Japanese as disorganised mind), different cultural experiences/interpretations (Malgady found in Morocco hearing voices is a sign of connecting with the spirits), Cinnerella and Lowenthal found ethnic group and religious faith have a marked impact on interpretation of mental illness, there's the issue of the DSM being developed in the Western world so it is highly westernised which is why twice as many black Indians get diagnosed with mental health issues


Original post by EmilyPlatypus
I feel like the majority of 18 markers are evaluation and there's only a little bit of description (like what social control means, what science means etc...) because you're debating and evaluating the rest of it. I'm not 100% sure if science will come up as an 18 marker again though, it seems unlikely but not impossible. Sorry I couldn't help more :frown:

I thought this, but it's actually not true. For social control, say you do token economy and psychoanalysis, describe them both for 3 marks, including how the social control is exerted so how the knowledge is applied (i.e. operant conditioning principles used to encourage desirable behaviour). Then 3 marks of evaluation for each, for me I would do one practical implication and two ethical implications for each.

For science I agree, I saw a past question on it and there was a full mark answer on the examiner's report, it literally had one sentence on description like "according to Karl Popper, a science is falsifiable, objective...", and the rest of the answer was discussing whether elements are scientific or not. I basically replicated it and gave it my teacher to mark and she said no you should describe each criterion for 6 marks and then assess whether the approaches fit the criteria, but I'd find it hard that way ?
Original post by EmilyPlatypus
When evaluating ethical guidelines, is it just things like "to get valid results, some researchers have to deceive participants so they do not guess what the aim is" etc...?
Sorry for all the questions :colondollar: I just want to make sure I'm right

You don't have to evaluate ethical guidelines??
Original post by rileystringer1
You don't have to evaluate ethical guidelines??


For issues and debates, the specification says:

"Describe and evaluate ethical issues in research in psychology,both regarding humans and regarding animals (non-human)."
Does anyone have any general ideas on how to plan a study? I suck so bad at these!
Original post by EmilyPlatypus
When evaluating ethical guidelines, is it just things like "to get valid results, some researchers have to deceive participants so they do not guess what the aim is" etc...?
Sorry for all the questions :colondollar: I just want to make sure I'm right


Allows vulnerable people to be maintained, allows participants to feel safe in studies.

Weaknesses - restricts studies, covert studies can't be used because ppt needs to gain informed consent, unable to conduct study on aggressive behaviour and reports can't always be published because of confidentiality issues :smile:
Original post by EmilyPlatypus
For issues and debates, the specification says:

"Describe and evaluate ethical issues in research in psychology,both regarding humans and regarding animals (non-human)."

Describe and evaluate ethical issues?? How does one evaluate an ethical issue

That won't come up anyway
Original post by sophia.lega
Allows vulnerable people to be maintained, allows participants to feel safe in studies.

Weaknesses - restricts studies, covert studies can't be used because ppt needs to gain informed consent, unable to conduct study on aggressive behaviour and reports can't always be published because of confidentiality issues :smile:


Thank you! :smile:

Original post by rileystringer1
Describe and evaluate ethical issues?? How does one evaluate an ethical issue

That won't come up anyway



See above on how to evaluate, and well you can't be sure it won't come up - if it's on the specification it could be on the paper
Original post by EmilyPlatypus
For issues and debates, the specification says:

"Describe and evaluate ethical issues in research in psychology,both regarding humans and regarding animals (non-human)."


i guess you could evaluate a specifiv study so for example you can use Milgrim and begin to evaluate that interms of ethical issues e.g. psychological harm, they thought they actually killed someone
Original post by EmilyPlatypus
Thank you! :smile:




See above on how to evaluate, and well you can't be sure it won't come up - if it's on the specification it could be on the paper



I'm making no sense lmao maintained??? Protected*
Original post by sophia.lega
Does anyone have any general ideas on how to plan a study? I suck so bad at these!


you should defo check out mark schemes
Original post by EmilyPlatypus
For issues and debates, the specification says:

"Describe and evaluate ethical issues in research in psychology,both regarding humans and regarding animals (non-human)."


Not completely sure, but for animals I think its just ethical strengths and weaknesses
Question about what the examiner calls "generic evaluation points" which gain no marks at all any more.

I'm used to writing evaluation ponits like "A strength of this explanation is that evidence such as from Gottesman and Shields(1966) showed a 42% concordance rate for MZ twins for schizophrenia compared to 9% for DZ twins, significantly suggesting a genetic link for the disorder."

I know that's not generic but what do they deem generic? Is it just stuff like "The study had strict controls in an artifical setting so had high reliability"?

Generic = no link to the study/theory?

Could you link a point to the study and it still be generic? For example "A strength is that Gottesman and Shields (1996) found a high concordnace for MZ twins" is that still geneeric?
(edited 7 years ago)
Original post by Jablonski
Question about what the examiner calls "generic evaluation points" which gain no marks at all any more.

I'm used to writing evaluation ponits like "A strength of this explanation is that evidence such as from Gottesman and Shields(1966) showed a 42% concordance rate for MZ twins for schizophrenia compared to 9% for DZ twins, significantly suggesting a genetic link for the disorder."

I know that's not generic but what do they deem generic? Is it just stuff like "The study had strict controls in an artifical setting so had high reliability"?

Generic = no link to the study/theory?

Could you link a point to the study and it still be generic? For example "A strength is that Gottesman and Shields (1996) found a high concordnace for MZ twins" is that still geneeric?


The last bit of your question I think could be generic? But it'd be less generic and say "thus this supports the explanation as it shows there is a biological factor in schizophrenia" - although I'm not sure. The specific findings make the evaluation stronger
Reply 514
Original post by Jablonski
Question about what the examiner calls "generic evaluation points" which gain no marks at all any more.

I'm used to writing evaluation ponits like "A strength of this explanation is that evidence such as from Gottesman and Shields(1966) showed a 42% concordance rate for MZ twins for schizophrenia compared to 9% for DZ twins, significantly suggesting a genetic link for the disorder."

I know that's not generic but what do they deem generic? Is it just stuff like "The study had strict controls in an artifical setting so had high reliability"?

Generic = no link to the study/theory?

Could you link a point to the study and it still be generic? For example "A strength is that Gottesman and Shields (1996) found a high concordnace for MZ twins" is that still geneeric?


I don't think it's generic because you've expanded it.. I'd probably word it like "One strength is that there is evidence to support this explanation, Such as X who found Y, therefore reinforcing the explanation..."

I think when they say generic they mean stuff like "The study had high ecological validity because it was a field experiment"- to make it into a more specific point you need to make it more explicitly about the study
How do you compare therapies/treatments and contributions... Do you compare in terms of description or evaluation or both? Thanks :smile:
Reply 516
Original post by JessRose2
How do you compare therapies/treatments and contributions... Do you compare in terms of description or evaluation or both? Thanks :smile:


I was going over this earlier!!
I've done it in terms of both
e.g. Drugs may have unpleasant side-effects where-as ACT doesn't
but also- both require professionals, nature vs. nurture etc
If it's generic, it's unclear which study you're evaluating. So if you get asked to evaluate Genie (unit 3 example) and you say it was a case study involving a unique individual situation, therefore the results can't be generalised, you wouldn't get the mark because it's generic, you could be talking about any case study. If you specified it was a case study, in which Curtiss used observations and neurological tests to see..., then it's specific.

But just because your evaluation point is specific, that doesn't mean it will get a mark. For example, you could say: A weakness of Curtiss' case study of Genie is that it was highly suspected that she suffered from mental retardation, so the study lacks validity. It's clear that you're talking about Genie and nobody else, but it's not developed. You could develop it by saying: ...so the conclusions drawn about a sensitive/critical period for language development may not be valid, as it could be that the cause of her inability to develop language is the mental retardation, and not the effects of privation.

(This is just be trying to reassure myself that I won't fail)
Original post by Rsprcy
I was going over this earlier!!
I've done it in terms of both
e.g. Drugs may have unpleasant side-effects where-as ACT doesn't
but also- both require professionals, nature vs. nurture etc


Ohh okay, thanks for your help :smile:
Original post by JessRose2
How do you compare therapies/treatments and contributions... Do you compare in terms of description or evaluation or both? Thanks :smile:

It's good to compare therapies and treatments on description and evaluation to be sure you've got enough, but I always find it easier to use evaluation, because for example if you're comparing drugs treatment and assertive community therapy you can think to yourself "what's good about drugs? they're cheap. is ACT? no. there's one comparison". Idk just makes sense to me!

You won't get asked to compare contributions, you can be asked to compare the usefulness of different approaches/applications/contributions, so you could just think "why is understanding autism useful? can help children in school. why is a biological explanation for schizophrenia useful? can reduce symptoms with drugs. which is more useful? bio because it suggests a treatment whereas with understanding autism there's no suggested treatment, just intervention"

hope that helps!

Quick Reply

Latest