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Reply 20
Did anyone else find the methodology questions worded really oddly? :confused:
I put matched pairs... It can't be repeated measures, because they can't be both teenagers and adults?? Those are the conditions...
Reply 22
Original post by Anny Smiles
I put matched pairs... It can't be repeated measures, because they can't be both teenagers and adults?? Those are the conditions...


But then how can you match teenagers and adults on things like, age, occupation, marrital status, etc.

What I'm thinking is that because the next questions was 'why do you think this is the best design for the study...' you could have chosen any of the designs and had to write about the strengths of it in the next question. Although I'm not sure, as I said before the methodology questions were really weird this year.

If there is a right answer to it, it's likely to be independent measures.
But then with matched pairs you can match it to families with teenage children?
Reply 24
Correct me if I'm wrong, the question said 'what participant design do you think is most suitable/appropriate...', or something like that, implying that you could choose between the designs. I think there is more than one answer out of the three participant design. But hey, I guess we will just have to wait and see.
Participant design and experimental design are different thing. You were doing a SURVEY and so, why would you want to use an experimental design i.e. repeated measures, matched pairs etc? You are not manipulating an IV. Participant design refers to how you get your participants i.e. volunteer sample. Why would you ever need to use independent groups for a survey - you wouldn't. You would use a opportunity sample.

The paper was much more difficult than normal, though, with most of the content and studies in detail being application (AO2) so mid to lower achieving candidates I think will have found the paper difficult especially for questions such as explain human behavior using the cognitive approach and explaining forgetting for 6 marks using theories of memory and or forgetting.

A harder than normal paper but, if you've put the work in, then it wasn't too bad at all. An easy 12 marker and no questions on either prescribed practical so that's a little bonus. Grade boundaries are for unit 1 are typically around 45 for an A, I think for this exam it will be more 40 marks. At least this paper serves as a kick up the arse for people who think A levels require no work.
(edited 11 years ago)
I went for matched pairs because I could justify it more- we've learnt the definition as being matched on characteristics the researcher feels are important, so not necessarily age, but perhaps social class, or area of the country, as they'd affect your habits as well as your age.

Now, if only I'd explained that decently in the exam :L

But yeah, I'm pretty sure they'll allow at least the majority of the marks for either of the two we've mentioned with a justification, especially if it's split as such here!

I don't see how you could justify repeated measures, since they can't be both an adult and a teenager, but the other two are equally justifiable, so I'd imagine at least some marks will be rewarded.

I put independent measures & then changed my mind because I thought that I could justify matched pairs better!
Reply 27
Original post by Neon-Soldier32
Participant design and experimental design are different thing.


In the AS Edexcel textbook, it clearly states the title of it as 'Experimental (participant) designs' and goes on to say how that experimental designs are also called participant designs.

I think if they were referring to the sampling technique they would have just said 'What sampling technique would you use...' or something. But I guess we will just have to wait and see. It's only 4 marks out of the 60 in total, so if anyone is worrying about it, don't.
Reply 28
Original post by Neon-Soldier32
Participant design and experimental design are different thing. You were doing a SURVEY and so, why would you want to use an experimental design i.e. repeated measures, matched pairs etc? You are not manipulating an IV. Participant design refers to how you get your participants i.e. volunteer sample. Why would you ever need to use independent groups for a survey - you wouldn't. You would use a opportunity sample.

Exactly, out of 71 people, i was the only one to think like that and put opprotunity because everyone else put matched and repeated but i keep getting told im wrong even though you cannot have them in a survey
Original post by mangatardallys
In the AS Edexcel textbook, it clearly states the title of it as 'Experimental (participant) designs' and goes on to say how that experimental designs are also called participant designs.

I think if they were referring to the sampling technique they would have just said 'What sampling technique would you use...' or something. But I guess we will just have to wait and see. It's only 4 marks out of the 60 in total, so if anyone is worrying about it, don't.


After looking through the book you are right about ps design being repeated measures etc, but I cannot see how, or why you would use an experimental design (repeated measures etc.) for a survey.

Matches Pairs: You match ps on variables such as sex, age and intelligence in order to compare the results to. Often one of the ps acts as a control. However, for a survey looking into who watches more TV; parents or their teenage kids this design cannot be used - you cannot match a teenager with a teenager for looking at who watches more TV.

Independant Measures: Where one group does one condition. What is the condition in this survey? They were merely gathering data on who watched more data teenage kids or their parents so an independent design cannot be used for this survey either.

Repeated Measures: Where all ps do all conditions. There is nothing being manipulated here so each ps cannot do each condition as there isn't even one condition.

In order to do a repeated measures / independent measures / matches pairs design you have to have an IV. Carrying out a survey (which at the top of the page was connected to social psychology (whose methodology is surveys (questionnaires and interviews)) has no IV, nothing is being changed so you cannot use one of the aforementioned designs.

I am, however, interested to know what reasoning people put for the aforementioned designs. I will say that calling it participant design when it meant sampling method was misleading when in the textbook refers to ps designs as RM/IG/MP. (Plus the book only refers to RM/IG/MP only as participant designs.)
(edited 11 years ago)
That is a very good point...

I'm expecting that edexcel will get complaints and such if they meant sampling technique and referred to it wrongly, though, because it's a misleading question!
Reply 31
I'm in interested to see what will happen now.


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Reply 32
i put independent groups because you couldnt control the IV which was age, so to see a clear cause and effect there needs to be 2 seperate groups
What did people put for explaining human behaviour using the cognitive approach?
Reply 34
Original post by bookworm786
What did people put for explaining human behaviour using the cognitive approach?


I said that it tries to explain how the brain tries to explain memory and forgetting.
Gave an example for both so LOP and Cue dependency and gave a brief explanation.
But i think you were suppose to give the computer analogy of input--> process---> also as that is a good way to explain it
Original post by simonb451
I said that it tries to explain how the brain tries to explain memory and forgetting.
Gave an example for both so LOP and Cue dependency and gave a brief explanation.
But i think you were suppose to give the computer analogy of input--> process---> also as that is a good way to explain it


Yeah i wrote about memory and forgetting. Oh well.
I outlined the two assumptions, but in pretty poor detail.. So I outlined the input-process-output, and the computer analogy. I gave examples of theories of memory & forgetting, and gave a real life application of eye witness testimony. And I tried to keep on track by referring back to explaining behaviour throughout...
Reply 37
For that question it referred to the 'underlying' concepts of the approach, so I wrote about the two key assumptions with examples.

Out of interest, this was a retake for me, was it a retake for you guys? Is it common for colleges to let first years take the exam in Jan?


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I'm Year 12- I have 2 January modules, this, and Religious Ethics. We never finished the course for Ethics though *rolls eyes*

We take them for almost all subjects where I am- there are people who're taking 4 AS modules this January in sciences & Math.

Other sixth forms in my area though, they choose to do none. So it is mixed.
Reply 39
Ah I see. I'm a year 13. I got 154 UMS last year for Psychology, only 6 off an A, really hoping I do better this time round.

Good luck with the rest of your exams.


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