PSYB1 past paper, research method

Okay so I am currently doing a question from the Jan 13 exam if someone could be so kind...

The stem of the research method question is basically, the aim of the study is to find out if the presence of another person affects people's likelihood of helping someone in need.

40 participant's sampled from a first year group at uni. 2 Conditions.. 20 Participants in Condition 1) sat alone.....Condition 2-20 participants) sat in the presence of someone else who has been instructed not to react to the interviewers cry's of pain. Researcher notes number of people who go to help.

Basically deception is used and the participants believe they are attending an interview on university life. Interviewer leaves participant in waiting room and goes into another room, 2 mins later starts screaming in pain.

So the question is...

Suggest one extraneous variable that might be present in the investigation? Explain why this variable should be controlled and how it could be controlled.


I have an idea...but this is challenging

One influencing variable could be the participants level of extroversion or introversion (so personality type). To control this participants could take a short personality questionnaire before hand and then the researchers could put half of the introverts and half of the extroverts in each condition, to make each condition balanced.

have you revised gender development?..the social learning explanation is really confusing for me :/

please help..What is the difference between identification in S.L.T and identification in psychodynamic explanation?

Identification in the psychodynamic explanation is when a child adopts and takes on boards the same-sex parents values&beliefs thus taking on the parents morals.

Identification in SLT is when the child is most likely to imitate behaviour when they identify with role model that is modeling a behaviour. This identification is more likely if it is a role model of the same sex, although not necessarily a parent unlike which the psychodynamic theory proposes.It has to be just a person who is influential, therefore it explains how children such as boys who only have there mother are still morally competent.
That comparison would probably get you A02 where bold.