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Deconstruction of Psychological Investigation - Coggle Diagram
Deconstruction of Psychological Investigation
Potential Extraneous Variables (not confirmed nor measured in this study)
Participant Variables + Impact upon results
Anxiety levels
Anxiety levels reduce the ability to recall and induce forgetfulness, therefore impacting results and possibly leading to outliers
Additonals emotions
Additional emotions can cause lack of concentration and limit memory recall
Lack of sleep
Lack of sleep impairs the ability to learn and obtain information, therefore resulting in weaker recall
Medications/ medical conditions
Some medications or medical conditions may cause lack of concentration. E.g diabetes causing low/high blood sugar and results in a lack of concentration or “brain fog”
Degree of attention and awareness
If participants are unaware or understand the study, they aren’t able to complete it effectively, resulting in outliers and possible errors.
Participants enthusiasm towards test
The participant's enthusiasm towards the study may impact the amount of effort put into the recall test, therefore - low enthusiasm results in no effort to remember words possibly leading to a random error/ outlier
Participants honesty
Participants may decide to be untruthful and lie about the number of words they recalled, therefore causing inaccurate results.
Place where the test was conducted
Since some participants conducted the study at home= Different factors such as environment and other distractions can cause a decrease of focus and ability to recall efficiently.
Time of test conducted
Individual participants may have the most efficient memory recall at different times than others, resulting in some not completing study to the best of their ability.
Situational Variables + Impact upon results
Room temperature
Unfavorable air temperatures may impact memory negatively- However unlikely impacted this study
Additional noise
Depending on the nature of the sounds, impairments may result from specific interference with cognitive processes involved in the focal tests
Time of the experiment
Some participants may have conducted the test during their 'peak memory period' and others the opposite. This variable impacts data as participant's performance may alter accordingly.
Lighting
Bright light exposure activates regions of the brain that promote alertness, and improves cognitive performance
Independent + Dependent Variables
Independent Variable
Group 1 - Individual words
Group 2 - Words with a supporting sentence/ visual imagery
Group 3 - Words with elaboration + scenario/visual imagery
Potential Problems
Participants may not be able to mentally visualise words, therefore not enhancing memory recall
Music words may not prompt any emotions triggering that enhance memory recall.
Additionally participants may also not know the definition of the words, therefore the memory ‘enhancing factors’ may not improve their recall
Dependent Variables
The number of correct recall words -
Quantitative data
Disadvantages
Participants may decide to be untruthful and lie about the number of words they recalled, therefore causing inaccurate results. As the study didn’t supervision individual participants therefore making it easier to lie regarding the number of words recalled
The quantitative data is reductionism. A lot of detail and meaning is lost when human experience is presented quantitatively.
Quantitative data Often need large sample sizes to create more representable and reliable results/ conclusions and may be hard to source with minimal resources - This study did not have larger enough sample size
Advantages
The dependent variable results in quantitative results and factual evidence and isn’t subjective from each participant.
The nature of the quantitative data upholds anonymity
The results can be generalized to the specific population- This study results are generalized to Year 11 psychological students in Mr Taylor’s class.
Factual averages are able to be concluded from data - The data collected is used and not manipulated by interaction and biases (except the recalling of the word “music’ data collection)
Research Design Type
Experimental design
Disadvantages
Results are highly subjective due to the possibility of extraneous variables. Additionally it is unable to be determined if these independent variables (the sentences/ scenarios) influenced the results more so than the extraneous variables and being a conquindence in the independent variables favour.
This experimental research creates situations and environments that are unrealistic, possibly leading to additional stress and other extraneous variables. These excessive variables can lead to unrealistic and inaccurate data findings.
Data inputs investigation types
Music confidence collection- subjective quantitative
The 1-10 scale which was used to determine music confidence was subjective to the individuals and where they believed they lied on this scale. One participant may classify their music confidence to be rated a 6 while another participant may classify the equivalent as a 3.
Other data inputs
Dishonesty of participants entering false information of the dependent variable and other data requirements e.g. age, music confidence, etc
After recalling the 10 listed words, students were asked if they remembered recalling the word “Music”. Participants may have been subjective to bias in order to ‘fit in’ or not be judged. Additionally some participants may have no idea as they were not specifically told to remember this information prior, leading to misinformation being recorded.
Quantitative design
Advantages
Quantitative design allowed full manipulation, resulting in quantitative data of the recalled words.
Quantitative research results in objectivity and accuracy: There are far fewer variables involved in this quantitative research. The data collected is 'close-ended', resulting in a few numerical data results. E.g. number confidence, words recalled, etc
Disadvantages
Quantitative research can be limited by the study of particular statistical links, which can cause researchers to overlook broader themes and linkages.
Sample Size +
potential problems
Sample Size
38 participants
All studying year 11 SACE stage 1 psychology from Mr Taylor's class
All from Adelaide
All go to Glenunga International High School
Within the age brackets of 14-17 years
Potential problems
Small sample size may lead to variability and unreliability results - Quantitative research designs often have large sample sizes to better determine the average values of their data and avoid errors from testing a small number of possibly atypical samples.
Small sample sizes may also cause results to be extrapolated
Sample size only draws a very small conclusion to a specific population, not allowing to show a generalisation - Therefore not applicable to general population/ globally