GCSE

Psychology
Edexcel 9-1
Revision Guide

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 CONTENTS PAGE

Topic 1: Development………………………………………………………..3-17
Topic 2: Memory……………………………………………………………….18-24
Topic 3: Psychological Problems……………………………….……..25-39
Topic 4: The Brain and Neuropsychology………….……………..40-52
Topic 5: Social Influence……………………………………………………53-61
Topic 6: Criminal Psychology…………………………………………….62-72
Topic 7: The Self………………………………………………………………..73-86
Topic 11: Research Methods…………………………….………………87-100

How to use this revision guide…

This revision guide covers the content that you need to know from the last three
years ready for Paper 1 and Paper 2 of your GCSE in Edexcel Psychology.
Use this guide alongside the exam preparation booklet to prepare for your exams.
There are exam questions at the end of each topic to support your application of
knowledge.

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Topic 1: DEVELOPMENT
Colour Key
General information and good
studies to learn
Key Studies you must learn
Situational Factors
Personality Factors

Early Brain Development:

Building neural connections:

Neural = brain
• We have to build neural connections to develop our brains
• From birth to 3 years old you make between 700-1000 new connections each SECOND
• These allow for fast communication between different parts of the brain
• Brain doubles in size over the first year and reaches 80% of its size by 3 years old
• Early connections are of great importance and are reinforced by use so babies have to get a lot of
stimulation

Key terms:
• Brain: the organ in your head made up from nerves that process information and control behaviour
• Forebrain: the anterior part of the brain, including the hemisphere and central brain structures (forms
when foetus is 3 weeks)
• Midbrain: the middle section of the brain forming part of the central nervous system (forms when foetus is
3 weeks)
• Hindbrain: the lower part of the brain that includes the cerebellum, pons and medulla (forms when foetus
is 3 weeks)
• Cerebellum: an area of the brain near to the brainstem that controls motor movements (muscle activity)
(develops when foetus is 6 weeks)
• Anterior: directed towards the front
• Posterior: directed towards the back:
• Medulla: connections the upper brain to the spinal cord and controls automatic responses (develops when
foetus is 20 weeks)
• Involuntary response: a response to a stimulus that occurs without someone making a conscious choice.
They are automatic such as reflexes
• Neural connections: links formed by messages passing from one nerve cell (neuron) to another.

Piaget’s Stages of Development

• Theory of cognitive development

• Piaget suggested that we go through stages of development
• Each stage is fairly long and our thinking abilities don’t change much in the stage
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 • A change in thinking indicates when the next stage is reached
• The stages are fluid

Piaget’s Stages of Development:

Infants use their senses and movements to get information about the world
Sensorimotor
Stage (0-2 years) Live in the present rather than understanding time and space
Learn by linking what they see, hear, touch, taste of smell to objects they are using

Begin with reflex actions and learn to control these

6 months: develop objective permanence which means they learn that objects exist
even if they can’t see them anymore

4 months: children repeat actions such as dropping something deliberately that they first
dropped by chance

The symbolic stage (2-4 years)

Pre-operational
Stage (2-7 years) Symbolic play involves using one object to represent another

Think in pictures and symbols

Words as symbols for objects

Beginning of language development

Children see the world through their own eyes, not through someone else's
(they are egocentric)

Intuitive thought stage (4-7 years)

Start of reasoning

Ask questions

Centration (complexity of situations is considered)

Conservation is not fully achieved

Children do not realise that changing how something looks does not change its
volume, size or weight

Irreversibility: child not being able to use thought to reverse events such as
knowing that is water from a wide glass is poured into a tall glass so it looks
as if there is more water, then the water is poured back into the wide glass it
will look the same

Children begin to apply rules and strategies to help their thinking and use concrete
Concrete objects to aid their understanding
Operational Stage
(7-12years) They have difficulty with abstract ideas such as morality

Abilities here include:

Seriation: sorting objects such as into size

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 Classification: naming and identifying objects

Reversibility: if they know two bricks plus four is six bricks they will know
that six minus two is four bricks

Conservation: they know that size can remain even if it looks different in a
different scenario

Decentration: the ability to take multiple views of a situation

Formal There is control over thoughts

Operational Stage
(12+ years) Can think about two things such as height, age and gender when describing a person

Have the ability to think about how time changes things (as they get older they may
move house)

They can also understand that events have a sequence such as moving from school to
college then to work

Young person can see that actions have consequences – can understand why we don’t
drink and drive

Understand that others exist

Piaget and Education:

• His theory has been applied to classroom practices

• Children’s actions and interactions affect their thinking

• They cannot do certain things until they reach the appropriate stage of development

• Young children are egocentric and cannot understand the teachers point of view so might not do
as they are told because of a lack of understanding

• Children build their own schemas (knowledge of the world) from their own experiences and so
they individually build their own knowledge and understanding

Implications for teaching

• Slavin 2005 suggested some ideas;

• There should be a focus on the child’s thinking and not what they can do but the process

• Discovery learning is necessary and the child should be encouraged

• Teaching show accept that children do not think like adults

• Children are individuals and go through the stages in different ways so classrooms must
differentiate for that

Piaget and Intelligence

• Piaget held that children develop through adaptation – they adjust to the world as they
experience new things

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 • As they develop, babies have to understand many new things, this is done by forming ideas about
how things are in the world

• Their ideas take the form of schemas or plans through which they represent the world

• Schema: things drop if I let go

• However as they experience more, they need to change their schemas and create new

• Development of intelligence is about building knowledge and skills

• Intelligence is acquired through stages of development such as developing object permanence and
formal reasoning

• Intelligence is developed through building schemas via adaptation and through the four stages of
development

Meaning Example

Schemas/schemata Plans and patterns are formed A student has a classroom schema.
about what we experience. Upon entering a classroom, they
Mental structures give us would expect to see a board for
frameworks to understand the writing on, some chairs and tables,
world. a desk at the front and some fire
safety instructions
Assimilation Incorporating new ideas into A young child develops a schema for
existing schemas birds flying and, seeing an
aeroplane, calls it a bird.
Accommodation A schema no longer works and The child will see that bird alive
has to be changed to deal with and aeroplanes are not, and so they
a new experience. will be to change their ‘everything
that flies is a bird’ schema.

Equilibrium When a child’s schemas work The ‘bird’ schema is changed.

for them and explain all that Aeroplanes are included and the
they experience, the child is in child understands that they are
equilibrium. They are in a state metal and carry passengers, thus
of mental balance. moving from disequilibrium to
equilibrium.

Strengths Weaknesses
• Practical application. Discovery learning draws • Studies have found that children can do things
on Piaget’s ideas about focusing on the earlier than Piaget thought which challenges his
individual. ideas
• Generated lots of research including • Did not look at the influence of social
experiments to show the existence of the stages interactions or cultural setting
and how children build knowledge through • Dasen 1994 found that Aboriginal children
creating schemas developed the ability to conserve at a later
• There is research to support his ideas stage than Piaget’s Swiss sample did
• Piaget used interviews and observations –
what’s an issue with this? Subjectivity and
validity

Dweck’s Mindset Theory

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Fixed and growth mindset: ability and effort

• Mindset is the set of beliefs we all have about our ability to succeed in education and other areas

• Understanding mindset theory is important because children’s educational achievements can influence their
future and their mindset can be improved to affect achievement in a positive way

• Mindset theory suggests that children who think they can improve will continue to put in effort (growth
mindset)

• Those who think they can’t improve will stop trying (fixed mindset)

• Dweck has focused on helping students to achieve more, specifically by considering how praise affects
children’s development

• If a child is praised for good work then this can do some good

• If a child is not praise the child may assume they don’t have the ability and conclude that it is pointless

• It is better to praise children as they can then believe they can achieve

• Children need to avoid thinking they do not have an ability

• Children can develop a fixed mindset about a particular ability they think they don’t have and give up (like
some of you in Psychology) which can mean they stop taking on challenges and stop trying

• Growth mindset allows for the idea of effort bringing success

• Teachers also have fixed or growth mindsets which affect how they respond to a child as they may assume
that a child lacks ability and gives up on them

Experimental Evidence
• In one of Dweck’s experiments it was found that praising students ability led them to a fixed mindset and
they were vulnerable to issues such as coping with setbacks

• In contrast, praising effort or use of strategy taught a growth mindset, leading to students persevering
more

• Yeager and Dweck 2012 studied over 1500 students and found that low-achieving students who learned to
use a growth mindset did better compared to a control group who did not have that learning.

Strengths Weaknesses

• Practical application: Teachers and parents can • Most studies have artificial setting so lacks
focus on praise ecological validity

• Positive theory which helps society as it shows • Do they focus too much on the individual child
change is possible instead of poor teaching quality

• Evidence to support: Yeager and Dweck 2012 • Praise is not always appropriate and does not
found that adolescents could deal better with feature in feedback when there is no
not fitting in if they had a growth mindset judgement on the individual for example “add a
conclusion to an essay”
• Gunderson 2013 used a natural environment so
the findings are more valid

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Willingham’s Learning Theory

• Willingham is a cognitive scientist who studies thinking and the brain

• He applies his work to classrooms and other situations
• He explains not only his own ideas but also problems with the ideas of others like Piaget
• Knowing facts help to build skills of problem-solving and reasoning
• An issue with learning and developing skills is that previous knowledge is needed
• Knowledge can also free up space in our working memory to allow us to use mental skills such as problem
solving
• Working memory involves different processes working on information that comes in through our sense
• Visual information is stored and processes separately from sound information
• A part of working memory is used for making decisions about information
• Working memory is limited
• What someone already knows leaves them more processing power

Practice and Effort

• Willingham emphasises that practice and effort enable us to master knowledge and skills
• It is important to practice enough to be able to do things automatically
• This is necessary to leave enough working memory for learning new things

Building knowledge
• Short-term memory involves practise so we have to rehearse what is to be remembered
• What is learned then goes into the LTM where material have to be reviewed and practised to remember it
• When there is enough practice and effort we can stop so it is unlikely to be forgotten
• Can do quizzes to help build knowledge and practice it

Building Skill
• Problem-solving and creative thinking are skills a student needs to learn and these skills use working
memory
• Skills need to be developed so that they become automatic and use little space in working memory
• Reading becomes automatic once there has been enough practice and effort

Cognitive development Physical Development Social Development

• Willingham proposed teaching • Willingham also believed • Willingham’s focus on practice,
strategies to help students that practice and effort effort and development gave rise
learn. Teachers should: would improve physical to the ideas that teachers can
– Use problems that are development such as muscle also help with social
new and within movements (motor skills) development
students ability • He related muscle – Build on a child’s ability
– Understand a student’s movements to brain to take the view of
likely stage of processing, suggesting that someone else
development in order to improve these – Demonstrate appropriate
– Remember that skills you should; social behaviour
students abilities are – Focus on what – Help a child to stop
variable and can movements will be impulsive behaviour
change suitable and in what – Encourage practice
– Consider factors other order they need to which requires
than developmental be done self-regulation
level; the student – Practice the – Delay giving a reward for
might not understand movements in that a task to encourage a
the task order enough times child to keep working
to make the muscle
commands
automatic
– Use conscious effort

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 Strengths Weaknesses

• Applied to education and other situations to • High control – low ecological validity
promote child development • No emphasis on the importance of individual
• Other studies to support Willingham and his differences
arguments against Piaget’s view that
development is in stages
• Repacholi and Gopnik’s 1997 study provides
experimental support showing that young
children were not as egocentric as Piaget
thought
• High control – high reliability
• Come from science and neuroscience

Piaget and Inhelder’s Three Mountain Task

• A young child in the pre-operational stage sees the world from their own viewpoint and
cannot see someone else view point
• Piaget called this inability, egocentrism
• Children focus on themselves
• They are likely to change how things look in their own minds so that the world matches
how they see it
• The understanding that there are viewpoints other than their own is something that
develops over time
• This is when child decentre
• The three mountains task is part of a series of experiments that Piaget and Inhelder
carried our to study children’s ways of look at the world
• All children would see a mountain and on different sides they would have different views
of each mountain

• To find out the extent to which children of different ages were able to take the view of
another person
• Children’s overall system of putting together a number of different views of what they
see

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• 100 children
• Equipment:
– Three models of mountains using paper pasted together to form card
– 1 metre and ranged from 12-30cm high.
– Lowest mountain was green with a small path winding down, next was brown and
had a red cross on the top and the highest with grey with snow on top
– Ten pictures of the three mountains were taken from different positions around it
(features visible)
– 3 pieces of card the same colour as the mountains which the child could arrange to
represent the mountains according to viewpoints
– Wooden doll about 3cm high with no facial features
• Ways of questioning the child
– Child asked to use the cardboard shapes to show how the mountain scene looked
from different viewpoints. Asked to place the shaped to show the view they
themselves saw and then to show what the doll could see
– The child was shown ten pictures of the model and asked to pick out the picture
that represented what they could see and what the doll could see
– The child chose a picture and then had to positive the doll so it could see that
viewpoint

• Pre-operational stage
– Asked 4-6.5 chooses pictures and places cardboard to show their own view of the 3
mountains model even asked to show the doll’s view
• Concrete operational stage
– From 7-9 the child understand others looking from different positions and can see
the model differently
– By 9-10 years old the children can understand that the doll has a different view

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 • Piaget and Inhelder concluded that children up to about 7 years were egocentric – could
not see from another viewpoint but their own
• Older children were not egocentric
• Older children can build mental representations of how others see the world

Strengths Weaknesses

● Provided detail in the form of qualitative data • Doesn’t support the idea of distinct stages but
and strong results, in addition to counting the rather than children develop progressively as
number of errors, they looked into the detail of they age instead – Piaget admits the stages are
the errors and what each child did and said fluid
• Experimental methods: control, standardisation, • Other studies use more realistic scenarios and
reliability found different findings: Use the iPads to
•  Repeating the experiment with many children: research the study of Borke (1975) with Sesame
reliability Stree and Repachloi and Gopnik (1997) study
• Children didn’t understand the point of the task
• Originally done only in Switzerland

Gunderson Parent Praise

• Parents can praise a child personally, praise child’s behaviour or they can use a different type of praise
– Person praise seems to lead children to the idea that they are born with or without an ability. This
leads to a fixed theory known as entity theory or entity motivational framework where they might
not try hard as they think they aren’t good
– Process praise involves praising behaviour and effort leads children to see a link between effort and
success. They are more likely to see ability as changeable and are more likely to keep doing better
(Incremental theory or incremental motivational framework)
– Boys tend to think of ability and behaviour as changeable (incremental) suggesting that they
receive process praise
– Praise for girls is more likely to lead to entity theory meaning behaviour is seen as fixed, more
person praise

Gunderson’s Parent Praise

Research has shown that the way parents praise their young children impacts a child’s later ideas about reasons for
behaviour and beliefs
• It is found that praising children’s effort rather than their ability leads to the idea that working hard can
change achievements
• Gunderson et al 2013 set out to see whether looking at parents praising children in the home – a natural
setting – would support these experimental findings

• Researchers looked for a relationship between older children who believed effort was worthwhile as they
were receiving process praise both when they were answering questions about intelligence and when
answering questions about moral thinking

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 • Followed children at 14 months, 26 months, 38 months and then 5 years later too
• 29 boys and 24 girls
• 64% were white, 17% African-American, 11% Hispanic and 8% multicultural
• No participants or experimenters knew that praise was being studied, they thought the study was about
language development
• At each visit, participants were told to go about a typical day at home, interactions video-taped in 90
minute sessions.
• At 7-8 years the same children answer 2 questionnaires about what they thought led to a person’s
intelligence and what led people to act morally
• 18 items were covered about what underpins intelligence and 6 items about their beliefs for ‘good’ and
‘bad’

• Children are affected by different types of praise

• Parents give girls less process praise and more person praise
• Parents use of process of person praise in early childhood predicts a child’s reasoning 5 years later about
what causes and motivates behaviour (is it ability or effort?)
• They found giving process praise leads to a more incremental framework (effort pays off). Therefore the
argument was strengthened.

• Relationship found between parents use of process praise and a child’s later use of incremental
motivational framework
• Study’s aims were only partly supported because they did not show that parental use of person praise led to
entity motivational framework (fixed ability)
• There are gender differences in praise

Strengths Weaknesses

• Supports Dweck • Unethical – lack of consent over content

• Naturalistic experiment • Deception
• Experimenters did not know it was • Would have to debrief
about praise: avoids investigator • Parents may have acted differently when being observed
effects and bias – lacking validity

• 53 families in Chicago -generalisability?

Issues and Debates

The development of Morality
Morals: what is right and wrong in human behaviour. Moral means what most people agree what is good and right
behaviour. This can vary between cultures

Morality: proper behaviour, people should behave according to principles of what is right and wrong, separating
good behaviour from bad behaviour

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Theories of moral development (1): Piaget’s 1932 theory of moral development:

Theories of moral development (2): Kohlberg’s 1958 theory of moral development

Level and Ages Stages and Explanations

Level 1: Pre-conventional morality (aged up Stage 1: Focus on the child obeying in order to
to around 9 years old) avoid punishment
Believes the rules cannot be changed it is a
consequence of the action- whether there is
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punishment or reward makes it a good or bad Stage 2: About self-interest and ‘what’s in it for
action. They are a basic view of what is right or me’, including what benefit can be gained from
wrong. moral actions.
Level 2: conventional morality (most young Stage 3: About being seen as ‘good’ and
people and adults) conforming to social roles- wanting to be liked
The young person or adult sees themselves as a Stage 4: About maintaining social order by
good member of society and that is their obeying authority, which is a duty.
strating point for what is moral behaviour.
Reasoning comes from group norms.
Level 3: Post- conventional morality (only Stage 5: Is about laws being social contracts
about 10% of people reach this level) which individuals enter into, so there can be
The individual has their own ideas about what differences in morality between individuals
is good and bad. They understand there are according to which laws they have agreed to.
moral principles that are universal (for Democracy is an example of stage 5 reasoning.
everyone) rather than being for one Stage 6: The understanding that moral reasoning
society.These two stages go beyond social laws is abstract and there are universal ethical
to what the individual has as moral principles. principles that ‘must’ be followed. This stage
emphasises right and wrong actions beyond
individual laws.

Development Assessment Material

Early Brain Development:

Bethany is in the first month of pregnancy, known as the embryonic stage. Katherine reads a
magazine article that says a human brain will have already started to develop in this early stage of
pregnancy. What early brain development would be expected in the first month of pregnancy?
(4 marks)

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What early brain development would be expected in the first 3 months of pregnancy?
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Piaget
Nicole’s family have two pet cats. One day, when Nicole is in the park with her mum, she points to a
dog and says ‘cat’. Why might Nicole think that the dog is a cat?
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Nicole can recognise her mother’s blue car as a ‘car’ and her father’s green car as a ‘car’. Her
grandmother had a red car, but buys a white car. Explain which process will Nicole use to understand
the change in her grandmother’s car?
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Nicole’s grandfather sells his car and buys a motorbike. Which process will Nicole use to understand
the change in her grandfather’s vehicle?
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Dweck’s Mindset Theory

Claire did not do as well as she wanted to in her biology test, but her teacher praises her for working
hard and trying her best. Claire feels more confident about her learning and works harder for her
next test. She achieves a better mark on her second test and her teacher praises her for excellent
effort. Why did the teacher praise Claire’s effort?
(4 marks)
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Willingham’s Learning Theory

Sarah teaches children aged 8 years old. She is planning an activity to help her students learn the
importance of healthy eating. Sarah has decided to create a series of food-choice dilemmas where
the students need to make choices between healthy and unhealthy food and to explain their
decisions. Her head teacher says this is too complicated. How can two strategies suggested by
Willingham help Sarah plan an appropriate activity?
(4 marks)
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Topic 2: MEMORY
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Processes of memory

1. Input The sensory information we receive from our environment

2. Encoding Turning sensory information into a form that can be used and stored by the
brain. Acoustic – holding sound. Visual – holding images. Semantic – holding
the meaning of information
3. Storage The retention of information in our memory system

4. Retrieval The recall of stored memory

5. Output The information we recall, the behavioural response

Short-term and long-term memory

Capacity Duration Encoding Forgetting

Short-term memory 7 +/- 2 Around 18 seconds Acoustic Displacement
without rehearsal Decay
Long-term memory Potentially limitless A few minutes to a Mainly semantic Displacement
lifetime Interference
Retrieval failure

Information can be forgotten through a process called displacement; this is when new incoming information pushes
out older information as we exceed the capacity of our short-term memory. In our long-term memory, memories
can decay, as they are not used, or they may be overwritten by new information, this is called interference, or in
the case of retrieval failure, we cannot find a memory as we may have lost the link

Multi-Store Model of Memory

Developed by Atkinson and Shiffrin

(1968). At the time there were
disagreements about how memory works,
whether it was one entity or a series of
entities.

Sensory Memory/Register - This is all the

immediate information we receive from our
senses. It is held very briefly in our sensory
memory. If we pay attention to information
it is transferred to our short-term memory.

Short-term memory – Information we pay

attention to gets transferred here, it can be
stored for around 15-30 seconds.

Role of rehearsal – Repeating information over and over again helps to hold it in our short-term memory; if it is
rehearsed for long enough it goes into our long-term memory. Rehearsal refers to repeating things out loud or over
and over again on our heads
Long-term memory – It can hold information indefinitely and is potentially limitless. Long-term memories are
mainly thought to be semantically encoded.

Strengths Weaknesses
1. There is a lot of evidence to support it. 1. It has been criticised for overstating the
Amnesia patients support the idea of role of rehearsal.
separate memory stores. 2. It is unlikely that we only have one type of
2. Ben Murdock (1962) in his primacy and long-term memory; this is shown in
recency experiments supported the amnesia patients.
separate memory stores.

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Amnesia

Amnesia is memory loss, often through disease or

injury. The two types are retrograde and
anterograde amnesia.

Retrograde amnesia – When a patient has suffered a brain injury and cannot remember information from before
the injury. It can be specific to one memory, such as the incident, or a timeframe. In severe cases people forget
there name or where they come from. It is possible to people to regain all or some of their memory loss.

Anterograde amnesia – When you can’t store any new long-term memories. The short-term memory remains intact
so sensory information can be processed, but memories will not last beyond a few minutes as information cannot be
transferred, long-term memories before the incident are usually retained.

Henry Molaison (Patient H.M)

● Famous case of retrograde and anterograde amnesia

● Had brain surgery for epilepsy and his hippocampus was
damaged
● He could recall childhood events, but not events from a few
years before his surgery
● He could not form any new memories
● He helped us to understand memory and amnesia
● When he died, he donated his brain to science

Bartlett’s (1932) Theory of Reconstructive Memory

● Our memories are not exact copies of events, but more like notes of what we have experienced.
● When we recall information we elaborate on these notes
● Memories are an active reconstruction, an interpretation of events
● A schema is a packet of information about an event, we have schemas for most things, like what a
restaurant or classroom is like

Schemas
Schemas are formed throughout our lives through personal experiences, this means they are unique and personal to
use. Bartlett discovered that schemas could influence memory as they can ignore and change details. Bartlett
found that recall displayed;
● Omissions - Leaving out unfamiliar, irrelevant or unpleasant details, our schema simplifies the information
● Transformations - Details are changed to make them more familiar and rational
● Familiarisation - We change unfamiliar details to align our own schema
Strengths Weaknesses
1. It has real-world practical applications, it 1. His data is subjective, he read and
can be used for eyewitnesses for crimes. interpreted each story himself.
2. His finding are ecologically valid, he did 2. Bartlett was not particularly scientific in
recall tests of stories hours, days and years his methods, he was interested in each
later. person’s unique memories rather than
using standardised procedure and controls.

● Rationalism - We add details into our recall to give a reason for something that may not have originally
fitted with a schema

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 Bartlett (1932) War of the Ghosts

Background

In his book, remembering Bartlett wrote about an experiment he conducted with folk stories and pictures. There
was a North American folk tale called ‘War of the Ghosts’. Bartlett chose this as the story would be unfamiliar to
Cambridge University staff and students so would support reconstructive theory as participants would be more
likely to draw on their own schemas.

Aim

To investigate whether the memory of a story is affected by previous knowledge. To find out if cultural background
and unfamiliarity with a story would lead to distortion of memory when it was recalled. To test if memory is
reconstructive and whether people store and retrieve information per expectations formed by cultural schemas.

Procedure

Sample: 20 British participants (7 women, 13 men). The participants were not told the aim of the study; they
believed they were being tested on the accuracy of recall. Bartlett used repeated reproduction, which is where
participants hear a story or see a drawing and are asked to reproduce it after a short time and then to do so again
over a period of days, weeks, months or years. The story used was a Native American story called ’The War of the
Ghosts’ which was unfamiliar to participants and contained unknown names and concepts. The story content was
also unfamiliar. The story was selected because it would test how memory may be reconstructed based on cultural
schema. Each participant read the story to themselves twice. The first reproduction happened 15 minutes later.
There was no set interval beyond this and participants recalled the story at further intervals from 20 hours to
almost 10 years.

Results

Bartlett found that participants changed the story as they tried to remember it. This happened in the early stages
(15 minutes) and throughout the further reproductions. Overall, the participants preserved the order of events and
main themes in the story. The reproduction of style was often changed, with reproduction of the story often being
transformed. Seven of the 20 participants omitted the title and 10 of the participants transformed the title – for
example, ‘War-Ghost Story’. Other transformations included changing ‘canoes’ to ‘boats’ and changing the names
of the characters. Much of the content was rationalised by the participants, who changed material so that it was
more acceptable to them (Bartlett called this ‘effort after meaning

Conclusion

Accuracy in reproduction of the story is an exception rather than a norm of memory. Style, rhythm and precise
story construction is very rarely reproduced. After repeated reconstructions, the form of, and items within, the
story become stereotyped and do not change much after this occurs. However, with infrequent reproduction,
omission of detail, simplification and transformation continues indefinitely. There is a significant amount of
interference with the story from reconstructing it. The details are altered to fit the participant’s own tendencies
and interests. In all recollections of the story, rationalisation reduced material to a form that was more accessible
or common to the participant. This could be because the material was initially connected to something else in
memory and treated as a representation of this. It reflected the character and individuality of the person recalling
the story, and names, places.

Strengths Weaknesses
● Using a story makes it a more naturalistic ● The story was illogical and not familiar,
test of recall, it is better than nonsense remembering the story is not an everyday
lists. task.
● It is reliable, Bartlett repeated the ● It lacked some control, Bartlett did not
experiment with various stories and found always give people the same time interval
the same results. before recalling the story

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 Peterson & Peterson (1959) Short-term Retention of Individual Verbal Items

Background

Lloyd and Margaret Peterson conducted a laboratory experiment to investigate the duration of short-term memory.
As we can hold information in the short-term memory by rehearsing it over and over, they could only test the
duration of a short-term memory trace by interfering with this rehearsal process. To prevent participants from
rehearsing, the Petersons got them to count backwards in threes.

Aim

Peterson and Peterson first aimed to see if retention of items was affected by interference during recall intervals.
In the second part of their study, they investigated whether silent or vocal rehearsal would affect recall of items.

EXPERIMENT PART ONE

Procedure

Sample: 24 students from an introductory psychology course at Indiana University, USA were selected. As part of
their course, the students were required to take part in research experiments. Each participant was given a
standardised set of instructions which explained the process of the experiment. This included explaining the ‘black
box’ in front of them and what to do at each of the light signals:
∙ The green light meant that the trial was ready to begin.

∙ The red light meant to stop counting and recall the trigram (three-letter consonant).
Participants had two practice trials in order to ensure the instructions had been fully understood.
At the beginning of each trial, the experimenter would spell out a trigram followed by a number from which the
participant had to count backwards in either 3’s or 4’s, e.g. CHJ 506. In half the trials, participants counted
backwards in 3’s (e.g. 506, 503, 500 and so on) and in the other half they counted backwards in 4’s (e.g. 312, 308,
304 and so on).
Participants counted backwards in time with the ticking of a metronome. This was a task that would minimise
rehearsal behaviour between presentation and recall. Once the red light came on, the participant had to
immediately verbally recall the trigram, e.g. CHJ. The next trial would then begin 15 seconds later, signalled by the
green light. The responses given by the participant during their 15 second interval were recorded.
Each participant was tested eight times at each of the following six recall intervals: 3 seconds, 6 seconds, 9
seconds, 12 seconds, 15 seconds and 18 seconds.

Results

Results indicated that participants took an average of 2.83 seconds to begin their recall of the trigram once their
counting had stopped. There was a significant difference between accurate recall following the first blocks (shorter
interference intervals) than the last blocks (longer interference intervals). With a 3 second interference interval,
participants could recall just over 50% of the trigrams accurately. This dropped to less than 10% from 15 seconds
onwards.

Conclusion

Information decays rapidly from short-term memory, with accurate recall of the trigrams decreasing rapidly over
the duration of 18 seconds, and very little accuracy shown in recall in 15 second and 18 second trials. Therefore,
short-term memory has limited duration.

EXPERIMENT PART TWO: Procedure

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Sample: 48 students from the same university programme. In this procedure, half of the participants were
instructed to repeat the stimulus of a three-letter trigram aloud in time with a metronome. This group was the
‘vocal’ condition. They were then stopped by the experimenter and instructed to count backwards from a number.
The other half of the participants were not instructed to repeat the stimulus trigram aloud, but they were given
interval time before being asked to count backwards from a number. This group was the ‘silent’ group.
Both groups were tested on various rehearsal interval periods of immediate recall, 1 second and 3 seconds. This
was completed for three interference conditions of counting backwards for 3 seconds, 9 seconds and 18 seconds.

Results

Participant recall in the ‘vocal’ group improved with repetition, with longer repetition leading to more accurate
recall. Participant recall in the ‘silent’ group did not improve with longer repetition.

Conclusion

Only in conditions where the repetition was vocal and controlled did accuracy of recall improve. The rate of
forgetting from short-term memory depends on the amount of rehearsal undertaken.

Evaluation

Strengths Weaknesses
● It had good control as fixed timings were ● Extraneous variables, the trigram may
used and researchers eliminated any have a personal meaning to a person, this
background noise is hard to control
● It has practical implications, it teaches ● This is not realistic to how we use our
how interference in the form of verbal everyday memory
distraction can affect our ability to retain
information

Issues and Debates – Reductionism and holism debate

Reductionism: the theory of explaining something according to its basic constituent parts
Reductionist: the practice of reductionism
An example of a reductionist approach to memory is the Multi-store model of memory

Holism: the theory of explaining something as a whole

Holistic: the practice of holism
An example of a holistic approach to memory is reconstructive memory

Reductionism
● Human behaviour or cognitive (thought) processes can be explained by looking at the parts that make up
that behaviour.
● Scientists often reduce complex behaviour into basic parts this means that we can be more certain that one
thing causes another (easier to measure).
For example, if we explain aggression as a result of a certain gene, we can test for the gene and see if it is
associated with someone being more aggressive than a person without that gene.
● Reductionism is associated with scientific methods (e.g. laboratory experiments), where factors that may
explain a behaviour can be isolated and tested under controlled conditions.
● Reductionism is a desirable scientific practice.
● However, the problem with reductionism is that it can result in an explanation that is overly simplistic.

Holism
● The opposite of reductionism.
● Tries to understand the whole behaviour rather than its parts.
● Believe that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.
● Uses qualitative methods to gain greater insight into the causes of behaviour

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For example, a cake can be described by a list of ingredients that went into making it. Each ingredient
contributed to the taste, texture and smell of the cake. However, you would need all the ingredients working
together, interacting during the baking, to make the cake, otherwise it would not work.
● Difficult to achieve because understanding the whole individual means investigating lots of variables at the
same time.
● Regarded as unscientific because the findings can only apply to a particular individual and the resulting
theories do not apply to everyone else.

How does this apply to human memory?

The area of cognitive psychology concerned with memory is generally regarded to be reductionist

Reductionist Holistic
The information processing approach Reconstructive memory
The Multi-store Model of Memory Qualitative analysis
Experiments

Atkinson & Schiffrin’s (1968) Multi-store Model of Memory can be seen as reductionist as it describes our memory as
a series of component memory stores with specific functions, such as rehearsal. Research, such as experiments can
be considered reductionist as experiments isolate variables without considering other factors.

However, Bartlett’s work cannot be considered reductionist because of the way he conducted his research. Bartlett
used qualitative analysis to explore the reconstructive nature of memory by understanding how individual schemas
influenced their recall of stories and pictures. He spent time establishing the character and backgrounds of his
participants in order to understand how their schemas were formed.

Memory Assessment Material

Structure and process of memory and information processing: Features of STM and LTM:
Rhianna is read a list of 11 items to buy from the shop for her mum. When her Mum finishes reading
the list of items to her, Rhianna has forgotten the first three items on the list. Why might Rhianna
have forgotten the first three items?
(4 marks)
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When Rhianna arrives at the shop, she can only recall eight of the items on the list. According to the
multi-store model of memory, why might Rhianna only be able to remember eight of these items?
(2 marks)
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Retrograde and Anterograde Amnesia

Tina has recently fallen and sustained a head injury. She can no longer recall where she lives or
where she goes to school. Tina can make new memories and remembers what she had for lunch.
What type of amnesia could explain Tina’s memory problems?
(2 marks)
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Theory of Reconstructive Memroy: Bartlett (1932)

Sue and Nicole were chatting in a café when a woman passing by fell to the floor clutching her arm.
Sue said she saw the woman trip over, but Nicole says she saw her being pushed. How can
reconstructive memory explain these different accounts?
(4 marks)
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 Topic 3: PSYCHOLOGICAL PROBLEMS
Unipolar depression

• Describes the type of depression that most people are familiar with

• The type where people suffer from periods of feeling down

• Uni – mood is being pulled in one direction

• Different to bipolar disorder where patients have mood swings and are pulled in multiple directions

Symptoms of unipolar depression

• International Classification of Diseases version 10 (ICD-10) says that unipolar depression is also known as
depressive episodes

• Type of mental health problem characterised by mood disorders

• These affect how people feel and unipolar depression makes people feel low

• Episodes can be classed as mild, moderate or severe

• For a diagnosis of unipolar depression the ICD-10 requires that at least one of these main symptoms
(lowering mood, lack of energy and lack of motivation) occurs most of the time on most days for at least 2
weeks

Features of unipolar depression

• The World Health Organisation says that 1 in 15 people suffer from an episode of serious
depression every year
• They also state that unipolar depression affects twice as many females as males
• It also seems to affect women for longer than it does men

Episode Symptoms Features

Mild Four symptoms displayed A patient might find their symptoms upsetting
but they will probably be able to carry on with
most day-to-day activities
Moderate Five or six symptoms displayed A patient might have serious problems doing
day-to-day activities such as going to work or to
school
Severe Seven or more symptoms plus general A patient may have suicidal thoughts or engage
feelings of worthlessness in self-harm to cope with their feelings

Incidence of depression over time

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 • More people are diagnosed nowadays
• Seligman 1988 reported that in 1980s people were 10 times more likely to be diagnosed with
depression than they were in the 1940s
• The King’s Fund in 2008 reported on mental health and estimated that by 2026, 1.45 million
people will be diagnosed with depression compared to 1.24 million in 2007
• Is it because people are more aware nowadays?
• Hidaka 2012 suggests that modern living is just more stressful – how is this so?

How depression affects individuals and Society

Individuals Society

- Increased risk of suicide - Time missed from work

- 10-15% will commit suicide - In 2014/2015 9.9 million days of work were
missed because of stress and depression (The
Health and Safety Executive)
- Cost of treatment
- Figures from 2007 estimate that depression
costs the NHS £1.7 billion in one year alone

Genetic explanation of unipolar depression

• If someone in your family is diagnosed with depression then there is a chance that you will be too
• So unipolar depression may be inherited through genes
• It is not clear which genes contribute
• Hyde et al 2016 found that 17 different gene variations were linked to developing depression
• This makes it challenging to identify people at risk
Twin Studies
• Identical twins share 100% of the same genes
• Non identical share 50% of their genes
• McGuffin 1996 found that if one identical twin became depressed there was a 46% chance that the
other twin would too
• But with non identical there was only a 20% chance that they would both be depressed
• There may need to be something in the environment that triggers the depression to start even if
they are carrying that gene
• So some people may have a genetic predisposition which needs triggering
• This combines genes and environment and is called the diathesis stress model
• What in the environment could trigger depression?

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 Strengths Weaknesses

- If genes explain depression then we can - Very deterministic

take away the stigma - Reductionist: fails to consider other factors
- Research support: Caspi 2003 found that that could cause depression
people with a variation of the serotonin
transporter gene were more likely to react
negatively to stressful life events and
develop depression

Cognitive Theory as an explanation for Depression

Beck’s Cognitive Triad

Ellis’ ABC Model

Strengths Weaknesses

- Takes into account life events - Difficult to tell whether the irrational thoughts
- Combines nature and nurture are a cause of the depression or a symptom
- Applied to therapy (CBT) - Is there always an activating event

Cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) as a treatment for depression

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 • Therapy to help the patient change the way they think
(cognitive) and change the way they act (behaviour)
• Based on an understanding that the way we think affects how we feel
and how we feel influences how we behave
• First stage of CBT is for the patient to discuss all their
symptoms
• Then the therapist attempts to challenge these irrational ways of
thinking and attempts to replace them with rational thoughts
• There will be multiple sessions

Strengths Weaknesses

- Evidence to suggest it works – Beltman 2010 - Relies on patients wanting to change

found that depressed patients treated with CBT - Expensive
improved more than those who were still - Unethical (tells them how they think is wrong)
waiting for treatment or not receiving any
- Longer lasting than anti-depressants
- Helps them to feel better

Drug Therapy for Treating Depression

• Some depressants may be offered drug therapy – antidepressants

• These drugs work by raising the levels of neurotransmitters such as serotonin and noradrenaline which are
thought to play a role in our mood

• Not all drugs used to treat depression work in the same way

• Some drugs are better for some patients

• All have a slightly different effect

Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors (SSRIs) Serotonin and noradrenaline reuptake inhibitors
• These block the reuptake of serotonin when it (SNRIs)
is released from a neuron • Similar effect to SSRIs but they block the
• So serotonin can be available for longer reuptake of both serotonin and noradrenaline
• So there is more opportunity for other neurons (and norepinephrine)
to absorb it which should increase levels in the • This helps to improve mood too
brain and improving mood

Monoamine oxidase inhibitors (MAOIs) Tricyclics (TCAs)

• MAOIs prevent the enzyme monoamine oxidase • Oldest drugs (1950s)
(MAOA) from doing its job properly • Boost the effect of serotonin and
• MAOA breaks down the neurotransmitters, noradrenaline in the brain by preventing the
serotonin and noradrenaline after they have reabsorption of these neurotransmitters into
been released from neurons the neuron
• The drug MAOI helps to make more of these • Enhances mood
neurotransmitters (serotonin and
noradrenaline) available which helps to lift the
persons mood

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 Strengths Weaknesses

- Improve mood quickly - Side effects

- Helps them to access other psychological - Treats the symptoms and not the cause
therapies
- 50-65% of patients show improvement compared
to only 20% who had a placebo
Addiction

• Psychological problem where people feel they have to do something to avoid negative feelings

• Can be addicted to smoking, gambling, alcohol etc

• International Classification of Diseases version 10 (ICD-10) calls addiction a ‘dependence disorder’

• People with addictions often have symptoms of withdrawal if they cannot have or do what they are
addicted to

• Withdrawal symptoms can make the person feel so bad that they believe they have to take or do the thing
they are addicted to feel normal again

• ICD-10 refers to addiction as a dependence disorder because the body depends on the substance in order to
feel normal

• You must have at least three of the symptoms at the same time for 1 month or for repeated occasions
over a year

Symptoms:

• Ignoring evidence that the substance is harmful

• Need to take the substance

• Stopping is difficult

• Physical withdrawal symptoms such as shaking and sweating

• Take an increasing amount of the substance over time

• Replacing normal activities with the substance

Features:

• In 2014-2015 there were 141646 adults being treated for addiction

• Most were addicted to drugs like heroin or alcohol

• 2 million people in the UK are suffering from some kind of addiction

• ICD-10 doesn’t recognise internet addiction as it seems to be a new one

• 6% of the worlds population have an internet problem

• UK study in 2014 found that 16% of the 1800 18-24 year olds admitted to using the internet for 15 hours a
day

Incidences of addiction changed over time:

• The definition of addiction has changed

• Addiction now includes the internet and video games

• Addictions are rising in society

• A report by the Centre for Social Justice 2006 suggested that many sources of addiction are becoming
cheaper to access which could increase the use of them

• 27% of people in 2008 said that they had used an illegal substance and 31% said they had in 2014
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 How does addiction affect individuals and society:

• Ignore family and friends

• May stop going to work or school

• May spend money that they don’t have

• Quality of life could diminish

• People may take time out of work – meaning this costs companies more money on cover staff

• Cost on NHS (every year substance abuse costs the NHS £488 million)

• Criminal behaviour increases

Genetic explanation of addiction

• Addiction can run in families

• If addiction is genetic then this would help to explain why not everyone gets addiction to alcohol for
example

• Carmelli et al 1992 found that in identical twins, if one was a smoker then there was a higher chance the
other would be too

• As they share more genes than non-identical twins this suggests that smoking could be genetic

• Goodwin et al 1973 found that adopted children who had at least one biological parent with alcohol
addiction would be more likely to be addicted themselves

• DDR2 is a gene that has been shown to be related in addiction

• Many different addictions like gambling and alcohol have been linked to this gene (a variation of the gene
called A1)

• This gene is thought to affect the way the brain reacts to pleasure

• Matinez et al 2004 found that a group of heavy users of cocaine were more likely to have a particular
version of a dopamine receptor in the brains of people with this form of the gene

Strengths Weaknesses

- Scientific evidence to support genetics - Reductionist

- Twin studies and adoption studies - Carmelli 1992 looks at environment too which
- Explains why only some people become clearly plays a role
addicted - No single gene identified so hard to distinguish
between

Learning Theory as an explanation of addiction

Classical Conditioning Operant Conditioning Social Learning Theory

• Behaviour is learned through • Behaviours are repeated when • This theory claims that
association they lead to positive behaviour is learned as a result
• When two or more things consequences of observing other people
happen at the same time our • If behaviour is rewarded, it especially those we consider to
brain associates them together will be repeated be role models and modelling
• E.g. if you have been unwell • This positive consequence is a our behaviour on theirs
after eating a certain food form of reinforcement

31
 then you won’t want to eat • This strengthens the behaviour • If a child grows up with a
that food again and means its more likely to parent who smokes they may
• This may explain why people be repeated imitate this behaviour
first become addicted to • If you are praised for helping • This can explain how the
something wash up at home then you’ll behaviour starts as they
• If a substance is associated do it again believe this is normal
with positive feelings in some • This could explain why people behaviour as it is what they
way the person learns to become addicted have observed
associate it with the positive • If the thing they are addicted
feeling to makes them feel good then
it reinforces the behaviour and
makes them want to do it
again
• If friends say you’re cool for
smoking, the behaviour is
reinforced and so you’ll do it
again, and again and may
become addicted

Strengths Weaknesses

- If we learn behaviours then perhaps we can - Ignores the role of biology

unlearn them - Conditioning theories don’t explain why lots of
- Classical conditioning helps explain relapse people try drugs, alcohol and gambling but only
a small number become addicted

Cognitive Behavioural Therapy as a treatment for addiction

CBT

• Originally developed in the 1950s and 60s through the work of Ellis and BeckIt began as a way of stopping
alcoholics from drinking

• This is now a therapy that can be applied to other addictions

• Aims to help people understand the triggers for their addictive behaviours and then learn how to control
and manage these behaviours

• There are two key changes; functional analysis followed by skills training

Functional analysis

• Involves looking closely at the addicts behaviour and working out what makes them turn to their addiction

• Therapist and addict looks at emotions

• For example who they hang around with

• This helps to treat the addiction

Skills training

• Once functional analysis has been done then the therapist teaches them skills that they can use to avoid
the addiction

• Skills could include;

• How to cope with cravings

• Assertiveness training: may be useful if other people are encouraging them into the addictive
behaviour
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 • Improving motivation: helping them to commit to the therapy and stop the addictive behaviour

• In between CBT sessions the patient will be asked to keep a diary of important events to record their
progress

• They make notes of when they felt tempted etc

• This treatment can be combined with other therapies such as drug therapies to reduce symptoms of
withdrawal

Strengths Weaknesses

- CBT aims to give patient control – build up the - Addict has to be motivated to change their
right skills to help stop the addiction behaviour
- Young 2007 evidence supports that CBT is - Need skills
effective for internet addiction in the short - Sometimes skills don’t always mean the
term and up to 6 months after treatment behaviour will be reduced
- Morgenstern and Longabaugh 2000 found that
alcoholics often showed the ability to cope with
their addiction after CBT, but did not always
put these skills into practice and actually stop
drinking

Drug therapy as a treatment for addiction

Drug addiction

• Patients can suffer from many types of addiction and so treatments will be complex

• Treatment will depend on the type of addiction they have and the severity

• Patients can benefit from taking a form of medication to help them cope with the effects of detoxification

• Many substances like opiates, alcohol and nicotine can cause unpleasant side effects when the patient
stops using them

• Medication can help to reduce these effects

Withdrawal

• They can have physical symptoms when they stop the addictive behaviour

• E.g. sweating, insomnia, shaking, lack of appetite etc

• This can make getting off the substance difficult

• Drugs can be given to stop relapse

Reducing cravings

• Many patients who have addictions to substances will find that they crave the substance when they stop
using it

• Nervous system has become used to the effects of the substance and when they stop using it their body
feels like they need it to feel normal

• Medication can control these symptoms

• Some medicines can mimic the drug but can be less harmful so it almost plays a trick on the body

• This can help to reduce cravings

Treating other underlying mental health problems

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 • Some patients with addictions also have other mental health issues

• Drugs can help other issues too which can prevent relapse too

Behavioural addiction

• Drugs can be effective for addictions such as gambling and internet too

• Doctors now prescribe naltrexone which is normally for alcoholics but it can be good for gambling too

• SSRIs can help to control urges too

• Winder et al 2014 showed that SSRIs can help to reduce thoughts about sex in a group of sex offenders
which suggests it could be a useful therapy for people addicted to sex

Strengths Weaknesses

- Supporting evidence Won Kim 2001 presented - Mixed evidence

evidence that 75% of the gambling addicts who - Krystal et al 2001 found there was no significant
were treated with naltrexone showed a difference in relapse rates over a 12 month
significant improvement in their symptoms period between alcoholic patients taking
(compared to 24% who had a placebo) naltrexone and those taking a placebo
- May help patients access other therapies too - Treating an addict with another substance
seems unethical
- Once the drug is stopped they will relapse

Caspi et al (2003)

● Evidence suggests that life events can cause depression

● But not everyone who experiences stress becomes depressed
● This study looks at whether a gene linked to the neurotransmitter serotonin, a brain chemical known to be
involved in depression, makes some people more likely to be depressed after stressful life events than
others
● A group of antidepressant drugs called SSRIs (selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors) help to increase the
amount of serotonin available in the brain and reduce symptoms of depression, then maybe the genes that
cause someone to have lower levels of serotonin than the rest of the population could explain why some
people become depressed after stressful life events

• Caspi et al wanted to investigate why stressful life events seem to lead to depression in some people and
not others

• They then investigated whether stressful life events were more likely to lead to depression in people with a
certain variation of the 5-HTT gene (a gene linked to the amount of serotonin available in the brain)

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The researchers used an opportunity sample from a cohort of participants who were part of another longitudinal
study. There were 847 participants of 26 years old and they were split into three groups, depending on the version
of the 5-HTT gene they had.
Group 1 two short version 17% of participants

Group 2 one short and one long version 51% of participants

Group 3 two long version 31% of participants

This was a longitudinal study with each participant completing a questionnaire that measured the life events that
occurred between their 21st and 26th birthdays. The events included problems with money, health or relationships.
Another questionnaire assessed whether they had any symptoms of depression in the year before their 26th birthday,
which gave the researchers quantitative data in the form of a depression score. They were initially measured at the
age of 3.

● As the graph below shows, the participants with two short versions of the 5-HTT gene reported more
depression symptoms in response to stressful life events than either of the other two groups.
● Those participants with two long versions reported fewer depression symptoms.
● Moreover, childhood maltreatment was predictive of depression in adulthood only in adults with either one
or two short alleles.

• While there is no direct relation between short versions of the 5HTT gene and depression, there is a
relationship between these and incidences of stress and subsequent depression.

• The long versions of 5-HTT seem to protect against suffering depression because of stress. The effects of
the gene adaptation are dependent on environmental exposure to stress.

• There does seem to be a link between 5-HTT and depression

• Environmental stressors don’t always lead to depression

Strengths:

● This was a very large cohort of males and females and the age was controlled in order to isolate the
variable of number of stressful life events between the ages of 21 and 26.

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 ● It was a natural experiment, with the naturally occurring IV being the length of the 5-HTT. If the results are
replicated this would suggest high reliability.

Limitations: 
● Gene action is highly complex, and actions of other genes could not be controlled.
● While the stressful life events were standardised as employment, financial, housing, health and
relationship, whether or not a participant experienced a certain event as stressful is highly personal.
● Moreover, the symptoms of depression were self-reported, although one colleague was contacted for each
participant in order to verify the symptoms; self-reporting can be unreliable

Young (2007) Cognitive behavioural therapy with internet addicts: treatment outcomes and
implication

• Internet addiction has been seen as a specific mental health problem only in recent years
• So little is known about treatments
• Young had seen cognitive behavioural therapy being used effectively to treat many other types of addiction
and wanted to see if it could work for internet addiction

• To investigate the effect of using CBT on internet addiction and to see how problem behaviours improved
over time both during the therapy and after therapy sessions had ended

• 114 participants recruited from the Center for Online Addiction (USA)

• All participants completed the Internet Addiction Test (IAT) and were shown to be addicted

• Any participants who had other psychological problems were not chosen

• All participants were given CBT

• Session 1 (functional analysis): find out information about the client (when addiction started, what kind of
symptoms etc etc)

• Next few sessions: skills training (stopping using online apps)

• Session 3, 8 and 12: complete questionnaire called Client Outcome to measure the effectiveness of CBT (12
questions on a 5-point likert scale like ‘rate how your ability to engage in offline activities away from the
computer has improved’)

• 58% males and 42% females were included

• 61% participants were educated at a University level

• 30% of males were addicted to pornography

• 30% of females were addicted to online chat rooms

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 • 96% participants said their biggest problem was the time it took

• Over the course of the sessions the rating (how much they liked the sessions) towards CBT improved

• CBT did work (some improvement) and no significant drop in ratings of these goals 6 months after therapy
ended

• CBT can be effective for internet addiction

• Long-term benefits

Strengths Weaknesses

- CBT can be useful for internet addiction - Self-report

- Reliable as it uses the same questionnaire - Different types of internet addiction not
throughout controlled for

Issues and Debates

Nature vs Nurture Debate

Nature

• Biological factors

• In place before we are born

• Genes

• Behaviours work the same as hair colour, skin colour, eye colour etc

Nurture

• Environmental factors

• Watching family members

• We are born with a blank slate and learn everything

• Violence comes from copying this behaviour, it’s not in our genes

Mental health problems

• The nature nurture debate highlights an issue with how we treat mental health and crime

• Nature suggests it’s not someone’s fault that they are violent – so why do we punish people in prison?

• Caspi 2003 supports the nature debate

• Learning theories support the nurture debate

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 Psychological Problems Assessment Material

Scott has depression. What symptoms will Scott suffer from? (2 marks)

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Scott lives in Imbondu and has recently been diagnosed with a mental health problem. The incidence of his
mental health problem has been rising in Imbondu. How does the incidence of mental health problems, like
Scott’s, change over time? (4 marks)
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Scott has been recently diagnosed with depression. His parents have both been diagnosed with depression.
How could genes explain Scott’s recent diagnosis?
What strengths and weaknesses are there of this explanation for Scott’s diagnosis? (4 marks)

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Scott has recently been diagnosed with depression. He failed a recent psychology test and is now considering
dropping out of school. He recently suggested that life was pointless and he has no future.
How could cognitive theory explain Scott’s recent depression? (2 marks)

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Scott watched his Dad smoking. The next day Scott tried a cigarette. How could learning theory explain Scott’s
recent behaviour? (2 marks)
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Scott has been diagnosed with addiction and has been sent for CBT. What might Scott experience during his
CBT sessions?
What are the strengths and weaknesses of CBT for Scott? (4 marks)

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Scott has been diagnosed with addiction and has been prescribed drugs. What process would Scott go through
when experiencing drug treatment?
What are the strengths and weaknesses of drug treatment for Scott? (4 marks)

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Topic 4: THE BRAIN AND

NEUROPSYCHOLOGY

Frontal Lobe
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 • Decision making

• Impulse control

• Problem-solving skills

• Concentration

• Paying attention

• Motor cortex is here and this is a large area in front of the central sulcus. The motor cortex plays a key role
in voluntary movements which are the ones we have to think about e.g. kicking a ball

Temporal Lobe

• Hearing and understanding sounds

• Speech and creating speech

• Important areas involved in producing and processing sound-based information

• Contain auditory cortex (controls hearing)

• Parts also control memory

Parietal Lobe

• Ability to understand the world around us

• Ability to recognise faces

• A large section just behind the central sulcus that is responsible for our sense of touch (somatosensory
cortex)

Occipital Lobe

• Deals with ability to see

• Helps us to process visual information

• Visual cortex (sometimes called this)

Cerebellum:

• Vital role in movement, coordination and balance (motor skills)

• Takes information from all senses and our spinal cord to coordinate behaviour

• If we are running and see an object in our way the cerebellum combines this information and sends a
message back to the body, telling it to move to avoid the object

• The message is sent via the spinal cord to help us balance

Lateralisation

● Lateralisation of function in the brain means that each hemisphere of the brain has different jobs

• Some behaviours are controlled more from the left than the right and vice versa

Asymmetrical function:

• Two hemispheres are not exactly the same

• The difference between the two sides of the brain makes it asymmetrical because although they may look
very similar they are not a mirror image

• Each side of the brain appears to control the functions of the opposite side of the body

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 • Right side controls the left body and the left side of the brain controls the right body

Example

– Hand control: the right hemisphere is in control of the left hand while the left hemisphere controls
the right hand. To help the two hemispheres work together a thick layer of nerve fibres (corpus
callosum) connects the hemispheres together

– The corpus callosum allows the two brain sides to communicate with each other so the whole brain
can work as one complete organ

The role of the left and right hemispheres:

• It is difficult to pinpoint exactly what functions are controlled in each hemisphere

• We actually know very little!

• Right and left hemispheres are linked to the ear on the opposite side of the head

• Auditory information from the right ear will be processed by the left hemisphere but this info is shared
because of the corpus callosum with the whole brain

• Left hemisphere plays a role in processing language

• This is called Broca’s area

• Controls production of speech

• If it’s damaged people might find it difficult to talk and develop something called Broca’s Aphasia
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6zNKz7YoUao)

• Other areas in the left hemisphere are linked to writing and understanding language

• The right side plays a role in spatial awareness and facial recognition

Role of the Corpus Callosum

• Thick band of nerve fibres that connects the left and

right hemispheres together

• Allows messages to be passed from the left hemisphere to

the right and vice versa

• This makes it easier for the brain to pass messages

around
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How can we explain differences between males and females?

• Males and females are different, physically and behaviourally

• TV programmes, sports, interest generally

• Females are good at shopping, organising and gossiping

• Men are good at driving and parking

Does our brain influence this?

Sex differences in brain lateralisation

• Males and females brains work differently

• Females were better at language skills (left-brain tasks)

• Men were better at spatial skills (right-brain tasks) such as imagining what a shape would look like if it was
shown from a different angle

• Females may have a thicker corpus callosum meaning they may use both sides of their brain for some tasks

• Males show dominance for one hemisphere for the same tasks with more activity in one hemisphere than
the other

Strengths Weaknesses
• Supporting evidence: Harasty 1997 said parts of • Rilea 2005 found that males do not always do
the brain that process and produce language better than females of spatial tasks – variation
are slightly bigger in females. Rilea 2005 found • Sommer 2004 said there was no strong evidence
that males were better at some spatial tasks that females used both hemispheres for
• Scientific methods: not subjective and valid language tasks

Central Nervous System

• Neuron:

– A nerve cell that transmits information

• Synapse:

– A gap between two neurons that allows messages, in the form of neurotransmitters, to pass
from one cell to another

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 • The central nervous system (CNS) is made up of the brain and the spinal cord

• The CNS helps the brain and body communicate with one another by passing them messages backwards and
forwards between them

• The sensory nerves in the body (skin, muscles and organs) send messages to the brain via the spinal cord

• The brain processes the information and then sends messages to the body down the spinal cord

• This makes the body do something

• The spinal cord can activate the peripheral nervous system (PNS) which makes the body do the actions the
brain is telling it to do

• This happens in a fraction of a second

Synaptic Functioning
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 • Messages are passed throughout the nervous system from
one neuron to the next through synaptic transmission

• Synapses are tiny gaps between neurons

• Chemical messages pass between these

• An electrical impulse is triggered inside the neuron, the

neuron passes an impulse down the axon towards the end
of the nerve fibre

• At the nerve fibre there is a terminal button which is

filled with sacs (vesicles) of neurotransmitters

• When the nerve impulse reaches the terminal button the vesicle releases the neurotransmitter into the
synapse

• The receptors on the next neuron grab the neurotransmitter and they pass the impulse on

Neurological Damage

• Neurological damage refers to any kind of damage to parts of the nervous system

• The brain is an important part of our nervous system so when it’s damaged it causes problems

• When a large part of the brain is damaged it may be due to neurons being interrupted or not working
properly

• If normal functions are no longer possible it can have significant impacts on how a person thinks or behaves

• Damage to the pre frontal cortex always plays a role in behaviour

• Two examples of how the brains ability to process information is affected by brain damage are visual
agnosia and prosopagnosia

Visual agnosia

• Agnosia is a problem in the way the brain processes sensory information

• Means the brain is unable to make sense of the information

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 • Results in a person not being able to recognise something that is shown to them

• Visual agnosia is a disorder in which a person can see perfectly well but cannot understand what they are
seeing

• Can see a kettle but can’t explain that it is a kettle

• Damage to the back of the parietal lobe or the occipital lobe

• Information sent from the eyes to the brain cannot be understood

• Patients might not be able to recognise the colour of an object

• Patients might not be able to recognise objects and name them

• Patients might not be able to recognise places they are familiar with

Prosopagnosia

• Face-blindness

• Unable to recognise faces even though they can be seen

• Even if they know the person really well

• Caused by damage to the part of the brain near the back of the temporal lobe, next to the occipital lobe
known as the fusiform face area (FFA)

• Patients with prosopagnosia find it difficult to identify people from their faces

• Some people find that they see all faces as the same and cannot tell faces apart

• Some find that they cannot recognise faces of people that they know really well

• While other people have more trouble with matching up pictures of faces that they do not know

Impact of damage to the pre-frontal cortex

• Helps control our impulses

• Stops you from hitting someone when you’re angry

• Helps keep our emotions balanced so that we do not get too emotional

• If damaged people become impulsive and aggressive

• Rain et all 1997 studied the brains of murderers and compared these to a similar group of people who had
not committed murder. He found that there were differences in the pre-frontal cortex of the two groups

• Murderers had less activity in the pre-frontal part of the brain making them more impulsive and more
aggressive

Damasio et al 1994: The return of Phineas Gage

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• In 1848 Phineas Gage was working on a railway line in the USA when an explosion caused an iron rod to be
fired through his head

• Harlow wanted to understand what teaches us about the role of the frontal lobe in the brain

• Gage died 12 years after his accident

• Harlow requested his body so he could study his skull

• His skull is still in the library at Harvard university

• Damasio and her colleagues now used it to further study his brain

• Researchers used his skull to create a 3D computer representation of the skull, including the holes from the
rod

• Wanted to discover if areas other than the frontal lobe had also been damaged as it was originally thought
it was all damage to the frontal lobe

• Taking pictures and measurements of the skull

• Built a 3D computer replica

• Took actual measurements of the iron rod (3 cm in diameter and 109 cm long)

• Could then work out the path the rod took through his head

• 20 different entry points and 16 exit points were tested to try to find the most likely path

• They then mapped out which parts had been harmed of the brain

• Damage to both ventromedial regions on the right and left hemisphere

• Brain damage suffered in the accident was likely to only have affected the frontal lobe

• No other brain areas were harmed (language and motor was fine)

• The iron rod went through his left eye socket and up through the head

• Damage to white matter and neurons meant Gage was unable to pass neural messages in this part of his
brain making it useless

• Damage in both hemispheres seemed to be worse in the middle of the underside while the top edges of
the frontal lobes were less affected

• Changes in personality as a result of the damage to the brain

• Ventromedial area of the frontal lobe is important for making sensible decisions and controlling out
impulses around people and also important for emotions

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• Gage had trouble controlled emotions after the accident

• Damasio had evidence of 12 other patients with similar frontal lobe damage who all showed the same issue
with emotional control

Strengths Weaknesses

• Able to use modern day technology to • Had to use a replica of the skull – entirely
investigate data from 1848 so results can have reliable?
scientific status • Information may not have been accurate from
• Can make predictions and use this for the 150 years ago
future • Generalising information from a one off case
study to everyone else?

Sperry 1968 Hemisphere Deconnection and Unity in Conscious Awareness

• The aim of the study was to show the independence and conscious awareness possessed by each
hemisphere

• In 1968 Sperry studied what effects could be seen in these patients by monitoring how they processed
information using their ‘split-brain’

• He was interested to see how the split-brain compares to a normal brain

• 11 participants who had their corpus callosum cut were part of the study.

• All the participants were epileptics and had previously had surgery to deal with their severe epileptic
convulsions.

• All participants were those who had had this surgery to severe their corpus callosum at least 5 years before
the study.

• Given various tasks to test how they processed different types of information in the split brain

• So the left side of each eye would pick up one image (one on the right) while the right side of each eye
would pick up on the other image (on the left)

• We have two visual fields (this must not be confused with our two eyes) The left visual field is what we can
see with our left and the right visual field is what we can see with our right.

• Information on the right of the visual field would be passed to the left hemisphere whilst the left would be
passed to the right hemisphere

Visual Task

• Participants focused on the centre of a screen on which information was presented to the left and right side
of the visual field at the same time

• Two different words or pictures were presented – one of the left and one on the right.

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• This means that the left side of each eye would pick up one image (the one on the right) while the right
side of each eye would pick up the other image (the one on the left)

• Information on the right visual field will be passed to the left hemisphere and vice versa

• Participants would then be asked to say the word/picture they had seen on the screen

Selecting Task

• Occasionally, rather than say the word/pictures, the participants would be asked to point to an item or
picture

• They would be shown a variety of objects or pictures including the one they had just been shown

• They would then identify what they had seen using either the same hand or the hand on the opposite side
of the body

Unseen objects to be identified

• Other variations included putting unseen objects into one of the hands and asking them to identify them
from touch alone, and placing different objects in each hand and then asking them to feel for them in a
large pile of different objects

• Results for the tasks involving reading words or selecting objects were seen to be different;

• When words were shown to the right visual field, the patients had no problem repeating the word
back to the researcher

• However when words were shown the left visual field (sent to the right hemisphere), patients had
trouble saying what they had seen

• If a word or picture was shown to the left visual filed (right hemisphere), the participants had little
trouble selecting an object that matched what they had seen. When the word or picture was shown
to the right visual field (left hemisphere) they participants struggled to point to the correct object

• Similar results were found for objects presented to each hand:

• When objects were felt by the right hand (processed in the left hemisphere), they could name the
object. When objects were felt by the left hand (processed in the right hemisphere) they found it
difficult to name the object

• When two different objects were given to the participant – one in each hand – and after they were
asked to feel around in a pile of objects for the two objects, they could only identify each item
with the hand that originally held it. If the opposite hand picked up the item, they could not
identify it as the item they had held before

• Each hemisphere is capable of working well without being connected to the other side

• Each hemisphere has its own memories and without the corpus callosum these cannot be shared between
sides

• This can cause some problems

• Left hemisphere is better at naming items as we have language centres here

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 • Right hemisphere is better at identifying objects by feeling for them (feel with left hand if originally held in
left hand) as we have motor movement centres here

Strengths Weaknesses

• Lots of data has been produced supporting • Turks (2002) had a patient that learnt to speak
the roles of each using the right hemisphere after having a split
brain. This finding contradicts Sperry.
• Sperry’s experiment was ground breaking
and scientific
• Only 11 participants – lack of generalisability

• Lab experiment and standardised

procedures – reliability • Difficult to replicate as there are not many
split brain patients nowadays.

• Lab study – artificial, lacks ecological validity

Issues and Debates:

How psychology has changed over time

Introduction

• Psychology is defined as ‘the scientific study of the human mind and its functions, especially those
affecting behaviour in a given context’

• Psychology has been going over 200 years

• Started philosophical but now is very scientific

How has the study of psychology changed over time?

• Psychology was born in 1975 in Germany when Wundt (German researcher) opened the first laboratory for
psychology

• Before this, people has not considered what happened in our heads

• Phineas Gage’s case encouraged doctors to investigate how the brain influences our behaviour

• In these times we could only really study the brain after someone had died and we could remove the brain

• In 1924 Berger developed the EEG brain scan which helped us to measure brain activity in people who are
alive

• Start of ways to study the brain that didn’t rely on someone being dead

• Opened psychology up much wider

• Electrodes are placed onto the scalp and they measure activity

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 • This tells us which parts of the brain work during which activities

• This then led to more modern forms of brain scanning such as MRI and PET scans that give us more detailed
information about how the brain words

• This provides us with an opportunity to help people living with brain damage

• If we can see where the damage is and understand how that area is working or not working then help can
be given

• High powered microscopes to look at how individual synapses work are now used too

• Theories can therefore be developed about exactly which parts of the brain control what kinds of behaviour

• We can look at specific parts individually

• People with risk-taking tendencies often have high levels of dopamine in their nervous system and we can
see this with these scans

• New research is now developing even more

The Brain and Neuropsychology Assessment Material

Structure and Function of the Brain

Kunal has damaged his cerebellum in a cycling accident. How might Kunal’s behaviour be different to before
the accident?

(2 marks)

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Kunal has been for a brain scan and the doctor tells him that he has damaged his frontal lobe. What functions
is the frontal lobe responsible for?

(4 marks)

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Lateralisation

Kunal has damaged his left hemisphere. What tasks might Kunal struggle with?

(2 marks)

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Neurons and Synapses

Kunal takes some drugs. He feels happy and relaxed at first but later feels terrible. How could his central
nervous system have been affected by the drugs?

(4 marks)

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Neurological Damage

Kunal has visual agnosia. How might the condition affect Kunal?

(2 marks)

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Kunal has damaged his pre-frontal cortex in a motorbike accident. How might the damage affect Kunal?

(2 marks)

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Topic 5: SOCIAL INFLUENCE

Bystander Intervention

• Bystander effect/Bystander apathy: Failing to help a person when they are in need.
• In 1964 a young woman called Kitty Genovese was brutally murdered outside of her New York apartment.
Although there were many witnesses to this event, no one stepped in to help.
• Psychologists, Bibb Latané and John Darley called this The Bystander Effect, where people are reluctant to
help because they believe others will help instead.

Situational factors:
➢ Diffusion of responsibility: when several people watch an incident like the Kitty Genovese murder, they
seem to reason that somebody else can, should, and probably will offer assistance. This could explain why
people are generally more likely to help when they are the only person available to offer assistance.

➢ Noticing the event: in large crowds we are less likely to pay attention to what is going on around us so less
likely to notice an emergency.

➢ Pluralistic ignorance: we often look to others and react based on what other people are doing. If other
people are not helping then maybe it’s not an emergency.

➢ Cost of helping: Psychologists argue that when it comes to deciding whether to help or not, we tend to
weigh the costs (for example, humiliation, pain, financial loss) against the benefits (for example, financial
reward, esteem, affection, avoidance of failure or humiliation). We are more likely to help when we feel
that the benefits of helping outweigh the potential costs.
 
Personal factors:
➢ Competence: if we feel competent (e.g. first aid training) to help, then we are more likely to help.

➢ Mood: people are more likely to help when in a good mood.

➢ Similarity: if we see ourselves as similar to the person in need, we are more likely to help them.

Piliavin et al (1969) Good Samaritanism: Key Study

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 • Piliavin et al conducted a field experiment to investigate bystander behaviour

• They were particularly interested in the variables that affect whether people help someone in need

• Their study came from the knowledge of the case study of Kitty Genovese – she was brutally murdered and
despite people hearing her screams, no one came to help.

• Piliavin wanted to investigate why people fail to be good Samaritans

The aim of this study was to conduct a field experiment to investigate the effect of several different variables on
who responded to help, the speed of responding and the likelihood of responding. The main focus of the research
was to investigate the effect of the type of victim (drunk or ill) and the ethnicity of victim (black or white) on
the speed and frequency of the response and the ethnicity of the responder.

The emergencies were staged in the short 7.5 min journey between two stations on the New York
subway (underground). These were trains that did not stop at the stations in between. On each trial four
researchers (two males and two females) entered the train. Four different research teams gathered data from 103
trails. The procedure was always the same: The female confederates took seats and kept notes as unobtrusively as
possible, while the male “victim” and male model (potential “helper”) stood near a pole in the centre of the train.
The four victims were male, three white and one black, aged between 26 and 35 years, all identically casually
dressed. In 38 trials the victim smelled of alcohol and carried alcohol in a brown bag; in 65 trials he appeared sober
and carried a cane. All victims participated in both conditions. The models were all white and aged between 24
and 29.
After passing the first station (approximately 70 secs) the victim collapsed. In the “no help” condition, the model
did nothing until the train slowed to stop, and then helped the victim to his feet. In the “helping” condition, the
helper came to the victim’s assistance.
There were four different helping conditions used in both “drunk” and “cane” situations:
1. Critical area – early. The model stood in the critical area and waited until after the train passed the fourth
station, and then helped the victim. (Approx. 70 secs after collapse.)
2. Critical area – late. The model stood in the critical area and waited until after the train passed the sixth station
before helping the victim. (Approx. 150 secs after collapse.)
3. Adjacent area – early. The model stood a little further way, adjacent to the critical area and waited until after
the train passed the fourth station, and then helped the victim
4. Adjacent area – late. The model stood in the adjacent area and waited until after the sixth station before
helping.

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In summary, an individual who appears ill is more likely to receive help than someone who seems drunk. With
mixed groups of men and women, men are more likely than women to help a male victim. People are more likely to
help people of the same race especially if they are drunk. There is no strong link between the number of
bystanders and speed of helping in a visible incident. When escape from a situation is not possible and bystanders
are face-to-face with a victim, help is likely. People carry out a cost-reward analysis before deciding whether or
not to help a victim.

Research Method: The field experiments were not subject to demand characteristics, as the travellers on the
underground train did not know they were part of an experiment. Several different experimental conditions that
added to the validity of the findings.
Reliability: Because of methodological problems, there were more cane trials than drunk trials and more white
victims than black victims. Therefore the results from each group’s trials cannot always be reliably compared with
each other. The victims and helpers were all male and the results cannot be generalised to females or a mixed
group. Further research could investigate if women are more likely to help if the victim and the helper are both
female.
Ethical Considerations: There a number of ethical issues associated with Piliavin et al.’s study. Participants were
unaware that they were taking part in an experiment, therefore they could not consent to take part and it was also
not possible to withdraw from the study or be debriefed. Furthermore, seeing a victim collapse may have been
stressful for the participants, they also may have felt guilty if they didn’t help, therefore leading to psychological
harm.

Conformity

Conformity is matching the behaviour and beliefs of others in order to fit in or because we do not know how to
behave in an unusual situation.
Types of Conformity:
● Compliance: a change in behaviour without a change in opinion (going along with the group).
● Internalisation: a change in behaviour and opinion. 'True Conformity'.
● Identification: adopting the group's views because value group membership. Often temporary.

Explanations for Conformity:

● Normative social influence: want to be liked

● Informational social influence: want to be right

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Situational factors affecting conformity:

● Group size: conformity increases with group size up to 3 persons in the group, and then levels off
● Unanimity of the majority: the presence of a single confederate who disagrees with the majority reduces
conformity
● Task difficulty/ambiguity: if the task is more difficult then we are more likely to look to others for the
right answer and therefore conformity increases when the task is harder

Personality factors affecting conformity:

● Locus of control: a person with an internal locus of control is less likely to be influenced by others around
them and therefore less likely to conform as they feel responsible for their actions.

Asch’s conformity study

Aim: Solomon Asch conducted an experiment to investigate the extent to which social pressure from a majority
group could affect a person to conform.

Procedure: in a laboratory experiment Asch put a naive participant in a room with seven
confederates. The confederates had agreed in advance what their responses would be
when presented with the line task. The real participant did not know this and was led to
believe that the other seven participants were also real participants like themselves. Each
person in the room had to state aloud which comparison line (A, B or C) was most like the
target line. The answer was always obvious. The real participant sat at the end of the row
and gave his or her answer last. In some trials, the seven confederates gave the wrong
answer.

Results: Asch measured the number of times each participant conformed to the majority view. On average, about
one third (32%) of the participants in each trial went along and conformed to the clearly incorrect majority. Three
quarters of the participants (75%) conformed on at least one trial.

Conclusion: Why did the participants conform so readily? When they were interviewed after the experiment, most
of them said that they did not really believe their conforming answers, but had gone along with the group for fear
of being ridiculed or thought "peculiar". A few of them said that they really did believe the group's answers were
correct.

Haney, Banks and Zimbardo (1973) A Study of Prisoners and Guards in a Simulated Prison:
Key Study

To investigate prisoner-guard conflict in a simulated prison environment.

21 male psychology students. Paid $15 per day. They were randomly allocated to two groups: prisoners and prison
guards.

The prisoners were arrested at home (unexpectedly) and taken to the university.
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They were stripped, deloused and given a prison uniform and prisoner number. From now on they were referred to
by number, not by name. They were to spend 23 hours a day locked in their cells for two weeks.

The prison guards were given uniforms, including sticks and mirrored sunglasses. They worked shifts and went home
at the end of their shift.

The experiment was called off after only 6 days. The guards had become so brutal to the prisoners that two
prisoners had some form of nervous breakdown, one developed a nervous rash all over his body and one went on
hunger strike!! While the guards were giving their orders, the prisoners became apathetic. They did not stand up to
the guards and simply did as they were told, even though it caused them distress.

One explanation for why the participants’ reactions were so extreme in this study could be that they conformed to
social roles. A role is a part you play during your life. Each role requires different behaviour. If you are given a new
role, e.g. when you start a new job, you change your behaviour to suit. In Zimbardo's study, the students were
given new roles - prisoner or guard - and simply conformed to the behaviour of these roles.

● However, there is considerable evidence that the participants did react to the situation as though it was
real. For example 90% of the prisoners’ private conversations, which were monitored by the
researchers, were on the prison conditions, and only 10% of the time were their conversations about
life outside of the prison. The guards, too, rarely exchanged personal information during their
relaxation breaks - they either talked about ‘problem prisoners’, other prison topics, or did not talk at
all. The guards were always on time and even worked overtime for no extra pay. When the prisoners
were introduced to a priest, they referred to themselves by their prison number, rather than their first
name. Some even asked him to get a lawyer to help get them out.
● The only deception involved was to do with the arrest of the prisoners at the beginning of the
experiment. The prisoners were not told partly because final approval from the police wasn’t given
until minutes before the participants decided to participate, and partly because the researchers
wanted the arrests to come as a surprise. However this was a breach of the ethics of Zimbardo’s own
contract that all of the participants had signed.
● When Zimbardo realised just how much the prisoners disliked the experience, which was unexpected,
the experiment was abandoned.
● Approval for the study was given from the Office of Naval Research, the
Psychology Department and the University Committee of Human Experimentation. This
Committee also did not anticipate the prisoners’ extreme reactions that were to follow.
● Alternative methodologies were looked at which would cause less distress to
the participants but at the same time give the desired information, but nothing suitable
could be found.
● Extensive group and individual debriefing sessions were held and all
participants returned post-experimental questionnaires several weeks, then several months
later, then at yearly intervals
● Zimbardo also strongly argues that the benefits gained about our
understanding of human behaviour and how we can improve society should out balance the
distress caused by the study.

Obedience

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Obedience is a form of social influence, e.g. when a person obeys instructions from someone else, usually a
perceived authority figure. We are socialised to obey, obedience prevents accidents and creates an orderly society,
without obedience there would be challenges to social order resulting in chaos and war.

Milgram’s electric shock study (1963)

Aim: test the levels of obedience that ppts would reach when told to give
electric shocks. (Germans are different hypothesis)

Method: Laboratory expt. at Yale University

Participants: 40 male volunteers each paid for their service.

Procedure: confederate was ‘learner’ in a supposed memory test, Ppt was

‘teacher’ who was told to give electric shocks of increasing severity as learner
kept making mistakes, ppt faced a shock generator and thought they were giving real electric shocks. Verbal
prods given to continue.

Results: 100% ppts gave 300v, 65% ppt gave the highest 450v, many ppts showed distress.

Conclusion: Volunteers were willing to shock another person simply because they were told to by someone in
authority even when uncomfortable about doing so.

Situational variables affecting obedience:

After Milgram conducted his first study on obedience, he carried out a large number of variations in order to
consider the situational variables that might create greater or lesser obedience.

▪ Proximity of the authority figure: When the authority figure was not in the room and instead gave
instructions by telephone, obedience fell to 20.5%.
▪ Proximity of the victim: In the proximity variation, they were in the same room and obedience rate
dropped from 65% to 40%.
▪ Location (legitimacy of the context): Milgram conducted a variation in a run-down building rather than
the prestigious university setting where it was originally conducted (Yale University). Obedience levels fell
to 47.5%.
▪ Uniform: The role of the experimenter was taken over by an ‘ordinary member of the public’ (a
confederate) in everyday clothes rather than a lab coat. The obedience level dropped to 20%, the lowest of
the variations.
▪ Personal responsibility: when the participant was instructed to work with another person who gave the
shock obedience rose to 90%.
▪ Support of others: When a confederate refused to continue above 150v only 10% of the participants
continued to 450v.

Personality variables affecting obedience:

● Locus of control: People who disobey will be more likely to have an internal locus of control
● Authoritarian personality: someone who has respect for authority figures, rigid beliefs, right-wing and is
aggressive is more likely to follow orders. This authoritarian personality type can be measured using the
F-Scale as developed by Adorno.

Crowd Behaviour

Prosocial behaviour is helpful, kind, co-operative and peaceful. E.g. concerts

Antisocial behaviour is unhelpful, destructive and aggressive. E.g. riots

Crowd behaviour can be understood in terms of deindividuation as members lose their personal identity among
others. Each member of the crowd is more likely to conform to the behaviour of the majority.

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Within a crowd, an authority figure can exert an influence over others causing high levels of obedience.

Preventing blind obedience

What is blind obedience?

In society, we learn to conform and be obedient to authority figures from a young age. This obedience may cause
moral strain, however many people will still commit to their orders and carry them out even if it goes against their
moral code. People carry out the orders blindly and without thinking. Milgram argued that people enter the agentic
state when you think that an authority figure is legitimate and will take responsibility for your actions

How can you prevent blind obedience?

➢ Social support – the presence of a dissenting ally lowers levels of obedience as shown by Asch and
Milgram’s studies.

➢ Familiarity of the situation – the more ambiguous the situation the more obedience.

➢ Distance- proximity of authority figure is important so removal from the situation leads to less obedience.

➢ Education – organisations can use education programmes and policies to help support employees.

Issues and debates

Social and cultural issues in psychology

Society: a group of people in a community

A social issue is a problem that influences a considerable number of the individuals within a society e.g.
anti-Semitism and rioting.
 
● Obedience - helps us understand the Holocaust
● Conformity - helps us understand riots
● Deindividuation -helps us understand riots because people in large groups are more likely to be
deindividuated
● Bystander effect - Helps us understand the murder of Kitty Genovese

Culture: refers to a set of beliefs, practices and traditions held by a large group of people. The greatest division
between beliefs and traditions are held by:

Individualistic cultures: typically western, emphasising independence, autonomy and individuality.

Collectivistic cultures: typically eastern, emphasising group membership, interdependence and cooperation.

● Obedience - Milgram's obedience studies were all on Americans. America is a Western culture which
values individualism particularly highly; it is also a democratic culture with relatively
little deference (although American culture in the 1960s was more deferential than it is today). Because of
this, we might expect obedience levels to be higher in many other cultures, but perhaps lower in cultures
even less deferential and even more individualistic than the USA.
● Conformity rates are generally higher in collectivist cultures.
● Deindividuation occurs across all cultures equally.
● Collectivistic cultures are more likely to help someone in need if they are a member of their group.

Social Influence Assessment Material

Key terms:

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Elizabeth is watching football when she is told by her father to wash the dishes. She immediately does as her
father has instructed her to. Is Elizabeth conforming or showing obedience?

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Bystander intervention

There is a car accident outside a small office block with 32 employees inside. The employees in the office all
witness the car accident but none of them go outside to help the injured driver or passengers. Why might the
employees have remained inside?

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Conformity

Michael is in the local shopping centre with six of his friends and they begin to shout at a passer-by in the
shopping centre. Michael joins in with the shouting, but later he feels upset at what he did. Why might Michael
have joined in with the others and feel upset?

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Obedience

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Michael is told by his teacher to tidy the stationery cupboard at lunch time. Michael has homework and
revision for a test that he wanted to do at lunch time, but instead he tidies the teacher’s stationery cupboard.
Why might Michael have tidied the stationery cupboard instead of doing his own work?

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Ways to prevent blind obedience

Michael is at home and his mother has told him to tidy his room. Michael does not want to tidy his room today
as he has homework to complete. His mother states that he must tidy his room and Michael refuses, stating
that it is his choice and he is going to do his homework first. Can you explain why Michael reacted in this way?

(2 marks)

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Crowd Behaviour: Deindividuation

Michael and Oscar attend a football match between Michael’s favourite team and Oscar’s favourite team. Both
boys are dressed in their team football shirts. Michael and Oscar do not sit together at the match; they sit with
the groups of fans for their own team on different sides of the stadium. Both boys shout negative comments at
the fans of the opposing team during the football game. After it is over, they return home and continue to be
friends. Why might the boys behave in this way at the football match?

(4 marks)

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Topic 6: CRIMINAL PSYCHOLOGY

• Learning theories can explain behaviour as a result of the experiences that we have
• Like any other behaviour that we learn, criminal behaviour can be learned in the same way
• If we behave well in school we may be rewarded for our behaviour and then continue to act like this
• Similarly, criminal behaviour can be a result of being rewarded or can come from modelling the behaviour
from others that we see

Operant Conditioning
• Skinner 1948 developed a theory of learning called operant conditioning
• He believed that behaviours we display are likely to be repeated if they are reinforced, or extinguished and
not repeated again if we are punished
• There are two types of reinforcement – positive and negative – the consequences of which encourage us to
repeat a behaviour we have displayed
• There is also punishment (prevents undesired behaviour)

Positive Reinforcement
• We receive a pleasurable or rewarding consequence for our behaviour
• If this happens then we are more likely to perform this behaviour again
• Criminal behaviour: if someone receives praise from their family for fighting or for vandalising something
then they are likely to commit this crime again
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Negative Reinforcement
• When a behaviour we display is strengthened by the avoidance of an unpleasant experience
• We are likely to repeat a behaviour if it gets rid of something unpleasant
• E.g. doing your homework to avoid a detention
• Criminal behaviour: if someone is able to stop a bully by punching them they are likely to perform this
behaviour again

Positive Punishment
• Receiving a negative consequence for a behaviour, such as a child being told off by a parent for not keeping
their bedroom tidy
• This is often the way that we treat criminal behaviour
• If someone does a criminal act and is fined or imprisoned they are being positively punished (getting
something - getting attention)

Negative Punishment
• Taking away something pleasant as a consequence of undesirable behaviour
• Removing a child from a birthday party if they are being naughty
• Criminal: person may enjoy being part of a gang, the gang may start to vandalise public property but
because the person does not want to join in they are told to leave the gang
• Undesired behaviour of not vandalising property is punished

Primary Reinforcers
• These satisfy basic biological needs such as food and water
• Parent may reward a child with food treats for behaving well
• Most criminals won’t commit crime for a primary reinforcer but some who are in extreme poverty will
commit a crime so they can get a bed, food and a roof over their head in prison

Secondary Reinforcers
• Common such as school grades and tokens
• No survival value but we have learned to associate them with a primary reinforcer
• Credit card: the car itself has no value but it can be used to buy goods which are rewarding or can satisfy a
need such as hunger if the card is stolen

Social Learning Theory

• It explains that we learn from one another, rather than directly from reinforcement or punishment
• Bandura 1977 explains behaviour as a consequence of observing and modelling behaviour around us
• This is known as observational learning
• We don’t just copy, we are motivated to copy
• We copy role models

• Attention
– You must be able to and want to pay attention to the behaviour
• Retention
– You need to retain and remember the behaviour
• Reproduction
– You need to reproduce it, e.g. backflip
• Motivation
– Have to want to reproduce it e.g. get pleasure out of doing it
– Vicarious reinforcement
• Identification
– Most likely to happen with someone you identify with

Strengths and weaknesses of this theory

• Evidence to support the theory

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 • Look up the Bobo doll study
• Explains behaviour without reinforcers
• Explains why some who see crimes, copy and why some don’t – how?
• Studies to support are lab studies and some only measure short-term effects
• Were the studies ethical?
• Can we apply the findings to real life?
• Doesn’t explain murder? Have all murderers seen a murder?

Biological Explanation for Criminal Behaviour

• Biological explanations of criminality do not take learning experiences into account

• They explain criminality as a result of our brain, nervous system, genes and hormones instead
• Early theories believed that criminals had certain body types and facial characteristics
• Generally these theories are not followed any more
• Can you think why?
• There are still explanations for criminal behaviour that examine whether crime runs in the family though
• Studies have found that criminality runs in the family
• But upbringing and social situations may explain criminal behaviour more as you’ve based your behaviour on
your criminal parents (social learning)
• Biological explanations however have said that there is a genetic trait
• Twin studies have found that identical (monozygotic) twins are more likely to both be criminals than
non-identical (dizygotic) twins
• Identical twins have identical genes
• Christiansen (1977) found that 35% of identical male twins in Denmark were both criminals compared to
only 13% of non-identical male twins
• For female twins 21% identical and 8% non-identical for criminal behaviour
• HOWEVER
twins are more likely to be raised in a more similar way (non-identical twins can be different sex)
• So this could explain their similar behaviour instead of their identical genes
• A way to rule out the environment to see if genes really do play a role is to test identical twins who have
been separated at birth
• This can obviously be difficult so there are alternatives…
• Hutchings and Mednick 1975 found that 21% of adopted children who went on to commit a crime had a
biological father who was convicted of a crime
• This was compared to 10% of children whose biological father was not convicted of criminal offence but the
adoptive father had a criminal record

Personality Theory
• Personality: set of characteristics that determine what we are like
• Some personality theories believe that our personality is a temperament (the nature someone is born with)
which has a biological basis
• These theories can explain how some personalities are associated with being a criminal
• Eysenck 1964: studied different personality traits and suggested that certain characteristics could be more
prone to crime

Extraversion/introversion
• Extraversion is really outgoing and sociable, introversion is reverted and quiet
Neuroticism
• Nervous disposition of someone, if they are stable then they are calm and do not over-react in situations, if
unstable they are highly emotional
Psychoticism:
• This is a personality trait that shows a lack of empathy towards others

• Each trait can be measured using a questionnaire that Eysenck devised called the Eysenck Personality
Questionnaire (EPQ)
• Each question measures all three traits and gives them a PEN score (psychotic, extravert, neurotic)
• People with a high E on the EPQ are believed to have a nervous system that has a low arousal level so they
seek external stimulation to raise their biological arousal level
• They do this by being outgoing and sensation-seeking
• People with a low E are characterised by high arousal so they avoid thrill and excitement in order to
dampen their biological arousal level
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 • Unstable neurotics have a high N and are believed to have a nervous system that responds quickly to stress
and they over-react
• People with a low N have unreactive nervous system meaning they are calm in stressful situations
• Eysenck was less clear about the biological basis for psychoticism but he did believe that it was also linked
to our biological make-up
• A high P means that a person is cold, lacks compassion and can be antisocial

Strengths and Weaknesses

• Evidence of personality traits and criminal behaviour
• Farrington 1982 reviewed lots of studies and found that there was a relationship between high P and N
scores and criminal behaviour but no relationship for E scores (some support)
• Holism: Eysenck’s theory is not reductionist – it comes biology and psychological and social traits to
understand criminal behaviour
• Assumes personality is fixed
• Is it more about social conditions?
• Self-report questionnaires used: what’s wrong with how we answered the PEN

Recidivism

• This is the rate that criminals reoffend

• So an offender who has already been caught and punished and then goes on to commit another crime
• This person would be known as a recidivist

Prison
• Offenders can be punished in different ways
• For serious crimes, people will be imprisoned
• They will be denied of civil liberties such as freedom, privileges for a time determined by the court
• The period is decided by the seriousness of the crime
• The more serious the crime, the longer the sentence
• Prison is said to be effective because it is based on the principles of operant conditioning
• Operant conditioning: positive punishment is given to an offender that should prevent them from
reoffending
• Prison acts as a deterrent for potential offenders so is a form of negative reinforcement: people will avoid
prison by abiding by the law
• Some may commit a crime to be put in prison because they find stability, routine, friendship, food and
water (positive reinforcement)

Strengths Weaknesses

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 • Removes the offender from public so they don’t • Can still offend after
have the opportunity to reoffend • 25% of offenders reoffend within the first year
• Keeps the public safe – reassuring of release (young people more likely) – so does
• Operant conditioning says that a crime should prison work?
not happen again • Criminals are exposed to more criminal role
models – social learning
• Criminal record means they can’t get a job
after so may turn to crime again for financial
support etc
• Is it ethical? Putting all people in a confined
space

Community Sentencing
• When you are convicted of a crime and have to do a community service rather than go to prison
• Common for minor offences, first time offenders, or if prison is not appropriate
• Voluntary work or unpaid work in the community such as litter picking
• Offender may be given a curfew, be restricted from certain areas and have to report to a community
manager
• They may be sent to prison if they don’t follow these orders

Strengths Weaknesses

• Given a second change • Soft option

• Prevents prison where they could be at more • Recidivism is 30% so it’s not entirely effective
risk of becoming a worse criminal (less so than prison appears to be)
• Less likely to offend if they are not exposed to • Not locked away from society so can reoffend
criminals during and after the punishment
• More suitable than imprisonment • 10% fail to complete their community
• Negative reinforcement means they have sentencing
avoided prison so they may be happy about this
and not reoffend

Restorative Justice
• Practice that involves an offender meeting up or communicating with the victim or people they have
harmed by their crime
• So a burglar would meet the residents from whom they have stolen
• This can help the offender to see the impact of their crime first hand
• Conducted in an informal and neutral environment where they all feel safe

Strengths Weaknesses

• High victim satisfaction rate of around 85% - • RJ is voluntary of the criminal

makes them feel empowered and gives them • RJ may not lead to restoring the individual and
closure reduce crime rates – they may have already
• Beneficial for victim (not always for recidivism been contemplating a crimeless life
though) • Can cause extreme distress to both parties
• Not a form of punishment but still a 14% • Time consuming and costly
reduction on recidivism
• The cost is lower than dealing with reoffending

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 Treatments

Token Economy

• To reduce antisocial behaviour

• Increase prosocial behaviour
• Based on operant conditioning
• Prisoners given tokens for prosocial behaviour as a form of positive reinforcement/reward
• Once a prison has collected a certain amount they can exchange them for rewards; phone calls, television
time, visits and food privileges
• Rewards must be genuinely valued by the prisoner and the tokens should be given as soon as the prosocial
behaviour has been displayed

Strengths Weaknesses

• They control and manage behaviour (not reduce • Won’t reduce reoffending because tokens don’t
recidivism) exist in real life
• Short-term increase in prosocial behaviour • Prosocial behaviour is limited to prison only
• Hobbs and Holt (1976) introduced token • Limited rehabilitative value
economies in 3 prisons for young offenders and • Need commitment from prison staff
compared to a control prison and found that
targeted prosocial behaviours such as queuing
for dinner correctly was better in the token
prisons
• Cheap compared to counselling etc

Anger Management Programme

• Designed as a form of rehabilitation for offenders who have committed violent crimes because of their
anger
• Offenders work with a therapist in a small group
• During the treatment, offenders are encouraged to identify triggers to angry outbursts, to find ways of
coping with their feelings and to gain ability to resolve conflict situations I a better way than becoming
angry

Three stages:
• Cognitive preparation – where an offender has to reflect on their own anger: what makes them angry
• Skills acquisition: learn new skills to help control the anger, learn relaxation techniques
• Application practice: role playing anger-triggering situations so the offender can practice their skills

Strengths Weaknesses

• Offenders are only given this treatment if its • Not all crimes are violent
suitable • Offenders can abuse the programme
• Dowden, Blachette and Serin 1999 found that • Rice (1997) said that psychopaths were more
high risk offenders who received anger likely to reoffend and become more dangerous
management treatment were less likely to after this treatment because they had acquired
re-offend compared to high0risk offenders who new skills on the programme that helped them
did not undergo anger management manipulate others more effectively
• Howells 2005 did not find any improvement
other than the treated offenders having a
greater understanding of anger suggesting an
educational benefit
• Offenders have to be highly motivated

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 Bandura, Ross and Ross (1961) Transmission of Aggression through Imitation of
Aggressive Models

• Bandura, Ross and Ross were influenced by previous research that demonstrated that children could learn
incidentally through the mere observation of another
• They were interested in sex-appropriate behaviour
• Girls would be rewarded for role-playing housework and punished for rough play
• Sex appropriate behaviours would have been reinforced throughout childhood and so children would be
more likely to be in the habit of imitating the same sex

• To see if children would imitate aggression that was role-played by an observed adult
• They were specifically interested in whether the sex of the role model and sex of the child would be an
important factor in aggression of the child

• 36 girls and 36 boys aged between 37 and 69 months

• Stanford university nursery school
• Divided into 8 groups for 6 children and a control group of 24 children
• Control group did not observe a model
• 4 of the experimental groups were exposed to an aggressive model and 4 were exposed to a non-aggressive
model
• Further divided into male and female children who observed either a male or a female model
• A female experimenter brought each child individually to an experimental room where they were placed at
a table to play with paints and toys
• The role model was invited in to play with the toys in the opposite corner
• This corner contained an inflatable Bobo doll
• Experimenter left
• Model began to play with the toys
• Aggressive condition: punished and kicked the bobo doll and shouted ‘kick him’ ‘punch him’
• Model left the room
• Child was taken to a different room to play with more toys
• Child told after 2 mins not to play with the toys anymore
• Child was then taken to a different room which contained toys that they were allowed to play with such as
a Bobo doll
• They stayed here for 20 mins and their behaviour was recorded

• Children who were exposed to the aggressive role model (male or female) displayed more aggression than
the control group or the children exposed to non-aggressive role model
• Children imitate aggression
• True for physical and verbal
• They devised new ways of being aggressive too
• Boys were more likely to copy the same-sex aggressive role model physically than girls were
• But girls were just as likely as boys to imitate verbal aggression of same-sex role model

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• Children learn through observation
• Evidence for the social learning theory
• Children learn aggression from adult role models
• Child didn’t even have to know the model

Strengths Weaknesses

• High control as it was a lab study – • Children were tested in an unfamiliar

standardisation, reliable findings environment and may have guessed the aims
of the research and acted accordingly –
demand characteristics
• Researchers deliberately exposed small
children to aggression and could not predict
the long-term effects on behaviour for the
child – ethical issues

Charlton et al. 2000:

Children’s playground behaviour across five years of broadcast television: a
naturalistic study in a remote community

• St Helena is in the South Atlantic Ocean

• The island did not have access to mainland television but there were plans to introduce it in 2000
• Charlton et al were interested to see what influence television would have on the children there

• To investigate the effects of television on children’s behaviour

• The researchers were particularly interested to see whether television would cause the children to become
more aggressive

• Natural experiment because the researchers did not directly manipulate the independent variable
(introduction of television)
• Dependent variable was behaviour of the children before and after the television was introduced
• Measured in terms of prosocial and antisocial behaviour in the playground
• Researchers went there in 1994 and recorded behaviour of children four months before TV was introduced
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 • Video cameras in 2 primary schools and observed behaviour of children aged 3-8 years old over 2 weeks
• Five years later after TV was introduced they did the same again

• They made 64 comparisons, 9 of which were significant

• 5 declines in prosocial behaviour of boys and girls
• 2 increase in prosocial behaviour of boys playing alone
• 2 decreases in anti social behaviour of boys and girls
• No change in antisocial behaviour (kicking, hitting and pushing)
• Boys had a tendency to display more antisocial acts than girls and girls were more likely to show prosocial
behaviour (not significant though)
• Boys and girls displayed twice as much prosocial behaviour compared to antisocial

• Television had little influence on the behaviour of children studied

• Children were not copying the aggression that they had witnessed on TV
• Might be environmental conditions specific to the island that could explain this
• Close-knit nature of the community and high levels of adult surveillance over the children may have
explained why television had little effect on children’s behaviour

Strengths Weaknesses

• Same primary schools were used in both • Findings are limited to this community
observations – same environment – • Different locations find different things
standardisation – reliable • Williams 1981 conducted a similar study in
• Natural experiment, high ecological validity Canada and found aggression was influenced by
TV
• TV programmes watched may be different e.g.
Teenage mutant ninja turtles has a high level of
violence but was not shown here

Criminal Psychology Assessment Material

Learning Theories

Ian is given a sticker each time he tidies his room. When he does not tidy his room he is not allowed to play on
his computer game. What type of reinforcement does Ian receive? What type of punishment does Ian receive?

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Vicky is given permission to not attend a school trip to a large city because she is frightened of crowded
places. Her friend Sarah does not attend the trip either but this is without permission and Sarah receives a
detention from the head teacher. What type of reinforcement does Vicky receive by not attending? What type
of punishment does Sarah receive for not attending?

(4 marks)

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Social Learning Theories

Vicky is 12 years old. She is shopping with her 17-year-old sister Pamela when she observes Pamela taking
make-up from the shop without paying. That night, Pamela’s friends are complimenting her on how nice her
new make-up is. When Vicky is at the shops the following week, she takes make-up without paying. How would
social learning theory explain why Vicky takes this make-up without paying?

(4 marks)

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Biological explanations

Sarah has been arrested for smashing a window and breaking into a shop to steal some clothes. She tells the
police that she is not really all that bothered by her arrest and that the shop charges too much for clothes so
they deserve it. Sarah says she does not really care that there are laws that make theft a crime, then laughs as
the police officer charges her with several criminal offences. Can you describe one personality type that
Sarah’s behaviour might indicate?

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Recidivism

Mike is 19 years old and has been caught by police for drawing graffiti on the wall of the local community
centre. The centre is used by a parent and toddler group during the day and for community bingo for over 60’s
one evening a week. Mike’s family have a history of criminal and anti-social behaviours and they have said that
graffiti is not that bad and should not even be a crime. The court decides that using restorative justice may
help Mike to understand how his behaviour affects other people. Why might the court think that restorative
justice would work in Mike’s case? What other punishment could be appropriate for Mike?

(4 marks)

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Treatments

Mike is 22 years old and has received several criminal convictions. He appears in court for assaulting an
employee of a local company who Mike claimed deserved to be hit because they had refused to interview him
for a job. Mike is sentenced to 6 months’ imprisonment. How would you use a treatment programme to
prevent Mike from recidivism?

(4 marks)

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Topic 7: THE SELF

Concepts of the self

Michael Lewis
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 • Our self is what separates us from others

• Self-concept refers to our view of our view of our self that we get from how others react to us

• Lewis says the idea of self develops with age and is affected by experiences

• He separates the self into; existential self and categorical selfExistential self

• Refers to our existence

• We are all aware that we exist differently to others

• We see ourselves as a constant

• This starts at around 2 months old and it comes from interactions with the world

• E.g. a baby touches a rattle and hears a sound and so relates it own touching of the rattle to the sound

• We have control over our world and we quickly develop a schema for this

Categorical self

• A child realises that they can be categorised by; age, gender etc

• We see ourselves in these categories

• The categorical self changes as someone’s values change and develop at around 18 months old

• Cultural changes can also change how someone sees themselves

Evidence of Lewis’s concepts of self

• Lewis Brooks-Gunn (1979) used the red-nose test to study self

• Do babies reach for their own nose or the mirror?

• If they reach for their own nose they show a sense of self

• Findings 18 month old children reach for their own nose

The self and mental health

• Rogers 1959 split self-concept into 3 parts:

• self-image is how we see ourselves,

• self-esteem is how we value ourselves

• ideal self is what we think we should be like

Congruence and incongruence

• Ideal self might not match our self-image

• If what we think we should be from cultural and social views does not match how we see ourselves then this
gives a state of incongruence which impacts our mental health negatively

• Congruence: ideal self and self image match

Self-actualisation

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 • Refers to ones potential

• When the parts of the self match and a person experiences congruence there can be self-actualisation

• Self actualisation is only difficult when parts of the self don’t match or balance

• The goal is to self-actualise

The role of identity and free will

Eight stages of identity development

• Erikson built on Freud’s psychodynamic idea that we develop through stages

• Erikson 1959 focused on mental and social development and looked at our whole lifespan from birth to old
age and how we build our identity through crises

• We develop through 8 stages, each which occurs at a different age

• This is originally a biopsychosocial theory (biology, psychology and social factors all play a role)

Development through a sequence

• Erikson said that a psychological problem can occur if we do not develop through normal stages

• Importance of other people in our development is highlighted

• Each stage has opposite alternatives (e.g. trust and mistrust)

• Individuals need to resolve each crisis to successfully complete a stage

Strengths Weaknesses

- Can be applied to people throughout their - Cultures have wide differences and it doesn’t
lifespan consider other cultures (done in USA) – e.g.
- Practical applications: Goodcase and Love 2016 marriage at 13 in some cultures is normal
suggest using Erikson’s ideas about integrity and
despair with therapists working with those over
65 showing that older people are skill

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 developing and can benefit from examining - Gilligan 1982 criticised Erikson’s theory for
their own beliefs using gender stereotypes such as intimacy or
isolation being about women more than men

The consequence of belief in free will

• Baumesiter 2008 looks at free will which is about self-control and making rational choices

• Difference views about free will;

• If things happen because of our biology or our environment it is hard to say we are free in our
decisions – deterministic

• Jean Paul Sarte claimed that there is always a choice about an action

• Kant felt that freedom was about morality and sound reasoning but that only some actions are
decided on in this way. Free will is about reasoned choices

• Baumeister said that psychology must look at free will

• It can be studied scientifically

• Self-control and making choices is biologically expensive – it can deplete our resources by using up a lot of
glucose in our brain

• E.g. it was found that after blood glucose depletion, drinking lemonade with sugar improve people’s
self-control on tasks

• A belief in free will explains our justice system: if nobody is responsible for their behaviour then how can
we punish people. Our justice system believes in free will

• Belief in free will improves prosocial behaviour: can help with self control. People feel empowered

• A belief in free will improves control over emotions and impulses: rational decisions

• A belief in free will helps someone to learn from the challenges they encounter: can be reflective on any
guilt or problems associated with negative event

Strengths and weaknesses of Baumeister’s 2008 view

Strengths Weaknesses

- Focus on everyday understanding of what it - When free will is tested it becomes specific to
meanst to act from free will decision making tasks rather than wide spread –
can we generalise these findings
- Baumeister and Munroe 2014 suggested that - There are other explanations for what we might
once social psychology can measure free will in see as free will. Elbert and Wegnet 2011 carried
terms of making choices and decisions, out an experiment to see if randomness could
scientific experiments can be carried out to be mistaken for free will and found that it
advance understanding of free will – Vohr and could
Schooler 2008 did this experiment

Humanistic Explanation

• Looks at humans and the individuals own experiences and interpretation about what is going on

• What does each person class as important

• People have free will and they can change it

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 • People are inherently good with an inbuilt need to make things better

• Optimistic approach

• Self actualisation is the goal

Rogers’ humanistic theory: the development of self and self-esteem

• Humans are good by nature and all individuals naturally aim for personal growth

• To be the best we can be we must have a positive sense of self-concept and be in a state of congruence to
enable self-actualisation

Unconditional and conditional positive regard

• Rogers aimed to help individuals raise their self-worth and self-esteem

• Unconditional positive regard: need this from others, valuing someone for who they are with no conditions
attached, improves self-esteem and self-image. Can make mistakes and still be valued

• Conditional positive regard: being valued but only according to certain conditions, which lowers someone’s
overall self-esteem. Some parents might love a child only if they behave

Strengths Weaknesses

- Positive and focuses on the individual - Concepts are hard to measure

- Practical application where counsellors can use - Unscientific
the evidence to help their approach - Only suits certain situations
- Eyssen et al 2013 found client centred therapy
did not help those with multiple sclerosis
compared to occupational therapy

Hierarchy of needs

• Maslow’s explanation of personality includes biological aspects as they look at people as whole individuals

• Humanistic theory

• Maslow’s point is that underlying needs generally have to be met before the next need can be achieved

• First 4 needs ‘deficiency’ needs: if they are not met the person can be anxious and tense

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Strengths and weaknesses of Maslow’s humanistic theory

Strengths Weaknesses

- Positive psychology: people are good and can - Focuses on Western culture: generalisation
reach their full potential - Concepts are not measurable
- Claims humans are basically good but Van
Ijzendoorn et al 2019 found 7 year old
children did not show moral behaviour
because of inborn temperament but it was
situation that led to their donating to charity
or not

Internal and External Influence

Internal: Temperament
• Temperament is a biological aspect of a person
• It is different for each person and relates to emotions and controlling oneself
• Temperament can affect self-concept
• Someone with low self-esteem who has a shy temperament may become depressed

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 • Heinonen 2002 found that children judged by their mothers to have difficult temperaments at 12 years old
reported that they had low self-esteem at the age of 18
• Temperament types; effortful control (tendency to be negative)

Internal: Effortful control

• Links to self-regulation
• Means making decisions about what to attend and what to prioritise
• Paying attention in class when there are distractions
• A child who can self-regulate does better in their life because they can interact well with other
• High self-esteem might go with a temperament that includes self-regulation
• Robins 2010 showed that young adolescents who had high self-esteem also had high levels of effortful
control

Internal: Negative emotions

• Robins 2010 found that another aspect of temperament is a tendency to have negative feelings – more likely
to suffer from anxiety, giving them low self-esteem

Internal: Persistence
• Windle 1986 found that persistence goes well with high self-esteem
• If someone is persistent and determined to do something, they are more likely to have high self esteem

External: Experience
• Self-efficacy is how strongly we believe we can succeed
• Can be related to one goal
• Can depend on others reactions to us
• Comes from experiences and interactions with the world

External: Self-image
• Argyle 2008: influence on our self esteem comes from reactions of others
• Positive self esteem comes from praise and attention, negative comes from criticism
• Self image will be negative if we compare to others
• Experiences in the world give us an understanding of what is acceptable in our society including how we see
different social roles etc

External: Perception of others

• How others perceive us affects our self esteem
• If someone unexpectedly does well in a maths test then they are seen as good at maths from then on – this
affects their self-image in a positive way
• Bajaj 2008 said the effects of the London bombings of 2005 on the young Asian men in London could be
negative for how people perceive these people

How personality can be measured

Personality scales

• Hard to compare descriptions of personality but we can compare scores

• We can use scales to measure personality and then score them

• Scales such as ‘meanness’ can be given a number

• Questions or statements which are answered using a scoring system

• Personality tests involve questions or statements, called ‘items’

• Scales can include dimensions which people judge themselves against

• For example, ‘on a scale of happy-sad where happy is 10 and sad is 1, what score would you give yourself?’

• Items on a personality test often focus on the ‘Big Five’ dimensions; openness, conscientiousness,
extraversion, agreeableness and neuroticism
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 • Participants may get a likert scale e.g. ‘rate how you feel from 1-5’.

Avoiding Response Bias

Reverse the order of the wording Quality control question

For example, if the questions are mainly worded like You can insert a ‘quality control question’ in the middle
this; of the questionnaire that reads;
‘I tend to always be grumpy’ ‘This is a quality control question, please
1 = strongly agree, 2 = agree, 3 = neutral, 4 = disagree, select number 5’
5 = strongly disagree
And most of the participants answers are ‘1 = strongly
agree’, they may become lazy and stop reading the
question as they know they are just probably going to
be a ‘1’ on all answers.
To ensure we can tell whether the participants are
reading all the question, the next question might be
worded like this;
‘I tend to rarely be moody’
1 = strongly agree, 2 = agree, 3 = neutral, 4 = disagree,
5 = strongly disagree

Personality types

• A theory of personality can be a type or trait theory

• Type: someone’s personality is fitting into a category such as introvert or extravert

• Trait: personality having characteristics on a continuum such as a scale of extraversion

Myers-Briggs Type Indicator

• Myers and Briggs (1956) based their test of personality on Jung’s idea that we experience the world in
different ways

• Jung said there are 8 personality types made up of; extraversion, introversion, sensing, intuition, thinking
and feeling

• Myers and Briggs added ‘judging’ and ‘perceiving’

• They used this and came up with 4 ways that people experience the world:

• extravert (E) or introvert (I)

• sensing (S) or intuition (N)

• thinking (T) or feeling (F)

• judging (J) or perceiving (P).

• This helped couples recognise their differences and work on them to smooth their path

The use of trait theory as a measure of personality

Trait theory

• Trait theory is about the measurement of personality traits which can be broad

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 • There are lots of personality traits

• But they are all categorised (e.g. introvert covers shy etc)

• Trait theory says that there is a continuum in personality, underline

the difference between traits and types

• To what extent are you this way?

Factor analysis

• Forms underlying characteristics that predict behaviour from the outward characteristics that people show

• E.g. if someone enjoys parties, is interested in people and seeks out activities where there is danger, factor
analysis will show that these outward characteristics often go together in people – so they may be labelled
as an extravert

• Factor analysis is a statistical technique

Cardinal, central and secondary personality traits

• Allport (1936) came up with the first trait theory

• He classified traits into three levels which he called cardinal, central and secondary

• Cardinal traits: rare traits that govern us strongly, dominate someone’s life, extreme altruism for
example (helping someone at great risk to oneself)

• Central traits: less strong and more common; include loyalty and friendliness

• Secondary traits: do not always show but still have, such as being angry when we are made late for
something

16PF personality factor assessment

• Cattell 1946 aimed to reduce Allport’s list of around 4000 traits to something that would be easier to use to
measure personality

• Some of Allport’s words were similar to others but some were different

• 171 traits were left

• Cattell still wanted to measure personality in a more useful way

• Instead of 171 traits he suggested someone’s personality could be summarised more usefully by showing
how far they displayed certain traits

• To measure personality Cattell looked at:

• Life data that covered someone’s everyday behaviours

• Data from experiments to assess people’s reactions to standardised situations

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 • Data from questionnaires to get people’s self-ratings about their behaviour and feelings

• Cattell then used factor analysis on his data to see which traits went together to he could reduce the 171
list

• The 16 dimensions of the 16PF measure personality using continuums

Strengths and weaknesses of trait theory as a measure of personality

Strengths Weaknesses

- Observable traits used which means we can - Hard to predict behaviour from their traits as
measure them they might behave differently in different
- Self-rating scale meant no interpretation from situations
someone else - People have to be self-aware to rate themselves
- Different theories have come up with similar
traits – reliability

Vohs and Schooler 2008

The value of believing in Free WIll

• They wanted to see if encouraging a belief in determinism would encourage cheating

• They wanted to see if someone in control of their actions, but believing all behaviour is determined, would
use that control to be less moral rather than having ‘normal’ self-control and behaving morally

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● The experimental group read about Francis Crick’s claim, in 1994, that we have no free will and what we do
comes from the way our brain works
● The independent variable was which passage was read
● The computer program was a way of cheating to give them answers to maths problems they were supposed
to be solving themselves
● A measure of the participants beliefs about free will and determinism was recorded before and after the
study
● To measure cheating, the number of space bar presses one a computer (a space bar avoided the answer
being revealed, so avoided cheating) was recorded. This was the dependent variable.

● Participants who read Crick’s ‘anti-free-will’ passage showed lower belief in free will than those in the
control condition
● This showed that Crick’s passage lef some participants to believe more strongly in determinism
● Space bar presses for each participant were recorded
● However, presses showed a lack of cheating and Vohs and Schooler wanted their results to show cheating
● They therefore subtracted the number of space bar presses for each person from 20 to give a ‘cheating
score’
● Participants showed more cheating if they read the ‘anti-free-will’ passage than if they did not

● When determinism is put forward as a view and free-will beliefs are challenged, behaviour becomes less
moral (measured by cheating)

Strengths Weaknesses

- Ethical strengths: participants could shred their - Problems with measuring cheating; weren’t
results to remain private necessarily cheating, perhaps just not doing
- Debrief anything
- Practical application: behaviour comes from - Was it unethical to make people act immorally
genes and the environment – implications for - Artificial setting – ecological validity
society

Van Houtte and Jarvis (1995)

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 The role of pets in preadolescent psychosocial development

• Studies have shown that children see their pets as warm and empathetic

• Pets show an unconditional positive regard for owners (they don’t ask for anything in return)

• Having a pet is advantageous

• When children are aged between 9-12 they form a sense of autonomy

• These changes can affect their self-esteem and self-image

• Houtte and Jarvis (1995) focused on young adolescents, looking at pet ownership and children’s well-being

• Aimed to find out how pets affect children’s development

• Aimed to see how having pets impacted children’s self-esteem, self-concept, sense of autonomy and
attachment to animals

• Van Houtte and Jarvis tested 130 children aged between 8 and 11
• The school gave their permission for the study and they have the right to withdraw at any time.
• Of 130 children, 65 were pet owners and 65 were not.
• Interviews were used to find out background information such as whether the parents were married or not.
• The pet-owning children were then matched with non-pet-owning children based on this information
• The Independent variable was whether the child owned a pet or not
• The dependent variables were autonomy, self-esteem, self-concept and attachment all measured by
questionnaires

Measures taken;
• Measure of autonomy
– 20 questionnaire items, using likert type scales, asked about perception of parents as people, how
much parents are idealised, how much parents are depended upon
• Measure of self-concept
– Self-Concept Scale for Children (Lipsitt, 1958) was used, includes 22 descriptions that find out
children’s views of themselves, such as ‘I’m happy’
• Measure of self-esteem
– Standard scale asking how much the child agrees with statements such as ‘I am satisfied with
myself’
• Measure of attachment to animals
– A questionnaire was given to pet-owning participants with statements such as ‘I consider my pet to
be a friend’

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 ● 11 year-old pet owners had higher self-concept than non-pet owners of the same age (mean of 94.2
compared with 83.2)
● Pet owners were more likely than non-pet owners to see their parents as people and pet owners could see
their parents in roles other than the parental role – both suggest autonomy

• Van Houtte and Jarvis concluded that pet ownership seemed to increase autonomy and self-esteem
especially in adolescents
• Best for 11 year olds

Limitations:

• They used a questionnaire …

• The sample was limited ….
• They asked closed questions….

The Self Assessment Material

Bradley believes he is very bad at learning to speak French. He finds it very difficult and wishes he could learn
better so that he can pass his exams. Bradley is struggling to motivate himself to go to lessons as he feels
embarrassed when his teacher asks him questions. How would Rogers (1959) explain why Bradley feels
embarrassed? (4 marks)

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Cathy is in early adulthood. She has been in a relationship with her boyfriend for six years and they have
recently decided to get married. They are also planning a family once they marry. Erikson (1959) would say
that Cathy is in the intimacy versus isolation stage of development. How do you know if Cathy is in conflict or
has resolved this stage? (2 marks)
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Ted is 13 years old. He learnt how to make a meal at school, and tried to do this at home to show his parents.
Ted cooked the meal, but it did not taste very nice. His parents said they were proud of him for trying his best
and they appreciated him having a go at making the meal. What type of positive regard did Ted’s parents show
him? (2 marks)

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Caitlin is 11 years old and her family have recently bought a puppy. Caitlin helps look after the puppy. She
takes him for walks, bathes him and brushes him. Using your knowledge of Van Houtte and Jarvis (1995)
discuss how the puppy will benefit Caitlin. (2 marks)
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Jacob completed a self-report questionnaire about his personality. What issues might there be when
personality is tested using self-report questionnaires? (4 marks)
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Topic 11: RESEARCH METHODS

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