A-Level Psychology Coursework Ideas Help
1. Food deprivation and perceptual set. (Postman and Crutchfield)
Participants are given a set of partial words (e.g. s-e-k or fi--) that they are asked to complete. Sometimes the participant will make up a food word (e.g. steak or fish) and sometimes a non-food word (e.g. speak or file). Is there a relationship between the type of word the subjects make up and the length of time since they last ate?
2. Sexism in children’s literature. (Graebner)
A sample of children’s reading/picture books is selected and these are analysed to find out how many male and female characters are depicted, whether the characters are shown in stereotypical roles, if they play an active or passive part in the scenes described. How much sex stereotyping is there in children’s books? Is it related to the year of publication, the sex of the author, the target age of the reading group, etc?
3. Sex discrimination in opportunity and/or attitudes. (Fidell)
Participants are given identical stories/information/scenarios about a character … the only difference being that in one version the character is male and in the other female. The participants are then asked to rate the person described in terms of their suitability for a position or their likelihood of possessing a character trait. Does sex stereotyping influence their rating?
4. Appearance and compliance. (Chaikin et al)
Participants are approached in a public place and asked if they would sign a petition, fill in a questionnaire or comply with some other simple request. Half the participants are approached by the researcher dressed in hippy/punk/goth type outfit and the other half are approached by the same researcher who is dressed in smart conventional clothes. Does the appearance of the interviewer affect the willingness of the subject to comply with the request?
5. Androgyny and age. (Bem)
Participants are asked to complete the Bem Sex Role Inventory and scored for “masculinity” and “femininity”. Is there an age difference in androgyny scores?
N.B. Androgyny is the degree to which we accept both “masculine” and “feminine” traits into our personality. This method could also be used to see if there is a difference between people from different ethnic groups or social backgrounds.
6. Chunking and short-term memory. (Miller)
Participants are given “chunks” of letters or numbers to remember. Some have meaningful chunks (e.g. FBI, ITV, 1914, 1066). Others have meaningless chunks (e.g. IFB, VTI, 4119, 6016). Are meaningful chunks easier to remember than meaningless chunks?
7. Acoustic coding in short term memory. (Conrad)
Participants are given two lists of letters to remember. One list is made up of letters that are acoustically similar (e.g. e,v,b,c,g,p,t). The other list is made up of letters that are acoustically different (e.g. r,x,q,m,k,f,s). Which list is easier to remember? There is a theory that when we have to learn something like a telephone number that we store the number in the form of the mental sound that it makes i.e. acoustically. Participants have to learn lists of letters and then write them down after a delay. According to the acoustic coding theory participants will have more difficulty recalling letters which sound similar compared to a list of words which sound quite different.
8. Perceptual defence. (McGinnies)
Participants are asked to assemble cards to form a word. When assembled half the cards form a rude (taboo) word. The other cards make a conventional (non taboo) word. Will there be a difference in how long it takes subjects to form the two types of word?
9. Frequency and perceptual set. (Bugelski)
Participants are given a set of pictures to look at for a few seconds. Half the subjects are given pictures of animals and half of faces. All participants are then given an ambiguous stimulus that could be either a picture of a rat or a picture of a man’s face. Do the previous pictures influence what the participants sees?
10. Perceptual set and anticipation. (Solley and Haigh)
Children aged 4-6 are asked to draw pictures of Santa with his bag of toys in the weeks running up to Christmas. Then they are asked to draw the picture again after Christmas. Are there changes in the pictures they draw as Christmas comes nearer and what happens to their pictures in the New Year?
N.B. Special ethical considerations apply if you want to carry out research on children.
11. Organisation and memory 1. (Bower)
Half the participants are given words that are organised in a hierarchy. The other half of the participants are given the same words but they are randomly organised. Who remembers more?
12. Organisation and memory 2. (Tulving)
Participants are given a list of words to remember. Subsequently half the participants are given a blank piece of paper on which to write down what they remember. The other half are given a piece of paper with category headings (into which the words fit) on it. Who remembers more?
13. Organisation and memory 3. (Tulving)
Participants are given lists of words organised under headings. Half the participants have words that fit the heading in the right place. The other half have the same words spread around at random. Who remembers more?
N.B. This could also be conducted as a repeated measures design.
14. Impression formation and central traits. (Asch)
Participants are given a list of words that describe an imaginary person and afterwards are asked to rate the person on a number of personality traits. Some lists contain the word warm and the other cold. Do these words influence how they describe the person?
Versions of Asch’s (1946) ‘warm’, ‘cold’ central traits paradigm can be implemented in many topical ways. Candidates give one description of a person to one group of participants and an identical version to another group varying only one characteristic, for instance ‘agrees with nuclear testing’ for one group and ‘disagrees....’ for the other. They then ask participants to assess the fictitious person on, say, liking or trustworthiness on a 10 point scale and look for differences between groups. Asch’s ‘primacy’ effect can also be tested using a list of descriptors – e.g. ‘orderly entertaining humble cool calculating moody’ in that order for one group and in the opposite order for another. Those hearing the positive traits first might rate the person more favourably on a ten point scale – Anderson and Barrios (1961). Luria and Rubin (1974) – participants given the same picture of a baby but one group told it is male the other female. Record differences in descriptions. It is best to give a checklist to participants containing ‘typical’ masculine and feminine traits – fine featured, strong, robust, sensitive, cute, and delicate.
15. Person perception and first impressions. (Luchins)
Participants are given a story to read about an imaginary person who first appears to a cheerful character and then rather sad and lonely. A second group of participants are given the same information but in the reverse order. Afterwards all participants are asked to rate the person in the story in terms of certain personality traits. Does the order in which they received the information affect their opinion. The hypothesis is that due to first impressions the participants who hear the story with the first paragraph being the positive one will rate the person more positively.
16. Social facilitation. (Zajonc)
Participants are asked to run/cycle (perform a stamina task) to the best of their ability against the clock. They are also asked to perform the same task in a competitive race against others. Does racing against competitors affect performance?
N.B. you could also study the effects of social facilitation using a paper and pencil task. This could work quite well in a speed/accuracy competitive task where there would be the opportunity to study social facilitation on tasks that involve skill rather than stamina.
17. Language and thought. (Carmichael)
Participants are shown simple line drawings that could be interpreted in various ways. One group is then given one set of labels and asked to reproduce the drawings while another group is given different labels but asked to perform the same task. Do the labels influence what is drawn?
18. Interference and forgetting. (McGeoch)
Participants are asked to memorise a list of words/numbers and are then asked to recall the list after an interval of time. During the interval some subjects are exposed to interference while others are not. Does this influence how much the subjects remember?
19. The influence of context on long term memory (Baddeley)
Participants are asked to memorise some information. The next day they are tested on what they had previously learned. Some are tested in the same room in which the learning took place others in a different room. Does the similarity/dissimilarity of the environment affect recall?
20. Reconstructive memory. (Loftus)
Participants are shown a film (e.g. of a car accident) and are later asked questions about what they had previously seen. The questions are phrased differently for each group. Does the way a question is phrased influence what the participant claims to remember?
21. The serial position effect. (Glanzer)
Participants are read a list of about 20 “neutral” words at about the rate of one word every 2 seconds. Then after a 5 second break (waiting time) they are asked to write down as many words as they can remember in any order that they like. Which words in the list are remembered most often?
22. Conformity and estimation. (Sherif)
Participants are asked to estimate the number of dots displayed on an O.H.P. Some of the time they are asked to make their estimate alone and some of the time as a member of a group. Is there a difference in the estimates they make?
23. The reliability of attitude scales. (Spearman)
You devise a Likert scale on a contemporary issue (smoking, drinking, sexual behaviour, war with Iraq) and pilot it on a sample of participants. You test the internal reliability of the scale by conducting a split halves reliability test
N.B. You could also devise an intelligence or aptitude test and test its internal reliability in the same way.
24. Language and learning. (Berko)
Children aged 2-3 are given a picture of a fictitious animal and told, “This is a wug.” Then they are given another picture in which there are two. Now they are asked what they see. Are they able to form the plural (wugs) of a word they have never heard before?
N.B. Special ethical considerations apply if you want to carry out research on children.
25. Levels of processing. (Craik and Lockhart)
Participants are presented with words on a screen. One group are asked questions about what the words look like (structural). Another group are asked questions about what the words sound like (phonemic). A third group are asked questions about the meaning of the words (semantic). How does the type of information processing involved in answering the questions affect participant's ability to remember the words? Craik and Lockhart hypothesise that the deeper and more meaningfully we process information the better subsequent recall will be.
26. Semantic and acoustic memory. (Baddeley)
Participants are given a short list of words that are semantically similar (e.g. neat/tidy/clean/smart) and a list of words that are acoustically similar (e.g. heat/sweet/greet/sheet). Recall is tested immediately and after a period of time. Is there a difference in how well participants recall the words after a short and along interval?
27. Reliability of eye witness testimony. (Loftus)
Participants are shown a 30 second video of a bank robbery and are subsequently asked questions about the events depicted. How do their answers compare with the actual events portrayed on the film?
28. Eye witness testimony and gender. (Cross)
Participants are involved in an “accidental meeting” (staged by you) with a stranger. Subsequently they are asked 10 questions about the behaviour/appearance of the person they met. Are males or females better at remembering the details?
29. The Stroop effect. (Stroop)
This is the classic experiment where participants are presented with words printed in colors that do not match the colors of the words (for instance, the word "red" might be printed in green ink). They are then expected to name the color of the word rather than the word itself (in the above example, saying "green"). Participants take a lot longer to name the colour of ink that words are written in when the words themselves are contradictory colour words e.g. ‘red’ written in yellow ink – Dyer (1973).
30. Correlation of personality traits. (Spearman)
Participants are given two personality rating scales to fill in, the “Eysenck Personality Inventory” and the “Sensation Seeking Scale”. Are extroverts sensation seekers?
31. Retrieval in short term memory. (Peterson)
Participants are given trigrams(three random consonants put together e.g. TGM, NTP, RQG etc.) to remember and they are asked to recall them at intervals varying from 3 to 18 seconds. To prevent them rehearsing the trigrams they are asked to count backwards in threes from a three-figure number (e.g. 452, 449, 446, etc.) during the waiting interval then they are asked to recall the trigram. How long are items held in short term memory?
32. Attitudes to mental health. (Star)
In the 1950’s Star conducted research into the attitudes of the American public towards people suffering from mental illness. Are those attitudes still held in modern Britain? What stereotypes do people hold about the mentally ill?
33. Duration of Primary Memory (Peterson and Peterson)
Participants are presented with a series of syllables and then a three-digit number and are asked to count backwards from the number then recall the syllables.
Finally these are only some suggestions. From reading your textbook you may well come across other ideas or you might even come up with a completely original idea of your own. Whatever research you choose there are however 3 things to be kept in mind. They are:
1. Is the research practical? Do I have the time and the resources to conduct the research? Can I get the participants I will need? Will I require specialist equipment?
2. Is the research ethical? Am I behaving correctly towards my participants? Have I got their consent? Have I debriefed them?
Further Information
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Materials for replicating studies
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