Psych investigations

• How should the investigation be written up ?

  Investigations must be written up in the style of a scientific report. All the pages must be numbered and must be written in the third person passive. This means in the past tense and don’t say ‘I’ or ‘we’.

  It must be concise and precise!
• What order do you write a psychology report investigation in ?

  Abstract, Introduction, Methods, Results, Discussion, References
• What’s an abstract ?

  The first section in a journal article is a short summary/abstract (150-200 words) including the major elements of the research study: aims and hypotheses, method/procedure, results and conclusions

  They feature first, but are written last!

  These are a useful way of deciding whether or not to read on
• What do you include in an introduction ?

  In this section you review all the background research relevant to your investigation

  You must clearly quote your aim and operationalised hypothesis and null hypothesis

  ✓Review of background research ✓Aim

  ✓Hypotheses
• What does operationalisation mean ?

  the term used to describe how a variable is clearly defined by the researcher. The term operationalisation can be applied to independent variables (IV), dependent variables (DV) or co-variables (in a correlational design).
• What’s included in a method ?

  This is split into several sub-sections and should be sufficiently detailed so that someone would be able to exactly replicate your study.

  ✓Design

  ✓Sample (including sampling method and target population)

  ✓Apparatus/materials

  ✓Procedure – a ‘recipe list’ of everything that happened in the study including: briefing, standardised instructions and debriefing

  ✓Ethics (including how these were addressed in your study)
• What’s included in results ?

  The results section should summarise the key findings from the investigation

  This will feature descriptive statistics (i.e. tables, graphs, charts, measures of central tendency and measures of dispersion)

  Inferential statistics should include reference to the choice of statistical test, calculated and critical values and the level of significance

  Final outcome i.e. which hypothesis was rejected and which retained Do not include raw data here – refer the reader to the appendix
• What are some examples of results ?

  ✓ Summary table

  ✓ Graphs

  ✓ Descriptions of table and graphs

  ✓ Justification of statistical test

  ✓ Results quoted in terms of null hypothesis
• What do you include in a discussion ?

  There are several key elements in the discussion section

  Firstly, findings will be discussed in the context of the evidence presented in the introduction, and any other research that may be considered relevant

  The researcher should be mindful of limitations and discuss these (including how a future study may address these) and also any contributions the research has made to the existing knowledge-base within the field

  ➢Summary of findings (verbal)

  ➢Limitations and modifications

  ➢Implications and suggestions for future research
• What should be included in a reference ?

  Full details of any source material that the researcher drew upon or cited in the report must be referenced
• Journal Articles:

  Gupta, S. (1991). Effects of time of day and personality on intelligence test scores. Personality and Individual Differences, 12(11). 1227 – 1231.
• Books:

  Flanagan, C. and Berry, D. (2016). A level Psychology. Cheltenham: Illuminate Publishing.