Grant

Question 1

What area does this study belong to?

Answer 1

Cognitive

Question 2

What are the principles of the cognitive area?

Answer 2

• internal mental processes such as memory, thinking, reasoning, problem-solving and language are important features influencing human behaviour.

• the mind is mechanistic. This suggests that we process information like a computer and behaviour is predictable

• input —> process —> output

Question 3

What is the aim of study ?

Answer 3

To test for context dependency effects caused by the presence or absence of noise during hlearning and retrieval of meaningful info

Question 4

What is the background of the study?

Question 5

Describe the research method

Answer 5

Laboratory experiment
Independent measure design
IV:
1) whether the participant read the two page article under silent or noisy conditions
2)whether the participant was tested under matching or mismatching conditions

DV: the participants performance on the short answer recall test and multiple choice recall test

Question 6

Describe the sample

Answer 6

39 participants. 17 female and 23 male.
8 members of a psychology class served as experimenters and each of them recruited 5 acquaintances to serve as participants
Opportunity sample

Question 7

Outline the procedure

Answer 7

•each experimenter provided his/her own cassette player and headphones. Each played the same copy of background noise of a university cafeteria.
• instructions read aloud and stated that participation was voluntary
• they were then asked the read to e given article on psycho immunology.
• participants were informed that the comprehension was going to be tested.
• all participants wore headphones while they read even if they was in the silent condition.
• reading times were recorded by experimenters
• a break of approximately 2 mins between the end of the study phase and the start of the test phase.
• the short answer test was given first and then the multiple choice test.
• at the end, participants were debriefed
• the entire procedure lasted 30 mins

Question 8

Key findings

Question 9

Conclusions

Answer 9

There are context dependency effects for newly learned meaningful material regardless of whether a short answer test or multiple choice test is assessed.

Study and testing in the same environment leads to enhanced performance

Students are likely to perform better in exams if they study for them with minimum background noise

It’s better studying without background noise as it will not be present during actual testing

Question 10

Research method

Answer 10

+ controlled, scientific, objective and contains cause and effect.

• artificial environment and take.
  Lacks mundane realism. Students are asked to remember information whilst sitting in silence or noisy conditions which is an unusual setting to be placed in.

Question 11

Validity

Answer 11

• lacks ecological validity. Doesn’t represent how students revise in real life. Usually do their revision at home or in a library

+ population validity: target population is met

Question 12

Reliability

Answer 12

+ standardised procedure. All participants read the same article, sit the same test and all wear headphones

Question 13

Sampling bias

Answer 13

• sample is derived from friends of the experimenters who may be more or less affected by matching context than other people.

Question 14

Ethnocentrism

Answer 14

• other cultures may use different forms of assessment to measure ability that written exams

Question 15

How does it link to the area

Question 16

Psychology as a science

Answer 16

Uses lab experiments
Quantitative data
Has a standardised procedure

Question 17

Reductionism and Holism

Answer 17

Provides a reductionist explanation as it suggests that memory is affected by the context in which it is learned and recalled only.

Question 18

Usefulness

Answer 18

Gives us recommendations for the best way to go about revision
We can see knowledge of context dependent memory to approve accuracy of recall for witnesses by reinstating memory.

Question 19

Free will and determinism

Answer 19

Soft determinism:
Meditational processes influence our decisions and behaviour. We can choose to ignore the context