Answering ERQs - Paper 2 (DP IB Psychology): Revision Note

Answering ERQs - Paper 2

• Section B consists of one compulsory ERQ based on an unseen research study provided in the exam paper

  • This is not a study you need to prepare for in advance for it will be presented in the question

• You must discuss the study with reference to two or more concepts:

  • Bias

  • Causality

  • Change

  • Measurement

  • Perspective

  • Responsibility

• The research study that you are presented with may be experimental (e.g., lab experiment) or non-experimental (e.g., interview)

  • It will be drawn from one of the four contexts

    • Health & Wellbeing

    • Human Development

    • Human Relationships

    • Learning & Cognition

• The ERQs is worth 15 marks

  • The total for Section B is 15 marks

Command terms

• The command terms used in Section B include:

  • Describe (AO1)

  • State (AO1)

  • Compare and contrast (AO3)

  • Discuss (AO3)

  • Evaluate (AO3)

  • Examine (AO3)

  • To what extent (AO3)

Example research study (abridged)

In the early 1960s, Stanley Milgram conducted an experiment into obedience. A volunteer sample of 40 men from one US town were paid to participate. In a lab setting, they were instructed to administer increasingly severe electric shocks to a stranger (a confederate) for each incorrect answer, up to 450 volts (a fatal level). The shocks were not real, but participants were unaware of this. The dependent variable was the maximum shock level each participant administered. 65% of participants went to 450 volts.

• Discuss Milgram’s study with reference to two or more of the following concepts: bias, causality, change and/or responsibility. [15 marks]

Applying the concepts

• Bias

  • Sample bias: all participants were male, from one town, and only 40 in total

  • Response bias: participants may have felt pressured to go to 450 volts since it was the maximum

  • Acquiescence bias: as paid volunteers, participants may have felt obliged to 'please' the researcher

• Causality

  • Did the high-status lab setting cause participants to obey (believing they were 'helping science')?

  • If participants suspected the shocks were fake, the validity of the study is reduced

  • 35% of participants resisted, suggesting the situation did not inevitably cause obedience

• Change

  • The study took place in 1963; obedience levels may be lower today (temporal validity issue)

  • Public awareness of Milgram’s work through media/education means the study is hard to replicate

  • Would participants behave the same outside the lab setting? (question of ecological validity)

• Responsibility

  • Deception: participants were misled about the true aim and believed shocks were real

  • Harm: many left believing they were capable of lethal harm – significant long-term distress

  • Debriefing: necessary to reduce harm, but today such a study would not pass ethical review