Psychology · 2002 · May · Paper 2 · HL · Markscheme

MARKSCHEME May 2002 PSYCHOLOGY Higher Level Paper 2 M02/350/H(2)M+ INTERNATIONAL BACCALAUREATE BACCALAURÉAT INTERNATIONAL BACHILLERATO INTERNACIONALc 33 pages SECTION A [2 marks]1. Explain why this research design is not a true experiment. Award [2 marks] for accurate identification and explanation of one of the following: lack of manipulation of the independent variable, lack of truly random selection, or lack of truly random allocation. Award [1 mark] for simple identification of any of the factors above. No marks should be awarded for irrelevant points, such as “it doe s not test a hypothesis” or ambiguous points such as “it is not controlled”. [2 marks]2. State the independent variable and give a reason for your answer. Taxi-driver or control or similar wording (e.g. experience of driving a taxi). Allow the second mark for explaining th at this is the variable on which the two groups differ, even though it has not been manipulated. Do not award the second mark if the candidate states that this variable was manipulated as it was a naturally occurring difference (hence a quasi-experiment). [2 marks]3. State the dependent variable and give a reason for your answer. The (spatial reasoning test) scores, since this is the variable expected to vary as a result of taxi-driver experience, spatial memory use etc. No mark for “it depends on the independent variable” unless this is explained. [2 marks] 4. Explain why the selection method used for both samples of participants might produce bias. Both groups are volunteers and these ar e not representative of all people. Candidates could also say that volunt eers are known to differ from average on certain characteristics or they can simply say that volunteers might differ. Candidates might concentrate on the gi ven features of the control group (university staff/students, non-dr ivers) which should be awarded [1 mark]. For full marks candidates should concentrate on the method used for selection. – 3 – M02/350/H(2)M+