Saalamona everyone, i have created this thread as part of my interactive revision, for my favourite subject......*PsYcHoLoGy*.

Syllabus:

Cognitive Psychology, Developmental Psychology and Research Methods
50% of the total AS marks, 25% of the total A2 marks
1 hour 30 minutes

Structured compulsory questions based on:

Cognitive Psychology,

Developmental Psychology,

and Research Methods (boring)haha

Questions include short answer, stimulus material and one 12-mark question.

Below is what the specification covers (i took that info from the exam boards website).

Cognitive Psychology - Memory
Models of memory
• The multi-store model, including the concepts of encoding, capacity and
duration. Strengths and weaknesses of the model
• The working memory model, including its strengths and weaknesses
Memory in everyday life • Eyewitness testimony (EWT) and factors affecting the accuracy of EWT,
including anxiety, age of witness
• Misleading information and the use of the cognitive interview
• Strategies for memory improvement
Developmental Psychology - Early Social Development
Attachment • Explanations of attachment, including learning theory, and evolutionary
perspective, including Bowlby
• Types of attachment, including insecure and secure attachment and studies by
Ainsworth
• Cultural variations in attachment
• Disruption of attachment, failure to form attachment (privation) and the effects
of institutionalisation
Attachment in everyday
life
• The impact of different forms of day care on children’s social development,
including the effects on aggression and peer relations
• Implications of research into attachment and day care for child care practices


Research Methods
Methods and techniques
Candidates will be expected to demonstrate knowledge and understanding of the
following research methods, their advantages and weaknesses:
• Experimental method, including laboratory, feld and natural experiments
• Studies using a correlational analysis
• Observational techniques
• Self-report techniques including questionnaire and interview
• Case studies
Investigation design Candidates should be familiar with the following features of investigation design:
• Aims
• Hypotheses, including directional and non-directional
• Experimental design (independent groups, repeated measures and matched
pairs)
• Design of naturalistic observations, including the development and use of
behavioural categories
• Design of questionnaires and interviews
• Operationalisation of variables, including independent and dependent variables
• Pilot studies
• Control of extraneous variables
• Reliability and validity
• Awareness of the British Psychological Society (BPS) Code of Ethics
• Ethical issues and ways in which psychologists deal with them
• Selection of participants and sampling techniques, including random,
opportunity and volunteer sampling
• Demand characteristics and investigator effects
Data analysis and
presentation
Candidates should be familiar with the following features of data analysis,
presentation and interpretation:
• Presentation and interpretation of quantitative data including graphs,
scattergrams and tables
• Analysis and interpretation of quantitative data. Measures of central tendency
including median, mean, mode. Measures of dispersion including ranges and
standard deviation
• Analysis and interpretation of correlational data. Positive and negative
correlations and the interpretation of correlation coeffcients
• Presentation of qualitative data
• Processes involved in content analysis

Hey...i hope people will be interested in this. Please point out any mistakes....i havent eaten all day..lol

There are 2 theories which give an explanation for attachment of which the following are the learning theory and the evolutionary theory.

The learning theory---is put forward by behaviourists to explain how all behavior is acquired, using principles of conditioning.

2 principles of conditioning:

Classical conditioning:

Infant is born with reflex response, so the stimulus of food produces a response of pleasure—unconditioned stimulus (US) and an unconditioned response (UR). The person providing food (which is usually the mother) is associated with this pleasure and consequently becomes a conditioned stimulus. The food giver becomes source of pleasure, irrespective of whether food is supplied or not. According to this theory this is the basis of the attachment bond.
Stimulus (US)& response (UR) are innately linked, an animal associates sound of bell and food thus bell alone produces UR. Bell=neutral stimulus (NS) but is now a conditioned stimulus (CS) & salivation is now a conditioned response (CR)….thus animal has learned a new stimulus response link.

Operant conditioning:

Dollard and Miller (’50): suggested that when hungry, human infant feels uncomfortable & experiences a drive state, this drive motivates the baby to find some way to lessen the discomfort of being hungry. So the infant howls and its upto the adult to feed it. Being fed satisfies infants hunger and makes it feel comfortable. This drives reduction and the rewarding child learns that the reward=primary reinforce, while the person supplying is the secondary reinforce. And the infant seeks to be with the person who is the source of the reward.

-This theory can be supported because it provides an adequate explanation of how attachments form. We learn through association and reinforcement. However food may not be the main reinforce, it may be that responsiveness and attention from a caregiver are important rewards that create the bond.

-However the research was conducted in labs---which mean that variables can be controlled but we can’t infer causal relationships.

-The use of animals means that this piece of research has gone ahead.

-Harry Harlow: found that young monkeys should have become attached to the latching mother who offered reduction of the hunger drive, but the monkeys spent more time with the cloth covered mother and would cling to it when frightened (proximity seeking behavior)----undermines classical conditioning. This study wasn’t conducted on humans, thus it cant be extrapolated and used for human behavior i.e. anti extrapolation’.

-Schaffer and Emerson: said that cupboard love theories isn’t likely to be the best explanation for attachment, but association and reinforcement maybe part of the story.

Theory is reductionist—reduces complex behavior of attachement to either classical/operant conditioning..other factors need to be considered.

Evoulutionary theory: Bowlby:

Atachment is adaptive and innate –born with ability to attach

Critical/sensitive period—2.5 years of infants life where an attachment with primary care giver should be made.

Caregiving is adaptive—attachment and caregiving are innate since it is adaptive. Infants are born with certain characteristics i.e. social releasers’….smiling, crying etc.

Attachment=important for a secure base

Monotropy—1 relationship that infant has with primary attachment figure is of special significance in emotional development.

Internal working model—attachment starts as the relationship between a caregiver and infant, this allows the child to develop a model about emotional relationships.

Continuity Hypothesis—view that theres a link between early attachment relationship and later emotional behavior. Securely attached infants continue to be socially and emotionally competent. While insecurely attached children have more social and emotional difficulties later in childhood and adulthood.

This is suppored by Lonrenz------he wanted to imprint on geese who are likely to imprint on the first moving object they see …….he had had 2 groups….one who were with their real mother when their eggs hatched and others that were with Lorenz when their eggs hatched…….lorenz’s ones followed him.
So…….animals which follows its mother is more likely to be able to stay safe and find food i.e. survive and reproduce so that genes for this behavior are perpetuated.
Inherited behaviours that promote reproduction are natural.

However there are cultural variations

Individual differences—different kinds of attachments with caregivers. Main factor that determines kind of attachement is responsiveness of caregiver.

Did you write this from memory?

^ hmm.....some of it.......i did use my notes

Eyeliner, if you also need some notes too, mine are available. I still have my notes from my first semester in college :D

i think that this material will be of interest to those who are parents, work around kids......

Deprivation of Attachment:

Deprivation=describes loss of something that is wanted/needed. Maternal deprivation=loss of mother. Long term= permanent loss=implied.


Separation=where a child is away from a caregiver, they’ve attached to. Relatively short time---hours/days.



Separation can have major effects: PDD Model-----
1. Protest
2. Despair
3. Detachment (model).

1. During first few hours, child will protest a lot at being separated from its mother, by CRYING, PANICKING, CALLING FOR ITS MOTHER.
2. After a day or 2, child loses interest in surroundings, becomes more withdrawn, with occasional crying.


3. After few days, child becomes more alert and interested in surroundings. –cry less; seem to have ‘recovered’ from bad reaction to separation. However, previous attachment with carer= permanently damaged= due to lack of trust/security.



SUPPORT FOR PDD MODEL:

-Robertson and Robertson: The short term had very bad effects for john, including very bad effects on John…….including permanent damage to his attachment with his mother.



Evaluation: john reaction may not have been due to separation, could have been due to new environment, lack of attention, little control variables, difficult to replicate, natural setting-high ecological validity, but less reliable.


STRENGTHS AND WEAKNESSES:

1. Findings suggest separating child from carer should be avoided. Important implications for childcare practice e.g. child should be allowed to visit, or remain with mothers.



2. Shows that child who receive foster care do better than those placed in institutional setting. Children can manage to cope with separation so long as they receive 1-1 emotional support.



3. Many factors influences how child reacts to a separation. Includes age, quality of care received during separation, individual temperament of child, how often it experiences seperations. Hence separation doesn’t necessarily produce PDD effects.