EMA Part 1

For this part of the EMA you should write an essay with the title below.

Title: Critically assess the methods used in the field of biological psychology and the field of individual differences.

You must draw on evidence from Weeks 4 and 7 of the module. In addition, you should draw on and discuss at least two academic journal articles or equivalent primary source material not referred to in the DE300 module materials.

The word limit for this essay is 2000 words, excluding the reference list but including in-text citations.

Student notes for Part 1

This question requires you to critically evaluate methods used in the field of biological psychology and the field of individual differences, drawing on studies from two weeks of the module. You will by now be familiar with the concept of critical evaluation, but it is worth recalling that this involves identifying not just weaknesses but also strengths of the phenomena you are asked to assess. Please note that although the question explicitly asks you to evaluate methods, there is an implied, embedded question underlying it: how valid is psychologists’ knowledge in these specified fields, given the methods that have been employed?

To answer this question well, you will need to review studies presented in Weeks 4 and 7 of the module; identify the methodsthese studies used; and assess the strengths and weaknesses of the methods involved. Having done so, this should lead you to draw conclusions about the validity of the current state of knowledge regarding the aspects of human development and individual differences showcased in these sections of the module.

As the question requires you to draw on studies from two weeks of the module, you will need to present an overview of the kinds of research discussed in both Weeks 4 and 7 and then carefully select studies to focus on in your essay. In presenting methods and studies, please be very careful to provide relevant, indicative, brief detail, rather than lengthy descriptions, bearing in mind that you need to keep your essay focused and within the word limit.

To discuss the methods of biological psychology, you should draw on Week 4 of the module and on Chapter 3 of the textbook. This material examines the experimental method, using in particular the example of memory research. This week continues the discussion of memory from Week 3 and Chapter 2 (you may find the material in Week 3 on experimental neuropsychological techniques useful for setting out biological psychology research, but this is not necessary in order to do well on this EMA). In Week 4 and Chapter 3, psychological experimental research on memory and perception are discussed with a particular focus on forensic contexts. Issues of control, the limits of laboratory experiments and ecological validity are discussed in depth in these materials using a range of relevant empirical examples. These are key issues that a critical examination of the methods of biological psychology should consider.

Week 7 of the module and Chapter 6 of the textbook discuss methods for the study of creativity and personality. Week 7 explains how the statistical technique of factor analysis can be used to analyse survey responses. This discussion builds on that of the previous week and of Chapter 5 on self-report questionnaires (this may be useful material for your methodological discussion of individual differences psychology, but it is not necessary to use this material for this EMA). Chapter 6 and the second half of the online Week 7 Study Guide Week 7 discuss the psychology of individual differences, taking the particular empirical field of creativity and personality. They discuss different psychometric measures for assessing creativity, including self-report questionnaires. The advantages and disadvantages of different methods, and a consideration of issues of reliability and validity, will be useful in your critical examination of the methods in individual differences psychology. For example, if discussing methods psychologists use to assess human creativity, you may consider to what extent these can actually measure creativity (are participants able to self-report accurately on this ability, for example?), as well as how valid researchers’ definitions of creativity are and/or how, for example, sampling might affect their findings.

To write a coherent essay, rather than presenting two sets of unrelated annotated studies from biological psychology and individual differences, it will be important for you to synthesise across the content of Weeks 4 and 7 in some way. How you choose to do so is up to you. It could be useful to consider, for example, whether the studies presented in these chapters have features in common – do the methods employed compare, perhaps? Are there some features of the nature of the knowledge they explore that are similar or that differ? In doing so you will be able to make links and/or highlight differences, and therefore craft an essay that reads as a coherent whole.

Finally, please remember that for this essay you are expected to conduct research of your own into relevant material beyond the module resources and to include two primary sources not referred to in the DE300 materials. You will need to do some systematic searching for relevant source materials that support the arguments you make, and your choices should be well-integrated into the points in your essay – the purpose is to support your argument effectively, not just to satisfy a marking requirement. Remember how important it is to evaluate the source, nature and reliability of all the material that you find through searching. The primary sources you should draw on are likely to be psychology journal articles, though they could be chapters from academic psychology books – not textbooks. You could also consider more recent works by the authors mentioned in the DE300 textbook. To help the marker to identify the new material, please highlight the two sources in the reference list at the end of your essay.

In conclusion, your analysis of methods in this essay should ultimately allow you to draw conclusions about the nature of psychological knowledge in these domains of human cognitive functioning.