Comprehensive Study Notes: Edexcel GCSE (9-1) Psychology

Topic 1: Development – How did you develop?

• Foundations of Development: Development underpins all actions, speech, attitudes, and beliefs throughout a lifetime. It is determined by both innate factors (nature) and environmental influences (nurture).

• Mindset and Improvement: The belief that one is "good" at something can hinder development. Challenging ourselves to improve and practicing with effort leads to better performance, as suggested by Dweck’s mindset theory.

• Early Brain Development:

  • Neural Tube (3-4 weeks): A long tube develops in the brain, divided into three sections: forebrain, midbrain, and hindbrain. The spinal cord is below the hindbrain.

  • 5 Weeks Development: The forebrain splits into anterior (front) and posterior (behind) sections. The hindbrain splits through the middle. The midbrain does not divide.

  • Cerebellum: Visible at $6$ weeks. By one year after birth, it triples in size. It controls motor movements (muscle activity), fear responses, and processing sense information.

  • Medulla Oblongata: Located in the hindbrain, in front of the cerebellum. It controls involuntary (automatic) responses like sneezing, breathing, heart rate, and blood pressure. It is formed by $20$ weeks and connects the brain to the spinal cord.

  • Neural Connections: From birth to age $3$, babies form $700-1000$ new connections every second. The brain doubles in size in the first year and reaches $80\%$ of adult size by age $3$.

• Piaget’s Stages of Cognitive Development:

  • Cognitive Definition: Thinking, problem-solving, perceiving, remembering, and reasoning.

  • Schema: Mental representations or frameworks of the world based on experience.

  • Sensorimotor Stage (Birth to 2 years): Infants learn via senses and movement. Key feature: Object Permanence (knowing something exists even if out of sight, occurring around $6$ months).

  • Pre-operational Stage (2 to 7 years):

    • Symbolic Function Substage (2 to 4 years): Use of symbols/objects to represent others. Characterized by Egocentrism (unable to see other viewpoints) and Animism (believing inanimate objects are alive).

    • Intuitive Thought Substage (4 to 7 years): Start of reasoning. Characterized by Centration (focusing on one feature only), Irreversibility (cannot reverse events mentally), and Lack of Conservation (not realizing volume/weight stays the same despite appearance changes).

  • Concrete Operational Stage (7 to 12 years): Use of rules and concrete objects for logic. Features: Seriation (sorting by size), Classification, Reversibility ($2+4=6$, so $6-2=4$), Conservation, and Decentration (taking multiple views).

  • Formal Operational Stage (12+ years): Control over thoughts, understanding abstract concepts (morality), sequences of events, and consequences of actions.

• Piaget’s Theory of Intelligence:

  • Adaptation: Adjusting to the world through Assimilation (fitting new experiences into existing schemas) and Accommodation (changing schemas to deal with new experiences).

  • Equilibrium: A state of mental balance where schemas can explain experiences.

• Mindset Theory (Carol Dweck):

  • Fixed Mindset: Believing ability is innate and unchangeable. Results in avoiding challenges and fear of failure.

  • Growth Mindset: Believing effort and practice improve ability. Results in perseverance and positive response to feedback.

• Learning Theory (Daniel Willingham):

  • Knowledge comes before skill. Factual knowledge frees up Working Memory (limited capacity for sensory processing and decision-making).

  • Practice and Effort: Skills must be practiced until they are automatic (fixed in Long-term Memory).

  • Strategies: Teachers should use problems within ability that require effort and focus on social/physical development through self-regulation and delayed rewards.

• Studies in Development:

  • Piaget and Inhelder (1956) ‘Three Mountains’ Task: Investigated egocentrism in $100$ children ($21$ aged $4-6.5$, $30$ aged $6.5-8$, $33$ aged $8-9.5$, $16$ aged $9.5-12$). Children under $7$ (pre-operational) were egocentric; children over $7-9$ began to understand different viewpoints.

  • Gunderson et al. (2013) Parent Praise: Naturalistic observation of $53$ children ($29$ boys, $24$ girls) at $14$, $26$, and $38$ months. found Process Praise (praising effort/behavior) led to an Incremental Framework (belief that ability is changeable). Boys received more process praise ($24.4\%$) than girls ($10.3\%$).

Topic 2: Memory – How does your memory work?

• Information Processing Stages:

  1. Input: Sensory information from the environment (sight, hearing, touch, taste, smell).

  2. Encoding: Turning sensory input into a storable form (Acoustic, Visual, and Semantic).

  3. Storage: Retention of information for seconds or a lifetime.

  4. Retrieval: Recalling stored memories.

  5. Output: Behavioral response or retrieved information.

• Atkinson and Shiffrin’s Multi-store Model (1968):

  • Sensory Register: Immediate storage of sensory data. Very brief duration ($\approx 1$ second for iconic/visual; a few seconds for echoic/auditory). Requires Attention for transfer.

  • Short-term Memory (STM): Capacity is around $7 \pm 2$ chunks (Miller, 1956). Duration is $\approx 18-30$ seconds without Rehearsal. Encoding is mainly Acoustic.

  • Long-term Memory (LTM): Potentially limitless capacity and duration (minutes to a lifetime). Encoding is mainly Semantic (meaning-based).

  • Forgetting: STM forget via Displacement (new info pushes out old); LTM via decay, Interference (new info overwrites old), or retrieval failure.

• Types of Amnesia:

  • Anterograde: Inability to store new long-term memories following injury (STM stays intact); information cannot be transferred to LTM.

  • Retrograde: Inability to recall memories from before the injury. Sometimes specific timeframes or entire identities are forgotten.

• Bartlett’s Theory of Reconstructive Memory (1932):

  • Memories are not exact copies but Active Reconstructions based on Schemas (packets of knowledge based on experiences).

  • Memory Distortions:

    • Omissions: Leaving out unfamiliar/unpleasant details.

    • Transformations: Content changed to be more rational/familiar.

    • Rationalisation: Adding details to provide reasons.

    • Familiarisation: Aligning details with own culture/schema.

• Studies in Memory:

  • Bartlett (1932) ‘War of the Ghosts’: Participants read an unfamiliar Folk Tale and recalled it via Serial Reproduction or Repeated Reproduction. Found that the theme remained but details were rationalized (e.g., "canoes" became "boats").

  • Peterson and Peterson (1959): Lab experiment on $24$ students. Used Trigrams (three consonants like BFP) followed by counting backward in threes (to prevent rehearsal). After $3$ seconds, recall was over $80\%$. After $18$ seconds, recall was less than $10\%$. Conclusion: STM duration is very limited without rehearsal.

• Issues and Debates – Reductionism vs Holism:

  • Reductionism: Explaining behavior using basic parts or simple explanations (e.g., Multi-store model components). Often using laboratory experiments.

  • Holism: Understanding the whole person and multiple factors (e.g., Bartlett’s reconstructive memory considering social backgrounds and qualitative data).

Topic 3: Psychological Problems

• Unipolar Depression:

  • Symptoms (ICD-10): Feelings of sadness/low mood, lack of energy/motivation (main symptoms for at least $2$ weeks). Other symptoms: poor appetite/sleep, lack of self-esteem, guilt, suicidal thoughts.

  • Prevalence: $1$ in $15$ people suffer per year. Affects twice as many females as males.

  • Incidence: Rates increased $10 \times$ from the $1940s$ to the $1980s$. Modern living (sleep deprivation, etc.) is a contributor.

  • Genetic Explanation: Inherited through genes. Research on twins shows $46\%$ concordance for Monozygotic (MZ) twins and $20\%$ for Dizygotic (DZ) twins (McGuffin et al., 1996). Diathesis-stress Model suggests a genetic predisposition combined with a stressful life event.

  • Cognitive Explanation:

    • Beck’s Triad: Negative views of the Self, World, and Future.

    • Ellis’s ABC Model: Activating event leads to Beliefs (rational or irrational) which result in Consequences (emotional health or depression).

  • Treatments:

    • CBT: Challenging irrational thoughts and changing behaviors through functional analysis and homework.

    • Drug Therapy: SSRIs (block serotonin reuptake), SNRIs (block serotonin and noradrenaline reuptake), MAOIs (prevent enzyme breakdown), Tricyclics (boost effects by preventing reabsorption).

• Addiction:

  • Dependence Disorder (ICD-10): Diagnosis requires at least $3$ symptoms (e.g., tolerance, physical withdrawal, loss of control, ignoring harm) for $1$ month.

  • Genetic Explanation: Linked to the DDR2 A1 gene (affects brain reaction to pleasure) and fewer D2 dopamine receptors.

  • Learning Theory Explanation: Classical Conditioning (associations with positive feelings), Operant Conditioning (reinforcement of the "buzz"), and Social Learning Theory (imitation of role models).

  • Treatments: Detoxification assisted by methadone (for opiates) or nicotine patches; CBT including functional analysis of triggers.

• Studies in Psychological Problems:

  • Caspi et al. (2003): Longitudinal study of $847$ people. Participants with the short version of the 5-HTT gene and stressful life events were significantly more likely to develop depression ($17\%$ had two copies of short gene).

  • Young (2007): Tested CBT on $114$ American internet addicts ($58\%$ male). CBT showed long-term effectiveness up to $6$ months post-treatment.

Topic 4: The Brain and Neuropsychology

• Brain Structure:

  • Cerebrum: Largest part including the cortex. Surface features: Gyri (bumps) and Sulci (creases).

  • Frontal Lobe: Decision-making, impulse control, attention. Includes the motor cortex.

  • Temporal Lobe: Hearing (auditory cortex), speech production/processing, and memory.

  • Parietal Lobe: Perception (interpreting world) and touch (somatosensory cortex).

  • Occipital Lobe: Vision processing (visual cortex).

  • Cerebellum: Movement coordination, balance, and motor skills.

  • Brainstem: Connects spinal cord to brain; controls reflexes.

• Lateralisation and Communication:

  • Hemispheres: Brain is split into left and right. Left usually controls right-side body and language (Broca’s area). Right usually controls left-side body, spatial awareness, and creativity.

  • Corpus Callosum: Thick band of nerve fibers connecting hemispheres.

  • Asymmetrical Function: The two sides of the brain are not mirror images in role.

• Nervous System and Synapses:

  • CNS: Brain and Spinal Cord. PNS: Nerves connecting CNS to limbs/organs.

  • Synaptic Transmission: Electrical impulse travels down the Axon to the Terminal Button. Vesicles release Neurotransmitters into the Synapse. They bind to Receptors on the next neuron.

  • Neurotransmitters: Dopamine (attention/learning), Serotonin (mood), GABA (calmness).

• Neurological Disorders:

  • Visual Agnosia: Inability to recognize objects or names despite seeing them (parietal lobe damage).

  • Prosopagnosia: Face-blindness. Inability to recognize familiar faces (damaged fusiform face area/FFA).

  • Pre-frontal Cortex Damage: Results in impulsivity, aggression, and inability to control emotions.

• Studies in Neuropsychology:

  • Damasio et al. (1994) Phineas Gage: Used Gage’s skull and rod ($3\,cm$ diameter, $109\,cm$ long) measurements to build a 3D model. Found damage targeted the ventromedial region of the frontal lobes, confirming their role in impulse control.

  • Sperry (1968) ‘Split-Brain’: Studied $11$ participants with severed corpus callosa. Found visual info in the right field (left hemisphere) could be named, but info in the left field (right hemisphere) could not be named, though it could be identified by touch with the left hand.

Topic 5: Social Influence – How do others affect you?

• Core Concepts:

  • Obedience: Complying with orders from an authority figure.

  • Conformity: Matching behavior/beliefs to the majority. Types: Compliance (public change, private disagreement), Internalisation (adopting beliefs because of uncertainty), Identification (temporary change for group membership).

  • Deindividuation: Losing personal identity and responsibility in a crowd (anonymity).

• Bystander Intervention:

  • Bystander Effect: Reluctance to help others in need (e.g., Kitty Genovese murder).

  • Situational Factors: Diffusion of responsibility (thinking others will help), pluralistic ignorance (looking to others to define the emergency), and cost of helping.

  • Personal Factors: Competence (e.g., CPR training), mood, and perceived similarity to victim.

• Conformity Factors: Majority size ($3-4$ is optimal), unanimity (presence of a dissenting ally reduces conformity), and task difficulty.

• Obedience Factors: Proximity (of victim or expert), legitimacy (Yale vs run-down office), and personal responsibility. Authoritarian Personality measured by the F-Scale suggests some people are naturally more submissive to authority.

• Studies in Social Influence:

  • Piliavin et al. (1969) Subway Study: Field experiment in NYC subway carriage ($103$ trials). Victim (drunk or carrying cane). Cane victim helped in $95\%$ of trials ($62/65$); drunk victim helped in $50\%$ ($19/38$). Diffusion of responsibility was not found; larger groups were faster to help.

  • Haney, Banks, and Zimbardo (1973) Stanford Prison Study: $22$ participants randomly assigned as guards or prisoners. Paid $\$15$ a day. Guards became aggressive and prisoners submissive/distressed. Study stopped after $6$ days (planned for $14$). Demonstrates conformity to social roles.

Topic 11: Research Methods

• Variables:

  • Independent Variable (IV): Factor manipulated.

  • Dependent Variable (DV): Factor measured.

  • Operationalisation: Making variables specific and testable.

  • Extraneous Variables: Situational (noise, lighting), Participant (mood, ability), Order effects (fatigue), and Demand characteristics (guessing the aim).

• Research Design:

  • Independent Measures: Different people in each condition.

  • Repeated Measures: Same people in all conditions (requires counterbalancing).

  • Matched Pairs: Different people matched on specific traits.

• Sampling techniques:

  • Random: Everyone in target population has an equal chance.

  • Stratified: Proportional representation of subgroups.

  • Volunteer: Participants select themselves after an advert.

  • Opportunity: Studying whoever is available at the time.

• Hypotheses:

  • Null: Predicts no difference/relationship (e.g., "There will be no difference… any difference is due to chance.")

  • Alternative (Directional/Non-directional): Predicts an outcome (e.g., "Adults will recall more words…").

• Methodologies:

  • Experiments: Laboratory (controlled), Field (natural), Natural (IV occurs naturally).

  • Interviews: Structured (pre-set), Semi-structured, Unstructured (free-flowing).

  • Observations: Naturalistic vs Controlled; Overt vs Covert; Participant vs Non-participant.

• Ethics (BPS Principles): Respect (consent, privacy, right to withdraw), Integrity, Social Responsibility, and Maximising Benefit/Minimising Harm (protection from harm, deception, debriefing).

Data Analysis and Statistical Representation

• Descriptive Statistics:

  • Mean ($\bar{x}$): Sum of scores divided by $n$ ($\frac{\sum x}{n}$).

  • Median: Middle score when data is ordered.

  • Mode: Most frequent score (bi-modal/multi-modal).

  • Range: Highest score minus lowest score.

• Math Skills:

  • Percentages: $\frac{\text{score}}{\text{total}} \times 100$.

  • Ratios: Proportional comparison (e.g., $2:1$).

  • Decimals: Often required to $2$ decimal places.

  • Significant Figures: Digits with meaning based on accuracy level ($0.00378 \rightarrow 0.0038$ for $2$ sig figs).

• Graphing:

  • Normal Distribution: Mean, median, and mode are similar, forming a Bell Curve.

  • Histograms: For continuous data, no gaps between bars.

  • Bar Charts: For categorical data, gaps between bars.

  • Scatter Diagrams: Used for correlations; shows a Line of Best Fit.