IB Psychology SL Paper 1 Practice Paper | 10 SAQ and ERQ Questions, 100 Marks, 2 Hours

(Biological approach) (a) Explain how functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) measures brain activity through the blood-oxygen signal, and state its strength in spatial resolution. (b) Using Maguire et al.’s study of London taxi drivers, explain how the technique supports the localisation of brain function.

Answer: (a) fMRI uses a strong magnetic field to detect changes in the oxygenation of haemoglobin, the BOLD signal. When neurons in an area become more active, local blood flow and oxygenated haemoglobin rise, so the scan shows the more active regions. It has good spatial resolution and is non-invasive. (b) Maguire et al. compared London taxi drivers with a control group and found a larger posterior hippocampus and a smaller anterior hippocampus in the drivers, with posterior volume correlating positively with years of driving experience. The result links long-term spatial navigation to hippocampal structure, supporting the view that different brain areas carry out different functions (localisation) and that experience can change brain structure. Marking: 3 marks for the technique (magnetic field, BOLD, blood flow); 3 marks for the study (sample, comparison, result); 1 mark for the link. Total 7 marks.

(Biological approach) (a) Explain the role of acetylcholine in learning and memory formation, and state the effects of an antagonist and of an agonist. (b) Using Martinez and Kesner’s rat T-maze experiment, explain how neurotransmitter research provides evidence for a link between physiology and behaviour.

Answer: (a) Acetylcholine is an excitatory neurotransmitter in the central and peripheral nervous systems. Cholinergic pathways in the hippocampus and cortex are involved in learning and memory encoding; blocking the receptors with an antagonist weakens transmission while an agonist strengthens it, so drugs can be used to manipulate cholinergic activity and test memory performance. (b) Martinez and Kesner trained rats to run a T-maze for food and then injected different drugs. Rats given scopolamine, an antagonist, made more errors and took longer to reach the food, while rats given physostigmine, an agonist, performed better. The results show that cholinergic transmission affects memory formation and provide experimental evidence for a causal link between neurotransmitters and behaviour, although the limits of generalising from animal studies must be evaluated in the essay. Marking: 3 marks for the mechanism, 3 marks for the study (design, results, control) and 1 mark for the link. Total 7 marks.

(Biological approach) (a) Explain what is meant by neuroplasticity, and state which structural changes show that the adult brain remains plastic. (b) Using Draganski et al.’s juggling study, explain how experience changes the adult brain, and state one limitation of the study.

Answer: (a) Neuroplasticity is the ability of the nervous system to reorganise with experience, learning and injury. It includes changes in the number and strength of synapses, increased dendritic branching, changes in grey matter volume and the reassignment of brain area function. Plasticity continues throughout life and remains evident in adulthood. (b) Draganski et al. asked adults who had never juggled to practise a three-ball cascade for three months, scanning their brains before practice, after practice and three months after practice stopped. Grey matter volume in the mid-temporal area increased after practice and fell back after training stopped, showing that short-term training can change the adult brain. Limitation: the sample was small, the causal direction between grey matter change and performance is uncertain, and scan resolution limits inference about micro-level mechanisms. Marking: 3 marks for the definition and mechanism, 3 marks for the study and 1 mark for the limitation. Total 7 marks.

(Cognitive approach) (a) Explain the coding, capacity and duration of the three stores of the multi-store model (MSM): sensory memory, short-term memory and long-term memory. (b) Using Peterson and Peterson’s letter-counting experiment, explain why short-term memory lasts only briefly without rehearsal.

Answer: (a) Sensory memory lasts a very short time, about half a second for vision, has a large capacity and stores information in its raw sensory form. Short-term memory has a limited capacity of about seven items, lasts roughly eighteen to thirty seconds, codes mainly acoustically and needs rehearsal to be maintained. Long-term memory has almost unlimited capacity, lasts a long time and codes mainly semantically. Information passes from sensory memory through attention into short-term memory and is encoded into long-term memory, and forgetting may result from decay or interference. (b) Peterson and Peterson presented three letters and then asked participants to count backwards in threes from a given number to prevent rehearsal, testing recall after 3, 6, 9, 12, 15 and 18 seconds. Recall fell as the delay increased, with only about ten per cent correct after 18 seconds, showing that short-term memory decays quickly without rehearsal. Marking: 1 mark per store and 1 mark for the flow; 2 marks for the design and 1 mark for the results. Total 7 marks.

(Cognitive approach) (a) Explain the nature of schemas, and how they lead to omission, distortion and rationalisation in memory. (b) Using Bartlett’s “War of the Ghosts” study, explain why memory is seen as active reconstruction rather than word-for-word reproduction.

Answer: (a) A schema is a mental framework that organises past experience. It allows quick understanding of situations and fills in missing detail, but it also biases encoding and retrieval: schema-consistent details are remembered better, while inconsistent details are omitted, distorted or rationalised, producing systematic memory errors. (b) Bartlett asked English participants to read a Native American story, “The War of the Ghosts”, and to retell it repeatedly. In later retellings the supernatural elements faded, canoeing and hunting details were changed into forms that fitted English cultural expectations, and the story became shorter. Participants did not reproduce the text word for word but reconstructed it through their own schemas, so Bartlett argued that memory is an active, constructive process. Marking: 1 mark for the definition and 3 marks for the effects; 1 mark for the method, 1 for the findings and 1 for the conclusion. Total 7 marks.

(Cognitive approach) (a) Explain how System 1 and System 2 thinking differ in speed, level of control and mental effort. (b) Using Tversky and Kahneman’s wheel-of-fortune anchoring experiment, explain how heuristics pull judgement away from the rational answer.

Answer: (a) System 1 is fast, automatic, intuitive and low effort, relying on associations and shortcuts. System 2 is slow, controlled and needs working memory and calculation, and is used for complex or novel judgements. Both operate together, but System 1 often dominates everyday judgement and so produces systematic bias. (b) Tversky and Kahneman first had participants spin a wheel of fortune that stopped at a random number, 10 or 65, and then estimate the percentage of African countries in the United Nations. The group that saw the higher random number gave a significantly higher estimate, showing that judgement is pulled towards an anchor even when the anchor is plainly irrelevant, which is the anchoring and adjustment heuristic. Marking: 1.5 marks per system and 1 mark for the comparison; 1.5 marks for the design, 1.5 for the results and 1 for the conclusion. Total 7 marks.

(Sociocultural approach) (a) Explain the three processes in social identity theory: social categorisation, social identification and social comparison. (b) Using Tajfel’s minimal group study, explain how group membership alone produces in-group favouritism in the allocation of resources.

Answer: (a) Social categorisation divides people into an in-group and an out-group; social identification derives self-esteem and belonging from group membership; social comparison maintains positive distinctiveness through comparison with out-groups, producing in-group favouritism and out-group derogation. (b) Tajfel first asked schoolboys to estimate the number of dots on a picture and then told them they belonged to the Klee group or the Kandinsky group, although the grouping was in fact unrelated to their estimates. When allocating tokens the boys favoured their own group and even chose options that widened the gap between groups at the cost of a smaller gain for their own group. The results show that categorisation alone is enough to produce in-group favouritism, supporting the claim that group membership shapes resource allocation. Marking: 1 mark per process; 2 marks for the method, 1 for the results and 1 for the link. Total 7 marks.

(Sociocultural approach) (a) Explain the four processes of observational learning in social cognitive theory: attention, retention, reproduction and motivation. (b) Using Bandura et al.’s Bobo doll experiment, explain how adult modelling, vicarious reinforcement and gender differences affect children’s aggressive behaviour.

Answer: (a) Attention: the observer must notice the model’s behaviour and its consequences. Retention: the behaviour is stored as a symbolic representation. Reproduction: the observer must be able to carry out the behaviour. Motivation: expected rewards or punishments decide whether the behaviour is performed, through direct, vicarious and self-reinforcement, and self-efficacy also affects performance. (b) Bandura et al. showed children an adult behaving aggressively towards an inflatable doll, both verbally and physically; another group saw a non-aggressive model and a control group saw no model. Children who saw the aggressive model imitated more aggressive acts in free play, and boys imitated more than girls. When the model was later punished, imitation decreased, showing that vicarious reinforcement affects performance. Marking: 1 mark per process; 1.5 marks for the design and 1.5 for the results. Total 7 marks.

(Biological approach, extended response) Discuss the role of neurotransmitters and hormones in human behaviour, supporting your argument with evidence on acetylcholine, serotonin, cortisol and oxytocin, and evaluate the strengths and limitations of biological explanations in terms of causal inference, reductionism and generalisation from animal studies.

Answer: Knowledge: neurotransmitters are released at synapses and bind to receptors, changing the excitability of the next neuron and influencing learning, emotion and motivation, while hormones are secreted by endocrine glands, travel in the blood and act more slowly but for longer, affecting stress responses, attachment and sexual behaviour. Evidence one, acetylcholine and memory: in Martinez and Kesner’s rat maze study an antagonist increased errors and an agonist improved performance. Evidence two, serotonin and depression: Caspi et al. followed carriers of the short allele of the 5-HTT gene and found they were more likely to report depressive symptoms after more negative life events, showing a gene by environment interaction. Evidence three, cortisol and memory: Newcomer et al. gave healthy participants high doses of cortisol and found poorer performance on declarative memory tasks, supporting the view that cortisol under chronic stress impairs hippocampal function. Evidence four, oxytocin and trust: Kosfeld et al. used a trust game with intranasal oxytocin and found the treatment group was more willing to transfer money to a stranger. Application: these findings support drug treatments such as SSRIs that alter serotonin and support stress-management interventions, and they help explain individual differences. Evaluation: most human studies are correlational, so causation is uncertain; animal findings are limited by species differences; biological explanations tend to be reductionist and neglect cognitive appraisal and sociocultural factors; the diathesis-stress model, combining genetic vulnerability with environmental stress, explains more than a purely biological account; and effects in oxytocin research are small and hard to replicate. Marking: 8 marks for knowledge, 6 marks for application to evidence and practice, 8 marks for critical evaluation of method, causation, reductionism and alternative explanations. Total 22 marks.

(Sociocultural approach, extended response) Discuss the influence of culture on behaviour and cognition, using evidence on conformity and on classification strategies to illustrate cultural differences, and evaluate the methodological limitations of cross-cultural research in terms of cultural bias, essentialism and causal inference.

Answer: Knowledge: culture is the set of shared beliefs, norms and practices transmitted through socialisation. Individualist cultures stress an independent self and personal achievement, while collectivist cultures stress an interdependent self and group harmony, as in Hofstede’s cultural dimensions and Markus and Kitayama’s theory of self-construal. Evidence one, conformity: Asch’s line judgement study with American samples found about one third of responses conformed to a wrong majority at least once; Berry replicated the study with Temne and Scottish samples and found higher conformity in collectivist, subsistence-based communities; Smith and Bond’s meta-analysis found conformity higher overall in collectivist than individualist cultures. Evidence two, cognition: Cole and Scribner asked Kpelle farmers in Liberia to group objects and found they preferred functional pairing such as a knife with an orange, whereas people with Western schooling preferred taxonomic grouping by category; when asked to sort “the way a wise man would”, the farmers also produced taxonomic groups, showing that schooling and cultural practice shape classification strategies. Application: cross-cultural findings warn counsellors and teachers against judging normality or abnormality by the norms of one culture alone. Evaluation: cross-cultural research often uses Western instruments and scales to measure other cultures, creating cultural bias; within-culture variation is often larger than between-culture variation, which invites essentialism; researcher effects and problems of translation equivalence threaten validity; globalisation blurs cultural boundaries, and Hofstede’s national-level data should not be applied directly to individuals; most studies are correlational, so the causal direction between culture and behaviour is uncertain. Marking: 8 marks for knowledge, 6 marks for application to evidence and practice, 8 marks for critical evaluation of method, cultural bias, essentialism and causation. Total 22 marks.