Andrade (doodling)

I, Jyotika Varmani, tutor students of Psychology at all levels. I reside in Mumbai and tutor students online. You can contact me personally on my e-mail id jyotikapsychology@gmail.com or call/message me on 9892507784 for enquiries.

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Please note!!! This lesson is now available on YouTube with my narration:

You can view the first part - the explanation of the study below:

You can view the second part - the evaluation of the study below:

 You can view the third part - discussion of how to prepare this study for paper I below:

You can view the fourth and final part - discussion of how to prepare this study for paper II below

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Welcome! This post presents and illustrates the Andrade (doodle) as per the requirements of the IB IGCSE AS 9990 syllabus including the study's background, aims, research method, measured and manipulated variables, controls, sample characteristics, results, findings, conclusions, strengths and weaknesses, ethics, and evaluation. It also includes an explanation of keyterms from an operational point-of-view. Included in the last sections are specimen, model answers to paper 1 and paper 2 pertaining to this study.

(For a similar discussion on the Dement and Kleitman study, please click here.)
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Title of Paper: What does doodling do?

Researcher - Jackie Andrade

Approach - Cognitive

Original Paper Reference -  Andrade, J. (2010). What does doodling do? Applied Cognitive Psychology, 24,  100-106. DOI: 10.1002/acp.1561

Syllabus Reference - Pg. 16 of the CIE 9990 syllabus found here.


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(*Please click on any image to enlarge it)

 Quick Synopsis

Professor Andrade wanted to test whether doodling - which is often engaged in by people who are performing boring tasks - could actually facilitate their performance on their main task. She found that this was indeed the case through a study in which she asked participants to doodle as they performed their main task of monitoring a phone call.

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Syllabus-Based Understanding of the Study
(The requirements of the syllabus for this study are found on Pg. 16 here).
Part - I

(Please Note: Notes preceded by an asterisk and italicized are not required by the syllabus. Nonetheless, they are useful for study evaluation).

• The psychology being investigated in the study:
• This study investigated the effect of doodling on the simultaneous performance of a task. Therefore, it looked into the impact of doodling on any cognitive task i.e. any task demanding a person's attention.  

•  The background of the study:
•  This study was based on the following observations:
• People tend to daydream when faced with a boring task which distracts their attention from the task they need to perform. Past research has scanned the brain to find that higher brain activity in people performing boring tasks is associated with daydreaming.

• Some people doodle i.e. sketch aimlessly as they perform a boring task like listening to a lecture. Past research shows that interaction with external stimuli as done in doodling, can reduce daydreaming.

• Past research showed that if two attention-demanding activities are performed at once, then a person's attention is divided between these tasks, reducing his quality of performance on both tasks.

• However, research also suggested that doodling helps improve performance on a simultaneously performed boring task by either aiding the person's concentration, or preventing his level of arousal from dipping.  

• In terms of working memory, doodling increases load on working memory, but does not demand as many executive resources as doodling does. It places a continuous, low load on executive resources, which prevents working memory from using these resources for daydreaming.

• If doodling as a secondary task can help a person control his mind from wavering off i.e. prevent him from daydreaming, then this finding could be very useful for research in psychology as well as for people performing routine tasks in their daily lives.

Background of the Andrade (doodling) Study

•  The aim(s) of the study:
• The study aimed to show that doodling aids concentration. Operationally, it aimed to show that doodling would:
1. help participants accurately monitor a telephone message; and 
2. increase the depth with which they processed the message i.e. improve their recall of the message

Aims of the Andrade (doodling) Study

• The procedure of the study:
•  Research method 
• A laboratory experiment with an independent measures design was conducted in the present study. The independent variable was manipulated at two levels:
• doodling while monitoring a telephone message (experimental group)
• no doodling while monitoring a telephone message (control group) 

Research Method of the Andrade (doodling) Study

• Sample Size and Demographics - 
• 40 adults (18-55 years of age), participated in the study. 
• 20 participants (18 female, 2 male) participated in the control group. 20 participants (17 female, 3 male) participated in the experimental group.
• 1 participant in the experimental group was replaced as he did not doodle.

Sample Characteristics of the Andrade (doodling) Study

• Sampling Technique
•  A convenience sample (N=40) consisting entirely of the members of the participant panel of the cognitive research unit of the University conducting the study was employed. These participants were paid a nominal fee to participate in the study.

• Experimental Design
• An independent measures design was used in the present study. The independent variable was manipulated at two levels:
• doodling while monitoring a telephone message (experimental group)
• no doodling while monitoring a telephone message (control group)

• Participants were randomly assigned to either of the two groups i.e. the EG or the CG.

•  Controls
•  Situational Control(s)
• Induction of Boredom - Participants were recruited immediately after they had completed another experiment. This was done to prevent them from being alert and active during the present experiment.

• Instructional Control(s)
  • Instructions regarding Telephone Message - All participants were informed in the instructions that the message they would monitor would be dull. This was done to prevent them from trying to find anything interesting in the message, and thereby recall it better than usual. 
   
  • Instructions regarding the Doodling Task - The doodling task was described to the experimental group as 'something to alleviate boredom.' It was not conveyed at any stage that the task was expected to improve cognitive performance, so that the participants would not pay too much attention to it and instead perform it treat it like natural doodling.
    
    
• Material Control(s)
  • Standardized Telephone Message - The telephone message was recorded in a fairly monotone voice with an average speaking rate of 227 words per minute, and played at a comfortable listening volume. This assured that nothing about the message distracted the participants or caused them to pay any special attention to it.
   
• Task Control(s)
• Auditory primary task - Since doodling uses the visual sense, the primary task (telephone monitoring) was designed to use the auditory sense. This ensured that both the tasks did not interfere with each other by dividing the resources of the same sense amongst themselves.

• Surprise Memory Test - Participants were not informed that they would be tested for their memory of the telephone message. This ensured that they did not intentionally adopt any strategies to improve their memory for the message. Participants were also asked if they had suspected that their memory would be tested, and had deliberately tried to remember the message.

• Simple Doodling Task - Participants were instructed to shade in printed shapes presented on the response sheet instead of being asked to doodle freely. This was done so that the participants would not take the doodling task too seriously, and treat it as the main task; or become conscious of their doodling and pay too much attention to it. This attempted to retain the spontaneity of real-world doodling.

• Counterbalancing of Recall Order - Half the participants of the CG and EG respectively, were asked to recall the names of places first and the names of the party-goers afterwards; while this order was reversed for the remaining participants in both groups. This controlled for any effects of order of presentation on memory.

•  Scoring Control(s)

• Compensatory Scoring - Scoring of participants' recall task was done in a way that any false alarms were accounted for, and plausible mis-hearings were scored as correct. This assured that guessing on the part of participants did not lead them to attain higher scores.

Controls of the Andrade (doodling) Study

• Tasks
• Monitoring a Telephone Message - All participants in the experiment were assigned to the task of monitoring of a recorded telephone message of two and a half minutes. 
• The message consisted of a speaker inviting the participant to a party, and naming a few people who were likely to attend the party. Participants were asked to write down the names of the people who would be definitely or probably attending the party.

• Doodling - Half the participants - the experimental group - were asked to perform a doodling task while monitoring the message while the other half -the control group - were asked to simply monitor the message.
• Participants were instructed to shade squares and circles presented on their response sheet as the doodling task.

• Recall of the Telephone Message - All participants were given a surprise recall test of the names they had heard in the telephone message, including the names of places which they did not write down during the monitoring task. 

• Half the participants of the CG and EG respectively, were asked to recall the names of places first and the names of the party-goers afterwards; while this order was reversed for the remaining participants in both groups.

Tasks of the Andrade (doodling) Study

• Measured Variables
• Monitoring of the Telephone Message
• All participants had to note down on a sheet of paper, the names of party-goers that they heard on the telephone message that they monitored.

• Memory for the Monitored Telephone Message
• All participants were asked to recall the names of party-goers and places that they had heard on the telephone message that they had monitored.

• Manipulated Variables
• Doodling during Telephone Message Monitoring
 
This variable was studied at the following levels:

• Doodling Condition - At this level, participants had to doodle i.e. shade in the squares and circles presented on their response sheet as they monitored the telephone message. The EG was exposed to this condition.
• No Doodling Condition - At this level, participants did not have to doodle as they monitored the telephonic message. The CG was exposed to this condition.

• Ethical issues regarding the study:
• Deception - Participants were not informed about the complete purpose for which they had to monitor the telephone message. Specifically, they were not informed that there would be memory test that they had to perform after monitoring the message. However, the researchers did apologize to the participants for misleading them about the same. They also debriefed the participants at the end of the study.

• *Materials used in the study: 
• An audio cassette tape containing a recorded telephone message.
• The message was recorded in a fairly monotonous voice, at an average speaking rate of 227 words per minute.
• The script consisted of the names of eight people attending a party, and names of three people and a cat who would not attend. The names of eight places were also mentioned, along with much irrelevant material.

•  Response sheets for the participants to write down the names they monitored over the telephone message, and pencils to write the same.
• Experimental participants received a sheet with shapes of approximately 1 cm. diameter printed on a piece of A4 paper, with ten shapes per row, and alternating rows of squares and circles. A 4.5 cm. margin on the left hand side provided space for writing the monitored names.
• Control participants wrote monitored names on a sheet of lined paper.

•  *Data Analysis
• Certain considerations were made while scoring participants while assessing their monitoring and recall to prevent them from gaining scores on the basis of mere guessing.
• Any response with plausible mishearing like 'Greg' instead of 'Craig' was scored as correct since it reflected that the participant had paid attention to the monitoring.
• New names, and names mentioned on the tape as distractions were scored as wrong.
• Unclear responses were ignored.
• After accounting for these possibilities, monitoring performance was scored as the number of correct names minus false alarms. 

•  Non-parametric analysis was used since the data were not normally distributed.
• Fifteen experimental participants out of twenty, and nine control participants out of twenty, obtained the maximum score of eight out of eight correct.

• Recall performance was scored separately for names and places, (making all considerations mentioned in the first point of this section for each). This enabled researchers to compare memory for stimuli that participants were asked to pay attention to i.e. names and those that they were not asked to pay attention to i.e. places.
• An additional consideration here was that plausible mishearing had to be the same in the monitoring and recall phases, to assure that it was indeed a mishearing and not guessing.

• Results of the Study: 

• Key Quantitative Finding(s)
• Doodling Results:
  
• Participants in the experiment group shaded mean 36.3 printed shapes on the response sheet (Range = 3-110).

•  Monitoring Results:
• Control participants correctly monitored mean 6.9 (SD=1.3) names of party goers in the telephone message.
• Experimental participants correctly monitored mean 7.7 (SD=0.6) names of party goers in the telephone message.
• The inferential statistical test used i.e. Mann-Whitney U=124, p=0.01, one-tailed showed that the experimental participants monitored the telephone message significantly better than the control participants.

•  Recall Results:
• Experimental participants recalled mean 7.5 pieces of information (names and places combined).
• Control participants recalled mean 5.8 pieces of information (names and places combined).
• Therefore, experimental group had a 29% better recall of pieces of information compared to the control group.
• The inferential statistical test used i.e. mixed measures ANOVA, F(1,38)=54.9,p<0.001 showed that names of party-goers were better recalled than incidental places for both groups.
• The inferential statistical test used i.e. mixed measures ANOVA, F(1,38)=6.0,p=0.02 showed that the experimental group had better recall for both names and places compared to the control group.
• The inferential statistical test used i.e. mixed measures ANOVA, F(1,31)=6.9,p=0.01 showed that even if the data of participants who suspected a recall test were eliminated, the experimental group had better recall than the control group.

•  Combined Results of Recall and Monitoring:
• The inferential statistical test used i.e. mixed measures ANOVA, F(1,37)=3.8,p=0.058 showed that when monitoring performance was entered as a covariate of recall performance, then the experimental group had an even better performance than the control group rather than if either performance was considered independently.

•  Auxiliary Findings:
• Control participants showed more false alarms (total=5) while performing the recall task than experimental participants (total=1). This indicated that they probably engaged in daydreaming while performing the task which affected their recall, as compared to experimental participants whose doodling perhaps prevented them from daydreaming.  

• Conclusions drawn from the Study: 
• Doodling has a beneficial effect on monitoring and recall of boring material.
• Doodling aids concentration, most probably by reducing daydreaming. 
• The amount of resources a person normally uses in daydreaming are taken by doodling, leaving little or no resources for daydreaming. 

Conclusion of the Andrade (doodling) Study

•  *Suggestions for Improvement of research:
• The present study proposes that reduction in daydreaming is how doodling improves performance for boring tasks. Future research using psycho-physiological methods can look into another possible explanation - that doodling helps maintaining a level of optimal arousal, that enables a person to attend to boring stimuli.

• The present study attempted to induce boredom in participants by asking them participate in the study after completing participation in another study. This, however, did not necessarily lead to participants feeling bored. Further research can use more definitive techniques to ensure boredom in participants.

• More research is also needed in the area of understanding boredom in distracting attention and tasks that can help alleviate this boredom.

•  Further research can try to incorporate natural doodling into the research task. Shading in shapes, as done in the present study may not be equivalent to spontaneous, real-world doodling.

•  Further research can also look into real-world application of this study i.e. the impact of doodling on reducing mind-wandering which causes people to engage in depressive rumination or worrying.

• Strengths and Weaknesses of all elements of the study:
• Evaluation of Research Method
• Since a laboratory experiment was conducted, it gave a high degree of control to the researchers. The researchers exercised important controls such as setting up a completely auditory primary task, conducting a surprise memory test, etc. which all rarely occur in the real-world.
• However, the disadvantage of the high degree of control is that the relevance and applicability of the study to real-life situations (ecological validity) is questionable. Firstly, few boring tasks in the real world are purely auditory or visual in nature, a combination of the two is typically seen. Secondly, doodling as conducted in the study i.e. by shading in of shapes is not the way it is done in real life; people tend to draw shapes and figures while doodling. 

• Evaluation of  Sample
• The sample comprised of more females than males in both the experimental and control groups. This reduced the representativeness of the sample, as an inclusion of an equal number of both participants would be much more desirable.
• The sample was also based on convenience, and a more representative sample in terms of diversity would be more desirable for increased generalizabillity.

• Evaluation of  Experimental Design
• An independent measures design was used in the study. However, it is known that individuals tend to vary with respect to their memory capacity. A repeated measures design compensates for any individual differences in the memory of participants.
• A strength of an independent measures design is that it does not allow participants to become familiar with a task by performing it repeatedly. In the present study, the design assured that participants did not become better or worse in monitoring the telephone message, which would have been the case if they had practice of performing the same task once before.

• Evaluation of  Controls
• The study employed a number of controls, right from the planning to the scoring stages, which gives the study a very high degree of psychometric soundness. For example, a control like a standardized telephone message for every participant made the task very reliable. Another control, instructing participants to perform the doodling task casually, increased the validity of the study because the participants focus remained on the primary task, and did not deviate to the secondary task in line with the aim of the study.

• Evaluation of Tasks
• Primary Task - Telephone Message Monitoring
• The task of monitoring a telephone message with a list of specific names of people and places allowed researchers to have a very objective measure of memory. It was also designed to be purely auditory in nature, so that the primary and secondary tasks did not interfere with each other.
• On the flipside, however, real-world telephone messages seldom have a clear-cut list of objects, and people do not need to pay much attention to most telephone conversations they have. Besides, real-world conversations are filled with non-verbal communication which was not the case with the standardized tape used int the study. This greatly reduced the ecological validity of the task.

• Secondary Task - Doodling
• The doodling task was well-constructed in a way that it would not demand too much attention from participants, just like real-world doodling is a task associated with absent-mindedness.
• On the flipside, however, the task was limited in nature since shading shapes is only one component of doodling. Doodling typically involves creation of some random shapes, or even complete drawings. 

• Measurement Task - Recall of telephone message
• The recall task was very objective in nature since participants had to remember  a list of names, and not make any interpretations of their own. Besides, it was also given to participants as a surprise task, making it valid - performance was not subject to deliberate recall effort by participants. Also, it had ecological validity to the extent that we often need to recall information in real world which we might not know we need at some point of time in future, like an important point made by a teacher during a lecture. The recall task was also counterbalanced between participants to eliminate effects of presentation order, adding to its merit.

• Evaluation of Variables
• Both - the measured and manipulated variables - were very clearly operationally defined, and were completely in-line with the aim of the study. For example, the aim of the study was to show that doodling aids concentration. Operationally, this was expressed by including shading of random shapes with a pencil as the manipulated variable i.e. doodling; and monitoring and remembering a standardized telephone message as measured variables (providing evidence for concentration).

• Evaluation of Ethics
• Since participants were recruited from a pool, and were paid a small fee, it can be inferred that they were recruited with their consent. Besides, no element of the study subjected them to any psychological or physical harm. Participants' confidentiality is maintained in the research paper. The paper also mentions that the participants were debriefed at the end of the study. Ethics relating tot he right to withdraw and privacy are not discussed or indicated in the paper.
• Deception was the only ethical issue of the study. Participants were not informed about the complete purpose for which they had to monitor the telephone message. Specifically, they were not informed that there would be memory test that they had to perform after monitoring the message. However, the researchers did apologize to the participants for misleading them about the same. So, deception was justified as a necessity of the study design.

•  Evaluation of Scoring and Interpretation
• Data was analysed very carefully and using a variety of techniques in the present study. Firstly, the data of one experimental participant who did not perform the doodling task was discarded, and the required data was obtained from a replacement. Secondly, mis-hearings and false alarms were accounted for by specific rules. Lastly, appropriate parametric and non-parametric statistics were used to interpret findings. This gave a high degree of psychometric soundness to the study.

Strengths and Weaknesses of the Andrade (doodling) Study

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Part - II

• Describe and evaluate the research methods used:

(Method of evaluation of a research method can be found on Pg. 19 of the CIE 9990 syllabus here.) 

• Description:

• Please refer to the sections 'Research Methods' and 'Controls' within the section 'Procedure' in Part I for the description.

• Evaluation:

• Please refer to the sections 'Evaluation of Research Method' and 'Ethics' within the section 'Strengths and Weaknesses of all elements of the study' in  Part I for the evaluation.

• Use of Experimental and Control Conditions:

• In the present study, the aim was to study the impact of doodling on the concentration for a boring task. 
• The EG performed the doodling task alongwith monitoring a boring telephone message so that the researchers could study the impact of doodling on concentration.
• The performance of the CG who did not doodle as they heard the same boring message, served as the baseline that enable comparison to see how much concentration improved as a result of including doodling as a secondary task alongwith the boring primary task.

• Consider how the study relates to psychological issues and debates:

(The issues and debates to be mastered at the AS level can be found on Pg. 16 of the CIE 9990 syllabus here.) 

•  Application of Psychology to Everyday Life:
• The present study looked into attention, a mental process that is used constantly in everyday life. More specifically, it looked at how attention can be improved for boring tasks, which are a part of the everyday routine of every person. For example, most students find studying boring, homemakers find cooking and cleaning boring, and workers find tasks like data entry, monitoring people or things, filing, etc. boring; and are frequently found to daydream in such situations. Therefore, the theme of the study is highly relevant to everyday life.

• Past research suggests that daydreaming can often take the shape of depressive ruminations and worry, which can lead a person to maintain a state of sorrow. Thus, doodling can reduce the mental resources a person spends in negative thinking, thereby playing a role in the treatment of psychological conditions like depression and anxiety, and related disorders. Thus, the present study has high usefulness.

• However, the applicability of this particular study is also restrained by the following factors, that have been elaborated in part I above:
• The study was a laboratory experiment with high degree of controls, and the tasks did not accurately represent real-world activities. Thus, the findings of the study to the real world can only be determined by further fieldwork.

• The sample was not representative since it had significantly more females than males, and the sample was based on convenience. The generalizability of the findings, thus, becomes limited.

•  Individual and Situational Explanations:
• The present study attributes a lack of attention to the nature of the task being performed. That is, it considers that many tasks are innately boring. It's primary task, telephone message monitoring task, was assumed to cause boredom to every participant of the study. Thus, it provides a situational explanation for lack of attention.

• Further, the study posits that daydreaming is a direct result of the boring nature of the task an individual is expected to perform. Doodling is assumed to work as an initiative that could reduce the daydreaming caused by the situation which is boring by nature. Thus, the study assumes that the concentration of a person is directly contingent upon the nature of the task that the individual is required to perform.

• A strength of this explanation is that it recognizes that being attentive is not always a choice individual, however, the individual can regulate his behavior in a way that can reduce the impact of the situation. Thereby, the findings of the study present a useful technique i.e. doodling for the individual to deal with the situation i.e. performing a boring task.

• A weakness of this explanation is that it assumes that the situation will impact every individual in the same way. In reality, there are many people who claim to enjoy or perform without disturbance, routine and mundane tasks. Not everyone engages in daydreaming while performing such tasks. 

•  Nature v/s Nurture
• This debate does not apply to the present study since the study does not attempt to explain how attention is manifested in an individual.

• The use of children in psychological research
• The use of animals in psychological research
• These issues do not apply to the present study since it involved the participation of neither children nor animals.

Andrade Doodling Study Evaluation

•  Apply the findings of the study to the real world:
• The findings of the present study - that doodling can improve concentration - is applicable to any situation where an individual must perform a boring task, and also has the opportunity to doodle at the same time. Some real-life instances of this applicability are as follows:
• A student can doodle while passively reading through study material or listening to an audiotape of the same to prevent himself from daydreaming;
• Candidates for an interview can doodle as they await their turn and mentally revise their answers to possible questions, to prevent themselves from creating anxious thoughts;
• Security guards can doodle as they watch live CCTV footage to maintain their attention through the monotony; etc.

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Explanation of Key Concepts

Following is an explanation of key concepts specific to the present study:

• Doodling
• Doodling is an activity in which a person draws aimlessly, typically engaged in when the person is feeling bored.
• In the present study, it was operationally defined as the pencil shading in of printed shapes presented to participants on the recall sheet.
• Daydreaming / Mind Wandering
• Daydreaming is engagement in fantasies during active hours, typically occurring when a person is bored.
• It is a mental activity that takes away some attentional resources needed to be paid to a task at hand.
• In the present study, it was supposed that the monitoring task was boring, and would hence cause participants to engage in daydreaming.
• Boredom
• This is a mental state charactized by a difficulty in maintaining attention to a task at hand.
• In the present study, it was believed that the monitoring task by nature, would cause the participants to have difficulty attending to it.
• Monitoring
• Engaging complete attention to a given stimulus over a period of time is called monitoring.
• In the present study, this was operationally defined as noting down the names of party-goers mentioned on a recorded telephone message.
• Recall
• Remembering information one was exposed to previously is called recall.
• The present study employed incidental recall which is remembering information which has been learnt without an intention of remembering it.
• Depth of Processing
• This refers to the intensity with which learnt information is elaborated upon before being stored in memory.
• Information which is pondered upon or repeated for a number of times is believed to more deeply processed than information which is merely encountered once.
• In the present study, it was believed that daydreaming would cause control participants to not process information deeply as they would merely glance over it, while doodling would reduce stress on attention, thereby causing the experimental participants to attend more deeply to the message, and thereby process it more deeply.
• Central Executive Load
• In the working memory model, the central executive is the component in-charge of compiling information coming in from other components corresponding to vision and hearing of a person.
• Central executive load, then refers to the information that is being processed by the central executive at a given time.
• In the present study, the participants' central executive was loaded with either daydreaming and monitoring, or doodling and monitoring, depending on the group they were assigned to.
• Working Memory
• The working memory model, at its basic form, is a conceptualization of memory as an active processing unit, comprising of a component that takes in information coming from a person's vision, another component that takes in information coming in from a person's audition, an a component that integrates the information from these two sources to enable a person to perform a task at hand.
• In the present study, participants' working memory was supposed to be engaged while performing the tasks assigned to the participants.
• Divided Attention
• Any person is believed to have limited attentional capacity i.e. limited resources of attention. When a person performs any task, he is believed to use at least some of his attentional resources.
• When a person performs more than one task, then his total attentional resources are divided over these tasks. This phenomenon is known as divided attention.
• In the present study, the participants' attention was divided between tasks of doodling, monitoring, and daydreaming, depending on the group he was assigned to.
• Depressive Rumination
• Rumination is the tendency of a person to keep mentally churning the same thought or pattern of thinking. Depressive rumination is the tendency to repeat negative thoughts in the mind.
• The findings of the present study suggest that if people who have a tendency to engage in depressive ruminations while performing boring tasks adopt doodling, they might see a reduction in this tendency.
• Dysphoric State
• A dysphoric state is a mental state characterized by low energy, unpleasant thoughts, hopelessness, etc. i.e. by depressive mental symptoms.
• The findings of the present study, if useful to prevent depressive ruminations, can also be useful to reduce a person's dysphoric states, thereby helping him prevent or treat depression.

Key Terms of the Andrade (doodling) Study

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Answering the Question Paper

The candidate must be able to effectively use the information above to answer the question papers. I present some examples of how this can be done in the following sections. The candidate can go through these sections to get an idea of how (s)he can answer questions in the paper, making note of the terminology and precision used, especially in accordance with the weightage given to the question. The best approach would be for the candidate to first try to answer the question himself or herself, and then view the specimen answer proposed, so that the following sections work as practice for the candidate.

Answering Paper 1

 1. State one aim from the study by Andrade (doodling). [1]

Specimen Ans.  (The candidate should try to present the central aim of the study.)

The study by Andrade (doodling) aimed to show that doodling while performing a boring task improves the concentration with which the task is performed.

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2. Identify which one of the following statements is not true of Andrade's observations of the effects of doodling on concentration. [1]

• Doodling increases the accuracy with which a task is performed.
• Doodling increases the rate of daydreaming as a task is performed.
• Doodling places a constant low load on the central executive.
• Doodling improves the recall of the task with which it is performed.

Specimen Ans. The candidate must simply tick option 2 - doodling increases the rate of daydreaming as a task is performed.

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3(a). From the study by Andrade (doodling):

Explain why the study was carried out. [2]

Specimen Ans. (This question is asking for the aim of the study. Since it is presented for 2 marks, all the aims of the study need to be mentioned here.)

The study was carried to show that doodling aids concentration. Specifically, it aimed to show that doodling would:

1. help participants accurately monitor a telephone message; and

2. increase the depth with which they processed the message i.e. improve their recall of the message.

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 3(b). Describe what the participants were told about the purpose of the study. [2]

Specimen Ans. (The candidate is expected to present the instructions pertaining only to purpose, and not tasks given to participants. This need not be a verbatim account, for the question carries only 2 marks. The most relevant instructions must be presented, in indirect speech.)


Participants were told the following about the purpose of the study:
1. that they were requested to participate in another study (after the one they had just completed) which would take five minutes of their time;

2. that they would have to monitor a message as they doodled (only the EG), and the purpose of doodling was to alleviate boredom.

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 3(c). Explain why the participants were not told that the study was about concentration when they arrived at the laboratory. [3]


Specimen Ans. (This question moves from mere description to reasoning, which the candidate must infer even if not explicitly mentioned in the study. Since the question carries three marks, the candidate should try to provide at least three correct reasons. All reasons should relate to demand characteristics, even if the term is not explicitly mentioned, since that is always the reason why deception is used in a study.)

Participants were told about the real purpose of the study for the following reasons:

1. Since the study included a recall test, if participants knew about this test from the beginning they could have adopted strategies to improve their memory.

2. Since the study included a natural task like doodling, if participants knew why they were performing it, they could have performed it with more deliberation and less spontaneity.

3. Since the study included a monitoring task which was presumed to be affected by the amount of daydreaming of a participant, the participants could have deliberately avoided daydreaming since they would know that was expected of them.

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4(a). The study by Andrade (doodling) used adult participants, although child participants could also have been used.

Describe one methodological problem that could arise if child participants were used in this study [2]

Specimen Ans. (This question asks for a methodological problem, so the candidate must carefully avoid mentioning any ethical problem that could arise. Again, the candidate is expected to apply his knowledge of the issue of use of children to the present study.)

One methodological problem in using child participants instead of adult participants could have been that since children's attention and memory capacities are not fully developed, they might have had difficulty performing the monitoring and/or recall tasks as used in the present study.

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4. (b) Explain one useful application of the findings, if child participants were used in this study. [2]

Specimen Ans. (The key here is for the candidate to understand how the broad theme or area of research could benefit children. The present study looks into the field of attention, which is necessary for children in whose life academics plays a major role.)

If child participants were used in this study, then doodling could be considered as a serious classroom intervention that would help students pay attention to, and prevent them from daydreaming during long periods of the class.

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5. (a) Describe the conclusions from the study by Andrade. (doodling). [3]

Specimen Ans. (A question such as this asks for all conclusions, yet the candidate is rewarded one mark for each conclusion, so (s)he must present three conclusions.)

 The following conclusions were drawn from the study by Andrade (doodling):
1. Doodling improves monitoring of boring material.
2. Doodling improves the depth of processing of boring material.
3. Doodling improves recall and monitoring by saving the attention resources used for daydreaming.

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5. (b) Explain two ways in which the cognitive approach is different from the learning approach. Use the study by Andrade as an example of the cognitive approach. [4]

Specimen Ans. (Here, the expectation from the candidate's answer is clear cut - the candidate must state two aspects of the cognitive approach demonstrated by Andrade's study, and contrast these two from the learning approach.)

Two ways in which the cognitive approach is different from the learning approach include:

1. The cognitive approach investigates the mental processes of people. The study by Andrade (doodling), for example, studied divided attention. The learning approach, on the other hand, investigates the acquisition of thoughts and behaviours from the environment.

2. The cognitive approach focuses on the role of the individual in dealing with problems. For example, the study by Andrade (doodling) suggested how an individual can make use of doodling to improve his attention for boring tasks. The learning approach, on the contrary, focuses on the role of the environment i.e. how the environment can be changed to solve an individual's issues.
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6.(a) Describe one aim from the study by Andrade (doodling). [2]

Specimen Ans. (The command word describe is used here and not state, unlike in the first question. A description question requires an answer giving details alongwith a statement. You can contrast the specimen answer that follows with the specimen answer to question 1 for more clarity. Also, it is best to select the main aim of the study here, since describing a secondary aim would make attempting part (b) of this question difficult.)

The study by Andrade (doodling) aimed to show that doodling while performing a boring task improves the concentration with which the task is performed. That is, it aimed to show that if doodling is performed simultaneously while performing a boring task, then doodling will reduce the occurrence of daydreaming, saving the majority of a person's attention for the main task he needs to perform.

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6.(b) Explain how two results from the study by Andrade relate to the aim you have described in part (a). [4]

Specimen Ans. (This is a very straightforward question that requires the candidate to simply present and link them to the aim of the study.)

Two results from the study that correspond to the stated aim include:

1. Participants who doodled monitored the telephone message significantly better than the control participants (Mann-Whitney U=124, p=0.01). This indicated that they had been less distracted by daydreaming than the participants who had not been doodling.

2. Participants who doodled recalled the telephone message significantly better than the control participants (F(1,38)=6.0,p=0.02). This indicated that they had paid more attention to, that is, had had better concentration as they performed the monitoring task than the participants who were not doodling.

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7. Studies in cognitive psychology can be used to help workers doing repetitive jobs who find it hard to concentrate. 

Describe how the results of the study by Andrade (doodling) could be applied to help with this problem. [4] (*this question is from the specimen paper 1 released by CIE)

Specimen Ans. (Candidates must keep in mind here that the question looks for how the results could be applied, and not where or in which area they could be applied.)

The results from the study by Andrade were as follows:

1. Participants who doodled monitored the telephone message significantly better than the control participants (Mann-Whitney U=124, p=0.01).

2. Participants who doodled recalled the telephone message significantly better than the control participants (F(1,38)=6.0,p=0.02).

These results suggest the following for application:

1. If workers engage in doodling while performing repetitive tasks, they will be able to concentrate better as they will not be distracted by daydreaming. 

2. If workers engage in doodling while performing repetitive tasks, they will be able to attend to and remember information that will be useful to them in future.

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8. There were several controls employed in the study by Andrade (doodling). Describe any two of these. [4]

Specimen Ans. (Description questions require elaboration, and elaboration in the case of controls must always be an explanantion of what extaneous factors the control served to restrain.)

Two important controls employed in the Andrade (doodling) study were as follows:

1. Use of Simple Doodling Task - Participants were instructed to shade in printed shapes presented on the response sheet instead of being asked to doodle freely. This was done so that the participants would not take the doodling task too seriously, and treat it as the main task; or become conscious of their doodling and pay too much attention to it. This attempted to retain the spontaneity of real-world doodling.

2. Counterbalancing of Recall Order - Half the participants of the CG and EG respectively, were asked to recall the names of places first and the names of the party-goers afterwards; while this order was reversed for the remaining participants in both groups. This controlled for any effects of order of presentation on memory.

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9. The study by Andrade used a laboratory experiment.

Explain why laboratory experiments are frequently used in the cognitive approach to psychology. Use an example in your answer. [4]

Specimen Ans. (A key point to remember here is that the candidate must not deviate from the question by citing examples from studies other than the one mentioned.)

The cogntive approach uses laboratory experiments frequently, to control for factors other than the ones being studied that can influence the results of the study. Human cognition is highly complex, and determined by multiple factors.

For example, in the Andrade (doodling) study, an important control was counterbalancing of recall order in the surprise recall test. The order of presentation of material can influence what an individual remembers and what he forgets. In order that doodling or not doodling should be the sole determinant of participant's memory, this control was employed, which was only possible in a highly controlled environment of the laboratory.

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10.(a) From the study by Andrade (doodling):

Outline two dependent variables in the study. [4]

Specimen Ans. (The command word 'outline' suggests no need for an explanation, However, being detailed and specific is necessary to gain 2 marks per dependent variable here.)

The following were the dependent variables in the study by Andrade (doodling):

Monitoring of boring material - This was operationally defined as the number of names party-goers noted down by participants that they heard on the telephone message that they monitored.

Recall of boring material - This was operationally defined as the number of names of party-goers and places remembered by participants after they had monitored the telephone message.

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10. (b) Discuss at least two strengths and two weaknesses of the study. [8]

Specimen Ans. (Though the candidate is allowed to give more than the specified number of strengths and weaknesses, it is advisable that the candidate focus on explaining and elaborating the strengths and weaknesses he chooses to include, rather than on the number of strengths and weaknesses in the study.)

Two strengths of the study by Andrade (doodling) are as follows:

1. Use of Laboratory Experiment - Since a laboratory experiment was conducted, it gave a high degree of control to the researchers. The researchers exercised important controls such as setting up a completely auditory primary task, conducting a surprise memory test, etc. which all rarely occur in the real-world.

2. Careful Data Analysis - Data was analysed very carefully and using a variety of techniques in the present study. Firstly, the data of one experimental participant who did not perform the doodling task was discarded, and the required data was obtained from a replacement. Secondly, mis-hearings and false alarms were accounted for by specific rules. Lastly, appropriate parametric and non-parametric statistics were used to interpret findings. This gave a high degree of psychometric soundness to the study.

Two weaknesses of the study by Andrade (doodling) are as follows:

1. Lack of Ecological Validity - A disadvantage of the high degree of control  used in the study was that the relevance and applicability of the study to real-life situations became questionable. Firstly, few boring tasks in the real world are purely auditory or visual in nature, a combination of the two is typically seen. Secondly, doodling as conducted in the study i.e. by shading in of shapes is not the way it is done in real life; people tend to draw shapes and figures while doodling.

2. Lack of Representative Sample - The sample comprised of more females than males in both the experimental and control groups. This reduced the representativeness of the sample, as an inclusion of an equal number of both participants would be much more desirable. The sample was also based on convenience, and a more representative sample in terms of diversity would be more desirable for increased generalizability.

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11. Evaluate the study by Andrade (doodling). [10]

Specimen Ans. (The answer to this question is very similar to the previous one. However, the focus here needs to be on organization so that the answer comes across as a clear, detailed, stepwise analysis of the study).

The study by Andrade (doodling) used the cognitive approach to study attention. It investigated the impact of doodling on the monitoring and recall of a boring telephone message.

The study employed a laboratory experiment as its research method which enabled it to apply a high degree of control over other factors that could have influenced the monitoring performance of participants. Factors such as anticipation of recall, interference of tasks using the same attention modality, influence of order of presentation on memory, impact on monitoring of any outstanding elements in the message, assignment of participants to the experimental and control groups, etc. were appropriately controlled for. Also, the study used an independent measures design which controlled for any influence of fatigue or exposure on the participant's monitoring and recall performance.

On the downside, however, the use of a laboratory experiment restrained the generalizability of the study. In real-world settings, stimuli that a person needs to attend to are not as well defined as they were in the study. Besides, attention of people is not easily perceivable since it is rarely a matter of remembering a list of stimuli. Alongwith this artificiality in settings and tasks, the sample was also not as representative as desired. It was a convenience sample of adult individuals selected from a common pool, and the gender distribution was highly skewed in favour of females. A larger and more diverse sample would have been more desirable. Also, the impact of individual attention and memory capacity on the final results of the task cannot be ruled out since the participants did not perform any baseline task of determination of their attention or memory.

The independent variable investigated in the study was doodling. It needs special mention here, that doodling as employed in the study was very different from real-world doodling. Though the researchers tried to maintain the characteristic spontaneity of doodling by instructing participants to attempt it casually, and by presenting it very simply; the nature of the task involved shading of readymade shapes, whereas in natural settings, doodling involves the creation of shapes and patterns which are found to be different for different individuals. The laboratory adaptation of this task may, therefore, not be very ecologically valid.

The researchers maintained a high degree of ethics in the study. In particular, participants were given an apology alongwith a debriefing of why deception was used in the study i.e. why they had not been informed about the real purpose of performing the tasks they were given.

Finally, a detailed analysis of data was employed in the study. Separate inferential statistics were used to appropriately compare the monitoring and recall performances of the experimental and control groups. Besides, an overall comparison was also made to provide an overview of the findings. Special care was taken to account for guessing in the data, and missing or faulty data was adequately replaced before calculations were made. This gave the results of the study a high degree of psychometric soundness.

In sum, the Andrade (doodling) study investigated a useful problem, was very carefully and ethically conducted, its variables were meticulously defined, and its findings were technically accurate and psychometrically sound. However, it had limited applicability given it's low ecological validity and restrained generalizability.

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Answering Paper 2

1(a). A hypothesis in a study says 'Attention given to a boring activity will differ depending on whether doodling was performed alongwith performing the activity'.

Is this a directional (one-tailed) hypothesis or a non-directional (two-tailed) hypothesis?

Include a reason for your answer. [1]

Specimen Ans. (The candidate need not show any knowledge of the specific doodling study here. The answer should be to-the-point.)

The hypothesis is non-directional (two-tailed) because it does not specify whether attention for the boring activity will improve or decline as a result of doodling.

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1(b). Write a null hypothesis that could be used with the hypothesis given above. [2]

Specimen Ans. (A formal hypothesis always includes the dependent and independent variables in itself. A null hypothesis is hypothesis predicting no significance. Again, there is no need to mention the Andrade study in particular. Use the wording from the hypothesis given in the question.)

A null hypothesis for the hypothesis given above could be:
"Doodling performed with the performance of a boring activity will lead to no difference in the attention given to the boring activity."

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2. State two ways in which the research methods of a laboratory experiment and a case study are different. [2]

Specimen Ans. (Though this is a generic question, if the candidate has prepared the Andrade study well, then he can apply his knowledge to this question, though he need not illustrate the same in the answer.)

An experiment and case study are different in the following ways:

Degree of Control - A laboratory experiment is an investigation that occurs in a highly controlled environment i.e. where many controls are applied to prevent extraneous factors from influencing the measured variable(s). A case study on the other hand, is a narrative account that looks into natural occurrences, that have not had any control exerted over them.

Sample Size - A laboratory experiment typically consists of many more than one participants, and the more participants it includes, the more confidence that researchers gain in their findings. A case study is the study of one single person, phenomenon or unit, that is remarkable in some aspect to have captured the interest of the researcher.

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3. Explain one advantage of the sampling method used in the study by Andrade (doodling). [2]

Specimen Ans. (Since disadvantages are generally associated with the Andrade study's sampling method i.e. convenience sampling, this question is a good example of why the candidate must know the advantages and disadvantages of different methods of the elements of studies. The key is to simply know which method was employed in the study mentioned.)

Since the sample was a convenience sample, it gave the researcher the advantage that they were quickly and easily recruited.

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4 (a). From the study by Andrade (doodling):

Describe two ways in which the study was valid. [4]

Specimen Ans. (Validity is most often reflected in the controls, design and data analysis of a study. So, for the present study, the candidate has a good number of options to choose from in this answer.)

Two ways in which the study was valid include the following:
1. High degree of control - The study was a laboratory experiment and researchers exercised important controls such as setting up a completely auditory primary task, recording a monotonous telephone message for monitoring, conducting a surprise memory test, etc. which all reduced the influence of external factors on the measured variable.

2.  Careful Data Analysis - Data was analysed very carefully and using a variety of techniques in the present study. Firstly, the data of one experimental participant who did not perform the doodling task was discarded, and the required data was obtained from a replacement. Secondly, mis-hearings and false alarms were accounted for by specific rules. Lastly, appropriate parametric and non-parametric statistics were used to interpret findings.

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4. (b) Describe one way in which the study was not valid. [2]

Specimen Ans. (Here again, the candidate must be familiar with the strengths and weaknesses - both - of any element of a study. The same factors that add to the validity of a study can reduce it, if not planned or implemented correctly.)

One factor which reduced the validity of the Andrade (doodling) study was:

Use of Independent Groups Design - The study did not equate participants in the experimental and control groups in terms of their attention or memory capacity which left the possibility that these factors could have influenced the performance of the participants in either group.

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5(a). Andrade (doodling) calculated the mean number of monitored names of party-goers in each condition.

Explain how the mean of a data set is calculated. [2]

Specimen Ans. (This is a general question that has been illustrated with a specific study. Therefore, the candidate needs to focus only on the question asked and not the study.)

To obtain the mean of a data set, the scores obtained by all participants is simply summed, and then divided by the total number of scores in the data set:

Mean = Sum of all scores/Number of scores in the data set 

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5. (b). Identify an alternative measure of central tendency that Andrade (doodling) could have used. [1]

Specimen Ans. (This is a purely knowledge based question.)

The Andrade (doodling) study could have used the median as a measure of central tendency.

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6. Explain qualitative and quantitative data using examples. [6]

Specimen Ans. (The candidate can cite different studies here to explain the same concepts mentioned. However, since we are presently dealing with the Andrade study, we will use only that study to support our answer at this time. Therefore, take note that the answer given below is incomplete.)

Qualitative data is defined as data that non-numerical in nature, that is, data which cannot be quantified and directly compared.

Quantitative data, on the other hand, is numerical data that can be quantified and subject to direct comparisons. In the Andrade (doodling) study, for example, the monitoring performance of the participants in the two conditions i.e. in the doodling condition and the control condition was recorded as the number of names of party-goers noted down by the participants while they performed the  message monitoring task. Also, the data of the two conditions was compared to each other by calculating and comparing the mean number of names of party-goers noted down by each group.

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7 (a). Alice works as a teacher in a school. She notices that some of her students doodle as they listen to her lecture, and wants to know how attentive they are to her lecture compared to the other students in the class.

Outline one way that Alice could tell which of her students are more attentive. [2]

Specimen Ans. (The candidate must be careful here to only present a measurement technique that the teacher could use for her purpose, and must not deviate from the question by elaborately suggesting research designs or entire tasks.)

One way the teacher can determine which students were being more attentive is that she can randomly select students during teaching and ask them a one-word answer regarding what she just discussed. She can note their responses, and at the end of the lecture, compare the mean number of correct answers given by the students who were doodling against those who were not.

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7 (b). Alice decides to measure the attentiveness of her students by asking each of them to give a written paragraph that summarizes what was covered in the lecture. 

Explain one problem with the way Alice is measuring attention. [2]

Specimen Ans. (The candidate can easily answer this question if (s)he has carefully assessed the related study since it needs to be contrasted to the strength of the method used in the related study.)

The problem with how Alice is measuring attention is that she might be measuring writing skills rather than attention. Some students who might have carefully attended the lecture may not be able to provide a summary with the points that Alice is looking out for, since they might consider other points to be more important or, they might have poor skills in summarizing a long lecture.

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7 (c). Suggest an alternative way by which Alice to measure the recall of her students. [2] 

Specimen Ans. (The candidate should not confuse monitoring and recall here. This question is an example of how the candidate should always read the question very carefully.)

Alice can use objective type of questions which rely purely on memory of participants and not their writing skill such as fill in the blanks, match the columns, state true or false, etc. to measure recall of her students.

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8 (a). Dr. Brown was studying attention among employees of a large organization. Just before a presentation, he asked half the employees about to attend the presentation to doodle freely as they viewed and heard the presentation over the next one hour, and the other half employees to pay careful attention to the presentation, and not perform any other activity during that time. He also asked all the employees to write down the main ideas of the presentation as they attended to it. The presentation was constructed in a way that key ideas in the presentation were specifically mentioned at random times throughout the presentation.

Identify the dependent variable in this experiment and suggest how it could be operationalized. [2]

Specimen Ans. (The candidate should be able to easily identify the dependent variable by remembering the dependent variable in the related study.)

The dependent variable in this experiment is the monitoring performance of the participants, that is, the key ideas of the presentation noted by participants. This dependent variable could be operationalized as the number of key ideas noted by the participants as they attended the presentation.

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8 (b). Name one issue could arise from Dr. Brown's instruction to half the employees to doodle freely. [1]

Specimen Ans. (Since this issue was part of an important control in the Andrade doodling study, the candidate should be easily able to apply it here.)

One issue that could arise from asking employees to doodle freely is lack of standardization. Some employees would doodle elaborately while others would doodle minimally.

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8 (c). Explain how the issue you identified in part (b) could affect the validity of the study. [2]

Specimen Ans. (The candidate is required to explain how the issue could confound the measurement of the dependent variable.)

If participants doodled in a variety of ways, then the way they doodled would become an extraneous factor that could influence monitoring performance. For example, if some participants doodled elaborately, then that could distract their attention and their monitoring performance could suffer.

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8. (d) Describe one advantage of using a random groups design in Dr. Brown's experiment. [2]

Specimen Ans. (There are several advantages, the candidate must be careful to link the answer to the specific experiment presented.)

If a repeated measures design were used, then participants would have become familiar with the content of the presentation which would have improved their performance the second time they performed, rather than the influence of doodling or not doodling. 

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8. (e) Explain why telling the purpose of the experiment to the participants, that is, telling them that the experiment sought to measure the effects of doodling on attention, would be a problem. [3]

Specimen Ans. (A clear and detailed supporting justification is always the point for scoring in an 'explain' question.)

If participants know the purpose of an experiment, then they start acting as per what they believe is the performance expected from them i.e. as per demand characteristics. In the present experiment, if participants knew that the experiment was being conducted to study attention, then they would have likely paid unnaturally high attention to the presentation. In particular, participants in the doodling condition might have not devoted natural attention to doodling, instead reserving their attention for the monitoring task. This would have created artificiality in performance, defeating the purpose of the study.

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9. (a) Two students, Hilja and Sakri, are using using a recorded message that participants must monitor to test their attention. They are worried about reliability in their investigation. 

Suggest two considerations that the students can make while preparing their message to maintain good reliability. [2]

Specimen Ans. (Good reliability and validity are closely associated to controls, so if the candidate has learnt the controls of the study well, this answer is easy to attempt. Also, the controls are to be implemented while the students record the message, not while they present it to participants.)

The students can make the following two considerations while recording the message to be used in their study:

1. The message must have a low, consistent pitch so that it does not attract unnecessary attention from participants.
2. The message must have a normal, even pace so that it is not too slow to be boring or too fast for participants to attend to.

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10. (a) Cathy is a psychology student. Her friends is in another class of the same school. She learns that many students in her friend's class doodle as they attend their lectures. She wonders whether this doodling helps them to be more attentive to the lectures. She requests concerned authorities to let her enter  her friend's class as a student and observe the students there for a day.

Describe how Cathy could go about conducting her participant observation. [10]

Specimen Ans. (This question carries a lot of marks, and the key for the candidate is to avoid presenting a seemingly endless narrative. The answer should be well-structured and organized. In order to be able to do this, the candidate must have sufficient familiarity with and practice of writing out reports corresponding to all types of research methods.) 

Cathy's aim is to check the effects of doodling on students' attention for their lectures. For this purpose, her participants would include all the students in the classroom, both students who doodle and those who don't. Accordingly, she can undertake the following tasks:

Structured Observation:
Cathy can prepare a set of questions in her notebook before beginning her observation, the answers to which she can keep noting as she observes the students through the day. Some questions could be as follows:
1. Do the students doodle during every lecture? If not, during which lectures do they doodle?
2. For how long do the students doodle? Does the duration change for different lectures?
3. When do the students begin doodling - during the beginning, towards the ending or in-between lectures?
4. What kind of doodling do students engage in? Is it elaborate or simple? Does the detailing vary for different students?, etc.

Interviews:

Cathy could also casually interview the students during a break, and ask them questions such as the following:
1. What prompts you to doodle during lectures?
2. Do you doodle intentionally or is it spontaneous?
3. Do you feel you are able to learn from the lecture as you doodle along?
4. How attentive or distracted do you feel during lectures? (this question could be asked to students who are not found doodling), etc.

Cathy could also interview some teachers when they have the time, and ask them questions such as the following:
1. Do you see a difference in the attentiveness of some students in your class?
2. Do you think that the doodling of some students is distracting for you or other students of the class?
3. Would you encourage or discourage doodling during your lecture? What would be the reason?, etc.

Cathy would simply need a notebook and pen to write down and record her observations or the answers of students and teachers.

Post her observation and interviews, Cathy could compare all the different findings, and prepare a detailed qualitative report from different perspectives, including her own observations of the students' attentiveness, the students' self-perception and the teachers' experiences of the same. She could also request to meet the class once more to debrief the students regarding the study she conducted - it's purpose, why she could not tell them that a study was in process, assure them of confidentiality, and clarify any doubts they would have.

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10. (b)  Identify one possible weakness/limitation with the procedure you have described in your answer to part (a) and suggest how your study might have been done differently to overcome the problem. [4]

Specimen Ans. (Here, the candidate should identify a genuine issue regarding the nature of the study rather than a superfluous issue that is not a part of the study but some kind of carelessness in carrying out the study, because that does not qualify as a legitimate limitation.)

Since the study mentioned in part (a) is an a participant observation, it has limited reliability. Particularly desirable would be inter-observer reliability since the findings are completely dependent on the subjective perception of the single observer and his ability to appropriately record events, there are no objective methods of determining the attentiveness of students, or any other impact of doodling or not doodling. A useful solution would be to have two or more observers participate in the same situation, and compare their opinions for similarities and differences during data analysis.

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Summary of the Andrade (doodling) Study

You can attempt the following quiz to check your understanding of this study:
https://goo.gl/forms/2sYhWxTIjZcWp4U52

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(Search Terms - Psychology 9698, Psychology 9990, CIE A level psychology, AS and A psychology, IGCSE A level psychology, Andrade 2010, doodling A-level study, Model answers for A level Psychology, AS Core studies for A level)