A-LevelPsychologyResearch methods9990/23 · May/June 2020 · Q24 Marks
The study by Piliavin et al. (subway Samaritans) was conducted in a subway train.
- (a)Suggest one advantage of conducting a study in this location.[2]
- (b)Suggest one disadvantage of conducting a study in this location.[2]
Mark scheme
Marking points from the official mark scheme (May/June 2020). The mark or mark type is shown in brackets.
- [2] (a) 1 mark for advantage; 1 mark for link. The participants were unaware that they were being observed so behaved normally because people do get ill on trains. OR The passengers were (relatively) confined to the carriage so they had to make a decision about helping or ignoring/leaving, which made it easy to judge whether they helped or not.
- [2] (b) 1 mark for disadvantage; 1 mark for link. It is possible that the participants had seen the situation travelling in the other direction, so this might have been a source of demand characteristics. OR There might have been differences between the participants, e.g. if the people travelling in one direction might have been cross after work.
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