Design a field experiment to investigate the effectiveness of a reward system to reduce the number of accidents in school science lessons.

Mark scheme

Marking points from the official mark scheme (Feb/Mar 2019). The mark or mark type is shown in brackets.

1. [10] Design a study showing evidence of design features appropriate to the named method (field experiment).
2. [10] Specific features: Experiments: type, IV, DV, controls, experimental design.
3. [10] General features of research methodology: sampling technique and sample, type of data, ethics, reliability, validity, data analysis.
4. [8] Explanation should be both psychological and methodological, justifying decisions made in part (a).
5. [8] Psychological evidence: Syllabus: health promo in schools, worksites and communities; worksites (Fox et al., 1987).
6. [8] Psychological evidence: Fox et al. (1987) use a token economy system to reduce accidents in the workplace. Operant conditioning could also be used, with positive reinforcement being applied to increase safety behaviour. Note: the question states reward system, so positive punishment would be inappropriate.
7. [8] Methodological evidence: Explanation of method using general and specific features as above (from 7(a)).