Cambridge Past Paper Questions

You must answer one question from this section. Psychology and abnormality

You must answer one question from this section. Psychology and consumer behaviour

You must answer one question from this section. Psychology and health

You must answer one question from this section. Psychology and organisations

You must answer one question from this section. Psychology and abnormality ‘Exposure and response prevention is always successful in treating obses...

You must answer one question from this section. Psychology and consumer behaviour 'Determinism: retail store architecture controls how shoppers beh...

You must answer one question from this section. Psychology and health 'All patients would rather disclose to a computer than a human, in order to b...

You must answer one question from this section. Psychology and organisations 'Job satisfaction can only be measured effectively using closed questi...

Miller (2010) proposed impulse control therapy which he developed from his feeling-state theory of impulse control disorders. This therapy uses wha...

The success of the disrupt-then-reframe (DTR) technique (Kardes et al., 2007) Experiment 1 shows that the DTR technique increases retail sales in a...

Fox et al. (1987) used token economy with miners The yearly costs, adjusted for hours worked and inflation, resulting from accidents and injuries a...

Fiedler (1967) proposed a contingency theory. Leader member relations: good or poor Task structure: high or low Position power: strong or weak

Design a study using an observation to investigate the characteristics of addiction in people with kleptomania.

Design a study to investigate the effect of musical style on spending in different types of restaurant.

Design a study using an interview to investigate the causes of stress at work in nurses.

Design a study to investigate which type of 'need for achievement' is most likely to motivate workers.

'Medical techniques, such as drugs, can treat all patients with depression effectively.' To what extent do you agree with this statement? Use examp...

'Determinism: Retail ambience may affect shoppers' emotional states, but does not determine their reason to shop.' To what extent do you agree with...

'Physiological measures of stress are much more useful than psychological measures.' To what extent do you agree with this statement? Use examples ...

'Situational leadership is irrelevant if the individual leader is a universalist 'great man or woman'.' To what extent do you agree with this state...

From the study by Saavedra and Silverman about a boy with a button phobia:

Before the study by Canli et al. (brain scans and emotions), other psychologists had found a relationship between amygdala activation and memory. C...

The study by Baron-Cohen et al. (eyes test) is based on Theory of Mind.

Jamie has learned about the study by Milgram (obedience). He believes that the study is unethical.

Dement and Kleitman (sleep and dreams) compared dream duration estimates for 5-minute and 15-minute REM periods.

In the study by Bandura et al. (aggression), inter-rater reliability was measured.

In the study by Piliavin et al. (subway Samaritans), observers counted the total number of victims helped. The results were that 62 'cane' victims ...

In a study on memory, participants had to recall a story. The researchers measured memory by rating the accuracy of each participant's recall of th...

Bruce is planning a case study of a famous woman known worldwide for her helpfulness.

Nola is investigating whether there is a correlation between hours of sleep and how much a person argues. She thinks that people who sleep less may...

Naomi is designing an observation of helping behaviour at an entrance to a library that has a door which is difficult to open. She intends to obser...

Brendan is planning to use a semi-structured interview in a study about road users. He intends to use a sample of people who are walking (pedestria...

In a study investigating the emotions associated with birthdays, qualitative and quantitative data are being collected. A possible problem with som...

In the study by Baron-Cohen et al. (eyes test), standard deviations were calculated on the Autism Spectrum Quotient (AQ) scores and are shown in Ta...

Explain what is meant by 'operationalisation' in relation to the dependent variable and independent variable, using the study by Piliavin et al. (s...

Describe reliability and validity, using any examples.

Zayn is conducting a laboratory experiment to investigate the effects of lighting on attention. The participants' attention will be tested using a ...

Gwyn is conducting a study about obedience to traffic rules. She believes that hot weather makes people angry so they disobey rules. Each day she h...

Hazel is conducting an overt, participant observation to identify factors that affect the emotions of residents in a home for elderly people. She i...

Jilpa plans to explore how personalities vary. She thinks that people's personalities can have several characteristics, for example, how serious/pl...

Explain why opportunity sampling may not produce a representative sample.

Studies using animals should follow the ethical guideline of 'deprivation and aversive stimuli'. The study by Yamamoto et al. (chimpanzee helping) ...

In the study by Canli et al. (brain scans and emotions), several types of quantitative data were collected, including data from fMRI (functional Ma...

In the cognitive approach, studies often need to deceive participants. Explain why deception was necessary in the study by Andrade (doodling).

Describe covert observations and overt observations, using any examples.

Section B Answer all questions in this section. Dhia is investigating when children learn to understand differences between shapes. She is comparin...

Bai is conducting a correlational study about pain and hours of daylight. He thinks that people experience more pain on days when there is less sun...