✓ Report Writing (AO1)

Question 1

What psychological report style do psychologists use & why?

Answer 1

psychologists use the same psychological report style after conducting research to make reports easier to navigate

⁖ everyone uses a conventional format - the American Psychological format (APA)

Question 2

What are the 6 parts of a report (in order)?

Answer 2

1. Abstract
2. Introduction
3. Methods
4. Results
5. Discussion
6. Referencing

(AIM RDR)

Question 3

What is the Abstract?

Answer 3

• short summary (150-200 words) that includes all the major elements: aims, hypothesis, method/procedure, results, conclusions
• it is important as it will be the first thing the reader sees & then they will make a decision as to whether they should the rest of the paper

Question 4

What is the Method?

Answer 4

Design - the experimental design (independent groups etc.) + the IV & DV

Sample - who their ppts were (no. of, gender etc.)

Materials - details of all equipment used + only relevant materials (not pen & paper)

Procedure - recipe-style list of everything that happened, step-by-step, beginning to end (allows replication) + would incl. standardised q’s given to ppts, briefing & debriefing

Ethics - what ethical issues arose & how these were addressed in the study

Question 5

What is the Results?

Answer 5

• this should summarise key findings from the investigation
• it would incl. descriptive stats (tables, graphs, charts, measures of central tendency & of dispersion)
• it would incl. which statistical test was used with the calculated & critical values + the level of significance
• it would incl. which hypothesis was accepted & rejected

Question 6

What is the Discussion?

Answer 6

• the researcher will summarise the findings in verbal rather than statistical form
• the results will be discussed in the context of the evidence & research in the introduction
• there will be a discussion of the limitations of the study (e.g. linked to the method/sample etc.) & how it could be improved in the future
• the wider-implications of the research are considered (real-world applications)

Question 7

What is the Referencing?

Answer 7

• details of any material/study that the researcher drew upon need to be included here
• this gives credit to the original authors & allows you to find the original paper
• they are written following the APA format & in alphabetical order

e.g. Author, Initial (year). Article title. Journal title (italics), vol no. (italics), issue number, page range.