IB Psychology: Sample ERQ for CLOA, 'Use of one or more Research Methods investigating the reliability of Cognitive Processes'

Sample Question - Evaluate the use of one or more research methods using the cognitive approach to understanding the reliability of cognitive processes.

Sample Answer -

Appropriate research methods must be selected for the investigation of any phenomenon for credibiilty and applicability of findings. Research methods in strengths and weaknesses on these parameters.

Research methods are tools used to investigate a phenomenon of interest. Several methods are used by psychologists, including those that gather numerical data that can be sophisticatedly analysed for credible findings - quantitative methods; and those that gather verbal data that can lead to new insights - qualitative methods.

The selection of a particular method of research is entirely dependent on the research question. For example, if a researcher wants to investigate the relationship between elapsed time and memory, then correlational quantitative methods would be useful. However, if a researcher wants to discover the reasons for fallibility of memory, then exploratory qualitative methods are appropriate.

In the area of reliability of cognitive processes, lot of research has looked into the vulnerability of episodic memory through investigation of the accuracy of eyewitness testimony. Classic research in this area made the use of laboratory methods to establish credible findings. With realization that these methods compromise on relevance to real-world phenomena, modern research in the area is making use of field work.

We will now look at examples of the use of these different research methods in turn:

Classic True Experiments on Eyewitness Testimony

Loftus and Palmer’s (1974) Investigation of the Impact of Language on Memory

The researchers aimed to investigate the effect of phrasing of interrogative questions on the eyewitness recall. They hypothesized that the phrasing of interrogative questions would modify participants’ memories for the incident in accordance with the question. They developed a task in which participants watched some films of a car accident and then answered a questionnaire regarding the sam. Critically, one question asked to estimate the speed of cars. Participants were divided into five groups each asked the question with a different verb, “What was the speed of the cars when they ………………………. into each other?” The five verbs were ‘contacted,’ ‘hit,’ ‘collided,’ ‘bumped’ and ‘smashed’ in increasing order of touch intensity. These varied question-conditions served as the five levels for the independent variable (IV), ‘Verb used in critical interrogative question.’ The dependent variable was the ‘mean speed estimate of cars.’

Essential to a true experiment are controls which were carefully employed at all stages of this experiment. In terms of material, authentic videotapes of accidents were used to engage participants in the task. The questionnaire was designed to embed the key question among several others so that participants would not guess that its true purpose. Also, the presentation order of the films was counterbalanced across the experimental groups. Finally, an additional experiment was conducted to rule out the possibility that only participants’ speed estimates were affected by the wording of the critical question and that their actual memory was not distorted. The experiment was successful in supporting this claim.

Adding to the high credibiity provided by these controls, were sophisticated quantitative data analysis, namely, the use of the ANOVA F test in determining the significance of results. The employment of an independent measures design was also effective, since repeated assessment of memory of the same participants would lead to familiarity.

The experiment was not without its limitations. In terms of sampling, it used a homogeneous group of forty-five students which amounted to the distribution of only nine participants per level of the IV. This compromised the population validity of the findings. Further, the presentation of films was made to groups of participants in various sizes which could have led to effects of unique viewing sessions confounding the development of memories in participants.

In terms of construct validity, researchers referred to past studies to derive that the words ‘hit’ and ‘smashed’ as having differential impact on rates of movement perceived by participants. However, for the three other verbs no such reference was made, giving construct validity only partial support.

The findings suffered the most in terms of ecological validity. Witnesses in real life are part of an incident and not merely passive viewers. The emotionality and consequentiality of such real-world incidents is absent in the laboratory. In this experiment in particular, participants were fully aware that the incidents they viewed were either simulated or passed events and therefore, their performance in reporting what they witnessed had no consequence for any important decision-making unlike the case with real testimonies.

Due to this weakness of early experiments, field research is currently preferred:

Modern Field Research on Eyewitness Testimony

Yuille and Cutshall’s (1986) Case Study of Eyewitness Memory of a Crime

The researchers conducted a case study of a nearly five month old burglary that resulted in the murder of the burglar which was witnessed by numerous passers-by from different vantage points.

In order to establish credibility for their findings, the researchers triangulated data by obtaining it from records of police interviews, forensic evidence, press reports and also by extensively interviewing participants’ themselves. They used data obtained immediately after the incident such as police records as a baseline to estimate the accuracy of participants’ accounts during their interviews. Additionally, they made three researchers analyse participant interviews’resulting in high inter-scorer reliability. Most credibly, they asked participants for descriptive details of the incident such as clothing and appearance of the burglar and details of certain objects which had never been solicited from them before and hence, could not have been influenced from sources other than the participants’ own memory and that could be corroborated with forensic evidence alone.

After coding and analysing their data under three categories - person descriptions, object descriptions and action details, the researchers found maximum errors in participants’ recall of action details and minimum in object descriptions. Most importantly, when they tried to mislead participants about certain object details, as was done in classic eyewitness research, their attempts failed. Researchers concluded that actual accuracy of episodic memory is very different in nature from the one tested in the laboratory and they could make this conclusion only because they used the highly detail-focused method of the case study.

The case study method suffers from difficulty of population validity, as in this case where researchers drew their conclusion froma single case of crime, that too, one of burglary and murder - a  specialized case that does not resemble many other cases of crime. Besides, only thirteen of the witnesses agreed to participate in the study, those too who had viewed the scene from different vantage points. Thus, the data that could be obtained was incomplete.

Despite its drawbacks, this study exemplified how a change of research methods used aids n drawing a more accurate picture of reality.

Conclusion

It is evident that the use of different research methods brings to light different aspects of a phenomenon - laboratory research brought about the suggestibility of episodic memory while the field method of case study helped understand the the involvement of different details in episodic memory and the difference between artificially formed memories as against naturally developed memories. The best resolution of the discrepancies between these methods would be to utilize all possible research methods and come to a conclusion about the reliability of memory with a synthesis of the different results, each of which would compensate for the weaknesses of the other.

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