The Complete IB Psychology Internal Assessment Guide

Wondering how to achieve a Grade 7 in your upcoming IB Psychology Internal Assessment? Don't stress! In this guide, I'll cover everything you need to know including topic selection, the four sections of the report, and how to achieve the top band in each of the four criteria.

Overview

The Psychology IA is a 1,800-2,200 word, 22 mark report in which you will prepare, conduct, and analyse a psychological experiment. These experiments are usually based on a study integral to the IB course studied under one of the three approaches: the biological, cognitive and sociocultural approaches. You will work in a group of 2-4, and will conduct the experiment and collect the data collaboratively. After the data has been collected, you will complete the rest of the IA individually.

Topic Selection

At the stage where you are starting your IA, you would have completed most of the course, so you probably have an idea about the areas you have enjoyed studying the most. It is important to choose a topic which you have genuine interest in as you will need to do broader research surrounding the topic to get an idea of the current psychological understandings.

When choosing a study to use as the basis for your own experiment, it is also important to consider the time and resources available to you as a high school student. You probably don’t have access to the same expensive equipment and technology as professional researchers do, so this will limit the studies you are able to replicate. You can adjust, combine and alter studies which you have looked at in class to best fit your investigation. For example, you could:

Add or remove conditions of the independent variable

OR

Simplify a study by removing a part of the study

There are four major sections to the Psychology IA which will provide the structure for your report. These four sections correspond to the four criteria of the IA, which are explained below.

Criterion A: Introduction (6 marks)

The introduction of your IA should be around 600 words. The IB Rubric provides that to achieve the top band of Criterion A:

1. The aim must be stated, and its relevance explained

2. The theory or model upon which the investigation is based must be described and the link to the investigation must be explained

3. The independent and dependent variables must be stated and operationalised in the null and research hypotheses.

As such, a strong introduction will firstly have a ‘zoomed-out’ perspective, and will provide definitions and explanations of key concepts which are involved in the topic. Then they will delve deeper into explaining the concepts more specifically related to the theory surrounding your exploration. For example, if you were replicating Wason’s card task study, you would start the introduction by...

Defining decision-making

AND

Outlining the contentions of Dual System Theory.

Then, you would explain Dual System Theory in greater detail, and place greater emphasis on the predictions Dual System Theory provides, as this is the part of the theory relevant to the study.

After providing a background to the topic you are exploring, you would then outline the aim of your report and explain...

1. How the findings will contribute to psychological understandings

2. How they will be relevant to your target population

3. How they will be relevant to the afore-described theory

You would then state your research and null hypotheses, which explicitly states the independent variable, the dependent variable, the conditions of the independent variable, and how the variables will be measured.

Criterion B: Exploration (4 marks)

The exploration section of your IA should be around 500 words. The IB Rubric provides that to achieve the top band of Criterion B:

1. The research design must be explained

2. The sampling technique must be explained

3. The choice of participants must be explained

4. The controlled variables must be explained

5. The choice of materials must be explained

The Exploration is the section where you describe and justify the approach you used to investigate your aim. You can separate your exploration into separate sub-sections for each of the 5 parts listed above.

Research Design:

Firstly, you would state the research design and then describe how this was carried out in your study. Then, you would justify why this was used. For example, if you used a repeated measures design, your justification could be...

To avoid the chance of individual differences impacting the findings

You would also mention and justify the use of techniques used, such as counterbalancing. Ensure that you do not simply state the research design and justify why it was used, but explain how it was beneficial to your specific study that these techniques were used.

Participants:

Secondly, you would...

1. Restate the target population, as per your hypothesis

2. State how they were sampled (convenience, stratified, random etc.)

3. State the ages and genders of your sample group

An example of a first sentence of this section is...

“A sample of the target population of senior school aged students was randomly sampled, resulting in 24 participants, including 14 female and 10 male students, ranging from 16-18 years old.”

Then you would justify your selection of participants and your sampling technique, in regard to your exploration.

Control of Variables:

The third sub-section of the Exploration would look at the control of variables. Here, you would choose two or three of the most significant variables you actively controlled in conducting the study.

Quick Tip: You will be more likely to achieve higher marks if you choose fewer variables to discuss and explore them in greater depth

Materials:

The fourth sub-section involves listing the materials used in the report and justifying them, such as informed consent forms, standardised instructions, debriefing statements, and any other materials you used or that were seen by your participants during the experiment. This only has to be in dot-point form and consist of one sentence per material.

Procedure:

The final subsection is the procedure. This is a short and very brief overview of what the group did and asked participants to do during the experiment.

Criterion C: Analysis (6 marks)

The analysis section of your IA should be around 350 words. The IB Rubric provides that to achieve the top band of Criterion C:

1. Descriptive and inferential statistics must be appropriately and accurately applied

2. The graph must be correctly presented and address the hypothesis

3. The statistical findings must be interpreted with regard to the data and linked to the hypothesis

There are two sub-sections to the analysis section – descriptive statistics and inferential statistics.

Descriptive Statistics:

The descriptive statistics section is where you look, prima facie, at whether there is a pattern in your findings. The descriptive statistics section involves identifying what type of data you collected in your study (e.g., dichotomous at nominal level) and then explaining what descriptive statistic was most suitable as a result (e.g., standard deviation, mode, mean).

You will then present the primary data collected and the calculated statistics for each condition of the independent variable in a table and a graph. After displaying the data, you will interpret the graph and table and relate this back to your aim and hypotheses.

Inferential Statistics:

The inferential statistics is the section which allows you to conclude whether the pattern of findings indicated from the descriptive statistics is statistically significant. In other words, making sure that your findings didn’t occur by chance and did indeed occur as a result of the manipulation of the independent variable.

This involves using tests such as the chi-squared and Mann-Whiney U tests to validate your pattern of findings, and then interpreting these to make a conclusive statement about the likelihood of the relationship between the variables occurring by chance.

Criterion D: Evaluation (6 marks)

The evaluation section of your IA should be around 600 words. The IB Rubric provides that to achieve the top band of Criterion D:

1. The findings of the investigation must be discussed with reference to the background theory or model

2. The strengths and limitations of the design, sample or procedure must be stated and explained and must be relevant to the investigation

3. Modifications must be explicitly linked to the limitations of the investigation and fully justified

The evaluation concludes the report and requires a definitive statement about whether the independent variable did influence the dependant variable, despite limitations.

A strong evaluation will firstly...

Identify and state whether the patterns of findings replicate those of the original studies upon which the report is based, and then...

Explore whether the results are consistent with the aspect of the theory being examined

The evaluation then requires examination of the strengths and limitations of the way in which the study was conducted. Stronger critical thinking points require depth as opposed to breadth. It is more convincing to pick the most significant points and explore them to completion. A useful process for examining limitations is to consider...

1. How they influence participants’ behaviour in the study

2. How this might affect the findings

3. How this might affect overall conclusions

4. Possible modifications to mitigate the specific limitation

The IB wants to see strong critical thinking, so using this framework to examine limitations is essential to achieving a 6/6 in this section. Remember, you should NOT just list every potential evaluative point, only the most important ones.

And that's it! From here, you should be well-equipped to get a start on your Psychology Internal Assessment. But if you're still scratching your head, wondering if there are any examples you can follow to achieve a high mark, make sure to check out our Grade 7 IB Psychology IA Example.

Or even better, click below to work with one of our expert IB Psychology tutors who can guide you personally through the complete process of achieving top marks in your own Psychology IA!

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