Edexcel Psychology for A Level Yr 1 / AS Revision Guide

Also in this series: Student Books Edexcel Psychology for A Level Year 1 & AS 978-1-911208-59-4 Edexcel Psychology for A Level Year 2 978-1-911208-60-0 Revision Guides Edexcel Psychology for A Level Year 1 & AS 978-1-912820-06-1 Edexcel Psychology for A Level Year 2 978-1-912820-07-8 www.illuminatepublishing.com Personality factors The authoritarian personality Adorno etal . (1950) Harsh parenting causes children to develop authoritarian personality traits (e.g. toughness,destructiveness,cynicism), measured using the F-scale (F for fascism). This parenting stylewas common inGermany in the early20th century, thusGermans submissive to authority. Permissive parenting (e.g. unconditional love)mightmean children grow into adultswho score low on the F-scale,e.g. they defywhat they perceive as destructive orders. Internal and external locus ofcontrol (LOC) Rotter (1966) Internal LOC – peoplewho take greater responsibility for their actions,and believe they are in control. External LOC – peoplewho take less responsibility,and feelwhat happens to them is due to other people and chance. ‘Internals’ aremore likely to show dissent and defy orders, ‘externals’ aremore likely to be obedient. Miller (1975) found,when told to grasp livewires,externals more obedient to high- than low-status experimenter, internals unaffected by status. Gender Womenmore obedient than men Sheridan and King (1972) Participants ordered to give real electric shocks to a live puppy. 100% of female participants fully obedient,54% ofmales. Males in this studyweremore de ant (with puppy target) than themales inMilgram’s study (with human target). Menmore obedient than women Kilham and Mann (1974) ReplicatedMilgram’s study inAustralia. Found unusually low obedience rate of just28%. 40% ofmales and16% of femaleswere fully obedient. Moral reasoning Men and women guided by different principles. Gilligan (1982) Ethic of justice –more common inmales, values of equality and fairness, requires a detached outlook to avoid bias. Ethic of care –more common in females,emphasises interpersonal relationships,nurturing,supporting those in need. Malesmay bemore obedient due to their feelings of obligation to an authority gure, femalesmay be less obedient due to their desire to support the person being harmed. Milgram’s study –malesmay bemore swayed by apparent scienti c goals of research supposedly for ‘the greater good’, femalesmay bemore concerned about the learner. Chapter1 Social psychology Factors affecting obedience and dissent: Individual differences Spec spotlight 1.1.3 Factorsaffectingobedience anddissent/resistance toobedience, including individualdifferences (personalityandgender). When participants are told to graspwires. Apply it Methods Mo is comparingdissent inboys and girlsbyobservinghowmany times each week theydisobey teachers and asking the children about theirdisobedience. 1. (a) State a fullyoperationalised directional (one-tailed)hypothesis forMo’s study. (3) 2. (b) Describe one participantdesign that Mo coulduse for this experiment. (2) 3.Methods essay: Mowonders if he shouldhaveused self-reports instead of observation. Evaluate theuseof self-reports to measure thedependent variable in experiments in studies such asMo’s. (12) Revision booster Authoritarian personality theory can be tricky. Likewise, it can be easy to confuse internal and external locus of control. Take your time, these concepts need careful attention to understand them fully. 32 AO3 Evaluation AO1 Description Knowledge check 1. Explain two ways in which personality affects obedience and/or dissent. (4) 2. Justify the claim that obedience is affected by gender, with reference to research evidence. (2) 3. Standard essay: Evaluate research into the effect of personality on obedience. (8) 4. Methods essay: Assess the validity of self-reported data. You must refer to research into factors affecting obedience in your answer. (8) Revision booster Revise this subtopic with care as there are several ‘small’ studies which show how personality and gender may or may not affect obedience – without thorough revision it could be easy to muddle these up. Remember, you could find yourself answering an extended writing question (essay) on individual differences in general or specifically on personality OR gender. Personality factors A strength of the authoritarian personality is research support. Elms andMilgram (1966) used the F-scalewith 20 fully and20 non-fully obedient participants. Obedient participants scored higher,plus other authoritarian features (e.g. not close to fathers). These ndings suggest obedience is related to the personality trait of authoritarianism. CA We cannot claim a causal relationship between childhood experiences and authoritarianism/obedience because these are correlations.Other factorsmay be involved (e.g. obedience and authoritarianismmay be caused by poorer education). Aweakness is LOC does not predict defiance. In aMilgram-type task, participants told to blast a studentwith painful ultrasound (Schurz1985). Fully obedient participants did not differ signi cantly from resistant participants in LOC score. This suggests that personality (LOC)may have little impact on obedience. Application to thefield of human resources (HR). Companies requiring employees to follow strict proceduresmay prefer obedient people. HR departments could use a scale assessing LOC to select suitable job applicants. Thus leading to greater productivity and job satisfaction. Gender A strength ofGilligan’s explanation is support from qualitative research. Gilligan andAttanucci (1988) foundmales and females used both ethics in real-life dilemmas. Butmen overall favoured a justice orientation and women favoured a care orientation. Thus showing there are gender differences in moral decision-making. Aweakness is thatmany studiesfind nogender differences. Blass (1999) reported nineMilgram-style studies withmale and female participants. No signi cant difference in obedience between men andwomen (in eight studies). This suggests that gender does not affect obedience. I&D extra:Milgram’s original researchwas androcentric. Milgram studiedmen,but Gilligan sayswomenmay see theworld differently so behave differently. On the other hand, research has found no consistent gender difference. Therefore, in this case, the ndingsmay not be androcentric. Becky’s dadwasn’t really swallowing the story that F stands for ‘fantastic’. Factors affecting obedience and dissent: Individual differences 33 Each topic is covered on one spread helping you get straight to the point. Revision boosters provide invaluable exam hints and tips. Lots of illustrations and the odd corny joke help make the books very user- friendly! Spec spotlight so you know what you have to know. Exam-style questions help you check your knowledge and understanding. Detailed exam advice section is included at the start of the book. AO2 application questions on methods and concepts provide lots of application skills practice. Evaluation points neatly broken down into ‘Point’ ‘Elaboration’ and ‘This shows...’ (Conclusion). Edexcel Psychology for A Level Year 1 & AS Revision Guide Everything you need to know for your exam!

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