CQUniversity Unit Profile.

This assessment is your opportunity to share your thoughts and analysis as to what you have read and experienced about a classical experiment in psychology. This piece of writing is meant to illustrate your understanding of the experiment (for example, the ethical implications of why and how it was done), how it affects your ideas, and how it may possibly affect your professional practice in the future.

Specifically, this assessment requires you to (a) select and research ONE of the 10 listed psychological experiments, and (b) provide ONE 450-550 word personal reflection on the experiment, according to the marking criteria (see below).

Please select one of the following psychological experiments to base your reflection on:

• The Little Albert experiment
• Asch Conformity experiment
• The Bystander Effect
• The Milgram experiment
• Harlow's Monkey experiment
• Learned Helplessness
• Robber's Cave experiment
• The Monster Study
• Blue Eyed Versus Brown Eyed Students
• The Stanford Prison experiment

Please note that you are not expected to include any references in this assessment. The content is meant to reflect your thoughts, feelings and reflections. You can of course include a reference if absolutely necessary. The word count includes all words excluding the title (and would include references if you had them).

You are required to submit ONE personal reflection on ONE of the ten experiments (worth 20% of your final mark for this unit). Responses should be posted on Moodle via the appropriate link in the Assessment tile.

This assessment does not require a cover page. Please COPY-and-PASTE your response from your word document into the relevant text box during submission. Do not attempt to upload a word file.

Level of GenAI use allowed:
Level 3: You may use Al to assist with specific tasks such as drafting text, refining and evaluating your work. You must critically evaluate and modify any Al-generated content you use.

The 72-hour grace period does apply to this task. Submissions later than 72-hours must obtain an approved extension via documentation such as a medical certificate or statutory declaration or be subject to a 5% per day penalty over the grace period. 

This assessment will be graded out of 20 marks. Marks will be allocated according to each of the following criteria:

1. A brief overview of the experiment’s contribution to psychology [5 marks]
2. An understanding of the ethics of the experiment is demonstrated [5 marks]
3. Reference to personal experiences, situations, events, or new information is made [5 marks]
4. The response is of sufficient length (i.e., adheres to the word limit), and is written with good spelling and grammar [5 marks]

Evaluating the value of diverse sources of information is an important research skill. Key differences exist in the way we evaluate qualitative and quantitative research and criticisms for one approach are not necessarily applicable to the other. For this assessment, you will be required to work in a group to:

1. determine whether common criticisms of research are applicable for qualitative research and/or quantitative research.
2. provide a justification for each of your decisions, commenting on how each issue could impact research findings.

Level of GenAI use allowed (group component): Level 1: You must not use Al at any point during this aspect of the assessment. You must demonstrate your core skills and knowledge.

You will also need to complete an individual reflection of these answers. Please reflect on the processes, procedures, conflicts, and times your group worked well together during this assessment. What have you learned that could be implemented or improved in research teams that you might be involved with in the future?

The 72-hour grace period does apply to the group component of the task. However, no submissions (even with a 5% per day late penalty) can be accepted after this period. Please ensure the group submits in a timely manner. Extensions can only be approved in exceptional circumstances and would need a) the support of the majority of group members and b) supply approved documentation. 

Level of GenAI use allowed (individual reflection): Level 3: You may use Al to assist with specific tasks such as drafting text, refining and evaluating your work. You must critically evaluate and modify any Al-generated content you use.

The 72-hour grace period does apply to the individual reflection component of the task. Submissions later than 72-hours must obtain an approved extension via documentation such as a medical certificate or statutory declaration or be subject to a 5% per day penalty over the grace period. 

Group component [24 marks]

For this assessment, you will be required to work in a group to assess 12 common criticisms of qualitative research and/or quantitative research. For each common criticism, you can receive 1 mark for each correctly identified paradigm and 1 mark for correctly identifying how each criticism could impact findings. The marking criteria are as follows: 

1. determine whether common criticisms of research are applicable for qualitative research and/or quantitative research. [1 mark x 12 critiques = 12 marks in total]

2. provide a justification for each of your decisions, commenting on how each issue could impact research findings. [1 mark x 12 critiques = 12 marks in total; approx. 50 words per item]

Individual component [6 marks; 250-word limit]  

The aim of this assessment is to enable you to develop your writing skills and to practice preparing a research report. A research report is structured in the order that you actually conduct research; typically, a researcher becomes interested in a puzzling psychological phenomenon, designs a study to investigate it, collects and analyses data, then interprets the results. However, this assessment is designed to just give you a 'taste' of the process of a research report. You will be required to demonstrate that you can critically evaluate the literature on a given topic, communicate a research aim, construct a hypothesis, and discuss research findings. Because this is an introductory unit, you will not be required to calculate any statistics or results for yourselves, but rather, you will be given the results for the study and then follow some basic steps in order to write up the results correctly. 

You will be required to write a brief (1500- to 2000-word) research report. You need to write the report as if you are the researcher (rather than a participant in a class study or study conducted by the unit coordinator). You will be assessed on your ability to put together a scientific report, based on collected data (note you will also be a participant), in American Psychological Association (APA) format, with sections including an Abstract, Introduction, Method, Results, Discussion, and References. Five references will be provided to you, but at least five more must be found, and referred to, in your report (so, your reference list should have a minimum of 10 journal articles in it. Non journal articles such as books, government websites etc do not count towards the 10 but can be cited if necessary). You will need to do some independent searching and reading of the literature. Reading and conducting scientific reports, and the use of the APA style are skills that you will utilise all throughout your psychology degree and beyond. Please refer to the APA publication manual (2020) and utilise the APA template provided for further information on how to appropriately format your report.

Level of GenAI use allowed:
Level 3: You may use Al to assist with specific tasks such as drafting text, refining and evaluating your work. You must critically evaluate and modify any Al-generated content you use.

The 72-hour grace period does apply to this task. Submissions later than 72-hours must obtain an approved extension via documentation such as a medical certificate or statutory declaration or be subject to a 5% per day penalty over the grace period. 

MARKS AVAILABLE FOR EACH SECTION