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Alexei wanted to investigate whether being in day care influenced how much children would share their toys - AQA - A-Level Psychology - Question 11 - 2022 - Paper 2
Question 11
Alexei wanted to investigate whether being in day care influenced how much children would share their toys. He used an opportunity sampling technique to recruit chil... show full transcript
Worked Solution & Example Answer:Alexei wanted to investigate whether being in day care influenced how much children would share their toys - AQA - A-Level Psychology - Question 11 - 2022 - Paper 2
Step 1
Explain one strength and one weakness of the sampling technique used by Alexei in his observation about sharing toys.
Answer
One strength of Alexei’s sampling technique is that he used an opportunity sample, which allowed him to gather participants quickly. This is advantageous as time is often limited in research settings. Additionally, the participants were readily available, as they were from a local day care centre and families he already knew.
One weakness of this technique is that it may not provide a representative sample of the entire population. Since the children were selected from families that Alexei knew, their behaviors might not reflect those of all children in different social backgrounds or locations. This lack of diversity could skew his findings regarding how children share toys.
Step 2
Step 3
Calculate the median number of times toys were shared by children in condition B.
Answer
To find the median, first arrange the data for Condition B in ascending order: 5, 6, 7, 9, 9, 10.
Since there are 6 numbers, the median is the average of the 3rd and 4th values:
Median = ( \frac{7 + 9}{2} = 8 )
Step 4
Determine whether Alexei’s results were significant or not at p ≤ 0.05 for a two-tailed (non-directional) hypothesis.
Answer
Alexei calculated an observed value of 4.5. To determine significance at p ≤ 0.05, we need to compare this to the critical value from the Mann–Whitney U distribution table.
If the critical value is greater than 4.5, then the result is not significant. If it is less than or equal, then the result is significant. Since the critical value is reported as 5, Alexei’s results are significant as (4.5 < 5).
Step 5
Explain one improvement that Alexei could make to his investigation.
Answer
One improvement Alexei could implement is to use a randomized sampling technique. By randomly selecting children from various day care centers and homes, he could obtain a more representative sample. This would help to reduce bias and provide more generalizable findings regarding how children share toys.