Experience Psychology

Experience Psychology KS3, KS4, Post-16  

Duration: 1 hour, max capacity: 35 students 

(with optional 30-minute experiment for KS4, and optional 1 hour investigation for Post-16) 

Updated and redeveloped in line with the new curriculum, this 1 hour workshop uses intriguing activities to examine memory and cognition. Whilst this workshop is aimed at KS3 & KS4, the content may be useful to Post-16 groups as an introduction.

Key Words:

Psychology, Brain, Cognition, Memory, Eyewitness testimony, Experiment, Evidence, Variables

Learning objectives

KS3-Post-16

Understand the roles of different neurons and of the central peripheral nervous systems. Gain an understanding of sensory, short-term and long-term memory. Gain an understanding of the flashbulb memory phenomenon. Consider the reliability of eyewitness testimony. Examine methods that increase memory capacity and improve recall. Explore the influence of group conformity. Recognise the important features of a successful investigation using human subjects

Post-16

Compare similarities and differences between the multi store and the working memory model.

Content

KS3-Post-16

Participate in a variety of games and other activities to discover more about their own perception and memories. Test their own reliability as eyewitnesses to an incident. 

KS4

Conduct an experiment and collect data for analysis (optional, 30-minute KS4) 

Post-16

Conduct an investigation and collect data from naturalistic observation of visitors within We The Curious (optional, 1 hour)

Curriculum Links:

KS3-4

AQA, GCSE Psychology. Memory: Processes of encoding, storage and retrieval. Structures of memory. Memory as an active process. Social influence: Conformity and obedience. Brain and neuropsychology: Structure and function of the nervous system. Neuron structure and function. Research methods: Formulation of testable hypotheses. Types of variable. Sampling methods. Designing research. Correction. Planning and conducting research. Ethical considerations

OCR, GCSE Psychology. Social influence: Conformity. Obedience. Memory: Stages of information processing. The structure and process of the Multi-store model. The structure and process of the theory of reconstructive memory. Research methods - Planning research: Hypothesis, variables, experimental designs, ethical guidelines. Doing research: Experiments, observations, correlations

Edexcel, GCSE Psychology. Memory: Understand the features of short-term and long-term memory. Understand the structure and process of memory through the Multi-store Model of Memory. The brain and neuropsychology: Know what neurons and synapses are. Social influence: Conformity. Obedience. Research methods: Designing psychological research

Post-16

AQA, AS & A Level Psychology. Social influence: Types of conformity: internalisation, identification and compliance. Memory: The multi-store model of memory. Long-term memory: episodic, semantic, procedural. The working memory model: Explanations for forgetting: Eyewitness testimony. Biopsychology: The divisions of the nervous system. The structure and function of sensory, relay and motor neurons. Research methods: Experimental method. Observational techniques. Correlations. Scientific process: Aims. Hypotheses. Variables. Demand characteristics and investigator effects. Ethics

OCR, AS & A level Psychology. Social: Responses to people in authority. Cognitive: Memory. Biological: Regions of the brain. Research method and techniques: Experiment, observation and correlation. Planning and conducting research: Aims and hypothesis and how to formulate. Variables. Data recording, analysis and presentation: Inferential statistics (Spearman’s rank). Methodological issues: Reliability, Validity, Demand characteristics, Researcher/observer bias, Researcher/ observer effect. Ethical considerations, including the British Psychological Society’s Code of Ethics and Conduct

Edexcel, AS & A level Psychology. Social psychology: Content- Obedience. Method- Self-reporting data. Ethical guidelines. Cognitive psychology: Content- Memory. Biopsychology: Content- Central nervous system. Methods - Correlational research. Analysis of correlational data. Criminological psychology: Content- Eye-witness testimony. Psychology skills: Methods- Types of data. Hypotheses. Experiments

Potential Hazards and accessibility

Students will be offered a drink of fruit squash as part of an investigation and will be invited to take part in a demonstration involving lemons and the ‘miracle berry’, Synsepalum dulcificum.