How important are names and years in the exams?

[Negotiation]

Hi!

I'm doing Psych SL, and I'm aiming for a 7, while currently getting sixes.

I've found out that there are waaay too many studies for me to memorize all the researchers and years conducted, and I so I wonder: what significance do these factors have? If you can perfectly explain the idea of a study without producing the name and year, will you be punished?

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Also, I'm using this book: http://www.amazon.com/IB-Psychology-Course-Companion-byHannibal/dp/B005MKBLHO/ref=sr_1_6?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1358512872&sr=1-6&keywords=ib+psychology

And each chapter has learning outcomes, with questions that seem like they could be on exams. Are all of them possibilities, or are they past questions? Is there a place IB has posted this list of possible questions?

Also, I have access to this study guide with slightly fewer questions: http://www.amazon.com/Psychology-Diploma-Study-International-Baccalaureate/dp/0199128308

Are these questions enough to review, or do I also have to review all the ones that aren't listed here?

[Nabz]

If you can do 5-6 past papers scoring above 5, then i believe you have chances of getting a 6 or even a 7...Past papers do help a lot and most of the time, questions do come from past papers as IB seems to repeat the same questions again and again.

[carpediem]

I've found out that there are waaay too many studies for me to memorize all the researchers and years conducted, and I so I wonder: what significance do these factors have? If you can perfectly explain the idea of a study without producing the name and year, will you be punished?

I asked my psychology teacher this a while ago, and she said that it isn't super important (as in, there are no specific marks taken away if you get the names and dates wrong), however it is very obvious to examiners, particularly with the very famous studies, when it is incorrect and that probably would affect their impression on your answer as a whole. (And may deduct marks as such.) Just try your best!

And each chapter has learning outcomes, with questions that seem like they could be on exams. Are all of them possibilities, or are they past questions? Is there a place IB has posted this list of possible questions?

What we do in my class is to live off of the Psychology IB Syllabus. The syllabus has specific points to cover (obviously), but from my experience most exam questions are the syllabus points or some variation of it (to either adjust it to be 8 mark or 22 mark questions), so use the syllabus to make your own questions and see how well you can answer them. In my opinion, that should be sufficient because a) there are lots of syllabus points, and b) it is what the IB use as well for their exam scripts.

[Shahad]

While studying psychology i found studies to be the most important. I got a 7 for Psychology SL and in all honesty, psychology was the subject i least studied for.

Psychology is mostly about understanding the content. I found that i could pretty much write a whole essay if i just knew case studies. The rest of the essay comes with the flow.

We were taught that case studies are vital as they inform the examiner that you have evidence and you aren't just making things up. I found case studies to be a way of proving your point. Besides, if you have the name and date of a case study, it makes your point seem a little more valid and factual if you know what i mean.

But of course you have to know how to use the case studies. You have to introduce your point first, which can be easily derived from a case study, talk about your argument first and then introduce the case study including the aim (easily derived if you know your case study), what they did, results and their conclusion (which you can easily derive from the results and your argument).

If you have trouble memorizing all the case studies i suggest picking case studies which makes sense to you. What i did was write all the case studies in a little notebook which i made purely for psychology case studies. I also made a list of all the case studies with a quick one line description of what it was about to jog my memory. I found that to be most helpful with the endless case studies lol.

They are a pain, but seriously worth it.

[Negotiation]

Okay, thanks for all of your inputs. I'm glad to hear that there's no specific points for it, but understand that it'll make my answer look more professional. I guess I'll try to remember as many as possible, and see how it goes.

[just8food]

One of the prevailing ideas of the IB program is academic honesty. My psychology teacher explained that, while it is not necessary to remember the dates, it is important to credit the researchers of a study, for their work and the study's value. The dates serve to establish the context in which the study was conducted in.

Take for example Asch's study on conformity in 1951. The date is important in evaluating the study because it could be labelled a 'child of its time', the era of individualism didn't take hold until the 1960's. This could explain and invalidate the present value of the results derived.

So yes, remember names (they usually have very peculiar or amusing ones so it isn't hard ), and also dates when relevant.

As for your second question, be prepared to write an LAQ for every learning objective given in the book you are using. The IB paper can put up every one of those questions as an LAQ and even change the command term.

Hope this helps.

[Negotiation]

Great, that explains it. Thanks!

[Negotiation]

Just read through the IB Psych guide, and saw that the command terms of the questions on the exam can be:

• the same as that specified in the related learning outcome, or

• another command term associated with the same assessment objective, or

• a command term of less cognitive demand. 
For example, if a learning outcome begins with the command term “explain”, an examination question based on this learning outcome could contain the command term “explain”, another command term associated with assessment objective 2 (such as “analyse”), or a command term associated with assessment objective 1 (such as “describe”), but not a command term associated with assessment objective 3 (such as “evaluate”).