AQA A-Level Psychology

Explanations for the success and failure of dieting

Psychological explanations for obesity, including restraint theory, disinhibition and the boundary model.

Biological explanations for obesity, including genetic and neural explanations.

Psychological explanations for anorexia: cognitive theory, including distortions and irrational beliefs.

Psychological explanations for anorexia: social learning theory, including modelling, reinforcement and media.

Psychological explanations for anorexia: family systems, including enmeshment, autonomy and control.

Biological explanations for anorexia nervosa, including genetic and neural explanations.

Neural and hormonal mechanisms involved in the control of eating behaviour, including the role of the hypothalamus, ghrelin and leptin

Explanations for food preferences: the role of learning in food preference including social and cultural influences.

Explanations for food preferences: the evolutionary explanation, including reference to neophobia and taste aversion.

Atypical gender development: gender dysphoria; biological and social explanations for gender dysphoria

The influence of culture and media on general roles

Social learning theory as applied to gender development

Psychodynamic explanation of gender development, Freud's psychoanalytic theory, oedipus complex; Electra complex; identification and internalisation

Cognitive explanations of gender development, gender schema theory

Cognitive explanations of gender development. Kohlberg's theory, gender identity, gender stability and gender constancy

Atypical sex chromosome patterns: Klinefelter's syndrome and Turner's syndrome

The role of chromosomes and hormones (testosterone, oestrogen and oxytocin) in sex and gender

Androgyny and measuring androgyny including the Bem Sex Role Inventory

Sex and gender. Sex-role stereotypes

Ethical implications of research studies and theory, including reference to social sensitivity.

Idiographic and nomothetic approaches to psychological investigation.

Holism and reductionism: levels of explanation in psychology. Biological reductionism and environmental (stimulus-response) reductionism.

The nature-nurture debate: the relative importance of heredity and environment in determining behaviour; the interactionist approach.

Free will and determinism: hard determinism and soft determinism; biological, environmental and psychic determinism. The scientific emphasis on causal explanations.

Gender and culture in psychology - universality and bias. Cultural bias including ethnocentrism and cultural relativism.

Gender and culture in psychology - universality and bias. Gender bias including androcentrism and alpha and beta bias.

Features of science: objectivity and the empirical method; replicability and falsifiability; theory construction and hypothesis testing; paradigms and paradigm shifts.

Reporting psychological investigations. Sections of a scientific report: abstract, introduction, method, results, discussion and referencing.

Probability and significance: use of statistical tables and critical values in interpretation of significance; Type I and Type II errors.

Factors affecting the choice of statistical test, including level of measurement (nominal, ordinal and interval) and experimental design. When to use the following tests: Spearman's rho, Pearson's r, Wilcoxon, Mann-Whitney, related t-test, unrelated t-test and Chi-Squared test.

Reliability across all methods of investigation. Ways of assessing reliability: test-retest and inter-observer; improving reliability. Types of validity across all methods of investigation: face validity, concurrent validity, ecological validity and temporal validity. Assessment of validity. Improving validity.

Content analysis and coding. Thematic analysis.

Case studies.

The implications of psychological research for the economy.

The role of peer review in the scientific process

Introduction to statistical testing; the sign test. When to use the sign test; calculation of the sign test.

Presentation and display of quantitative data: graphs, tables, scattergrams, bar charts, histograms. Distributions: normal and skewed distributions; characteristics of normal and skewed distributions.

Descriptive statistics: measures of central tendency - mean, median, mode; measures of dispersion - range and standard deviation; calculation of range.

Qualitative and quantitative data; the distinction between qualitative and quantitative data collection techniques. Primary and secondary data, including meta-analysis.

Self-report techniques: questionnaires; interviews, structured and unstructured. Questionnaire construction, including use of open and closed questions; design of interviews. Pilot studies and the aims of piloting.

Observational techniques. Types of observation: naturalistic and controlled observation; covert and overt observation; participant and non-participant observation. Observational design: behavioural categories; event sampling; time sampling.

Correlations. Analysis of the relationship between co-variables. The difference between correlations and experiments. Positive, Negative and zero correlations.

Ethics, including the role of the British Psychological Society's code of ethics; ethical issues in the design and conduct of psychological studies; dealing with ethical issues in research.

Sampling: the difference between population and sample: sampling techniques including: random, systematic, stratified, opportunity and volunteer; implications of sampling techniques, including bias and generalisation.

Types of experiment, laboratory and field experiments; natural and quasi-experiments.

The experimental method

The effects of endogenous pacemakers and exogenous zeitgebers on the sleep/wake cycle

Biopsychology - Biological rhythms: infradian and ultradian rhythms

Biological rhythms: circadian rhythms

Ways of studying the brain: scanning techniques, including functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI); electroencephalograms (EEG's) and event related potentials (ERP's); post-Mortimer examinations.