Psychology lab report: introduction
time to complete: 10 minutes
Having explored the key differences, we will now analyse this sample lab report from psychology titled “Distraction Data – Data Analysis Project”, starting with its introduction section.
ABOUT THIS TEXT
This lab report is an authentic piece of university-level student writing submitted as part of the British Academic Written English corpus (BAWE) and found on Flax. Although it is of a high standard, it might contain occasional errors with language and referencing.
Task 11: Read the introduction and answer the following questions:
- What is the purpose of this section?
- Are the aims clearly stated?
- Can you see a hypothesis?
- Are the claims supported by relevant literature?
Introduction
Previous research has shown that boys of primary school age are involved in a greater number of road traffic accidents than girls. It is possible that the reason for this is due to a difference in the development of attention skills between boys and girls of this age range. In this experiment, we want to investigate differences in the attention skills between boys and girls between the ages of four years and nine years, and observe how these attention skills are affected by a background distraction. We predict that boys will perform worse than the girls at an attention task when being distracted by a background event. As attention skills are known to increase with age, it is also predicted that performance by both girls and boys in both the distraction and no-distraction conditions will increase with age.
Adapted from BAWE (no date)
Answers
It provides the necessary background context. It also states the aims of the research and offers a hypothesis.
Introduction
Previous research has shown that boys of primary school age are involved in a greater number of road traffic accidents than girls. It is possible that the reason for this is due to a difference in the development of attention skills between boys and girls of this age range. In this experiment, we want to investigate differences in the attention skills between boys and girls between the ages of four years and nine years, and observe how these attention skills are affected by a background distraction. We predict that boys will perform worse than the girls at an attention task when being distracted by a background event. As attention skills are known to increase with age, it is also predicted that performance by both girls and boys in both the distraction and no-distraction conditions will increase with age.
Yes.
… In this experiment, we want to investigate differences in the attention skills between boys and girls between the ages of four years and nine years, and observe how these attention skills are affected by a background distraction. …
Yes.
… We predict that boys will perform worse than the girls at an attention task when being distracted by a background event. As attention skills are known to increase with age, it is also predicted that performance by both girls and boys in both the distraction and no-distraction conditions will increase with age.
No. This section could be improved by linking the claims to previously published work. For instance:
- Any examples of previous research???
Previous research has shown that boys of primary school age are involved in a greater number of road traffic accidents than girls.
- Think about the hypothesis as well, it would sound more plausible if it was grounded in the literature. Any examples to support what we know about attention skills?
As attention skills are known to increase with age, it is also predicted that performance by both girls and boys in both the distraction and no-distraction conditions will increase with age.