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Writing the Introduction

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  • Internal Assessment/
  • Writing the IA/
  • Writing the Introduction

One of the reasons that many internal assessments are moderated down is because of the quality of the introduction. The goal of this page is to give advice on how to improve this part of the report.

For a step-by-step guide, please see the following template.

 Teacher only box

I have my students submit the introduction before actually carrying out the experiment with the goal of finding problems before they happen.

Assessment criteria

The following descriptors are for the top mark bands for the introduction of the IA report.

5 - 6 markband
The aim of the investigation is stated and its relevance is explained.
The theory or model upon which the student’s investigation is based is described and the link to the student’s investigation is explained.
The Independent and Dependent Variables are stated and operationalized in the null or research hypotheses.

Tips for doing well on your introduction

Tip 1: You don't need to explain the original study, but it may be helpful to explain the theory.

Many students include a full description of the original study. This is fine, but it is not assessed.  It is better for you to have a good summary of your own procedure in the Exploration of the report. If you decide to include the original study, use it as a way of explaining the theory in more detail.

Tip 2: Outline the theory upon which the study is based.

As part of the introduction, it is important to identify and describe the theory upon which the study is based.  If students are replicating Loftus & Palmer (1974), there could be a short discussion of reconstructive memory, schema theory and the role of post-event information - known as the misinformation effect.

Tip 3: Explain why this research is relevant to the target population and worthy of study.

It is important that the aim/hypothesis is justified.  This happens in two ways. First, the predictions made should match those of the findings of the study outlined in the introduction.  In addition, why is this important in the target population that you are studying?  This helps to justify the research and also focuses on the population which is being investigated.

Tip 4: State your aim and its justification as clearly as possible

The aim should appear before your hypotheses in the report.  You should use the words: The aim of this study is.....  When discussing the relevance of the study, it may either be relevance for your population or for a wider population.

Tip 5: Stick to two levels of one independent variable.

The IB only allows you to have one independent variable.  Unless you have learned how to do more advanced statistics, only have two levels of the independent variable.  If you have more than two levels of the IV, no only your statistics change, but how you write the hypotheses changes.  See the statistics section of this site for more details.

Student sample

For comments on the sample, please see the file attached.

Introduction

In the cognitive approach, humans are seen as information processors. Cognitive researchers have been interested in how knowledge is stored and retrieved. According to the multi-store model of memory (Atkinson and Shiffrin, 1968 in Gross p 248), the memory system consists of sensory memory, short-term memory, and long-term memory. In order to be stored in long-term memory, information needs to be coded and rehearsed in short-term memory. Cognitive researchers have suggested that memory coding can have a visual (imagery) or verbal (semantic) form. Paivio (1969 in Reed p 181) argued that there are two major ways in which people could elaborate on information to remember. One is verbal association and the other is creating a visual image. According to Paivio, the ability to form a visual image of a word is dependent on whether the word is abstract or concrete. It is generally easier for people to form a visual image of a concrete word and therefore a concrete word is better recalled in an experiment than an abstract word. According to Paivio’s dual-coding theory (in Reed p 183), there are two independent memory codes – a verbal and an image - that can both result in recall. Research has consistently demonstrated that imagery is more effective.

This was demonstrated in an experiment by Paivio, Smythe, and Yuille (1968 in Reed p 181) where they investigated how well student participants recalled paired words that were high-imagery (for example, juggler, dress, letter, and hotel) to words that were low-imagery (for example, effort, duty, quality, and necessity). The researchers predicted that high imagery word lists were easier to remember than abstract word lists because the words that were high imagery were concrete. In the experiment, the participants were shown lists of words and asked to remember them. The word lists were combined so that one list contained words that were high-imagery and another list contained words that were low-imagery. There were also lists that combined words that were high and low in imagery. The participants were not given any particular instructions in terms of how to remember the word lists. The result of the experiment was that the participants recalled more high-imagery words than low imagery words. The researchers argued that this was because it was easier to perform mental images of words that were classified as high-imagery and concrete. One reason for higher recall in the high-imagery group could be that high-imagery words made it is possible to combine the two words to form an interactive image. According to the researchers, this strategy increased recall. After the experiment was over the participants were asked what strategy they had used to remember the words and for the high-imagery words it was often reported that imagery had been used as a memory strategy. The conclusion was that imagery was a more effective learning strategy than verbal coding.

This topic is worth studying because it may help students to develop better strategies for learning content in school.  Being able to visualize a concept may help students to better remember terminology and apply it. It may also inform teachers as to how to best present information to their classes.  If information is presented in a more visual way, then it is possible that student retention of that information will be better.

This study is a simple replication of Paivio, Smythe, and Yuille (1968). Based on the finding in the original experiment, the aim of the present experiment is to investigate whether concrete (high imagery) or abstract (low-imagery) words result in more recall in international high school students.

H0: There will be no significant difference in the mean number of abstract vs concrete words recalled by international high school students from a list of 20 words in which 10 of the words are abstract and 10 are concrete.

H1: International high school students will recall a larger mean number of concrete words than abstract words from a list of 20 words in which 10 of the words are abstract and 10 are concrete.

References

Gross, R. (2001) Psychology: The Science of Mind and Behaviour. 4th edition. London: Hodder and Stoughton Educational.

Reed, S.R. (1996) Cognition: Theory and application. 4th edition. Pacific Grove: Brooks/Cole Publishing Company.

Student copy with comments