"The title page should be the first page of your lab report.

The hypothesis and experimental variables should be included in the title. For example: "The Effects of [Independent Variable] on [Dependent Variable]"

Include important information such as the name of your paper, your name, and your academic affiliation" (Cherry, 2016).

"The abstract should be the second page of your lab report. An abstract is a brief synopsis of your report, usually no longer than a paragraph. According to the American Psychological Association (APA) style guide, your abstract should between 150 and 250 words, although specific requirements may vary depending upon your instructor or the academic journal" (Cherry, 2016).

"The purpose of an introduction in a psychology paper is to justify the reasons for writing about your topic. Your goal in this section is to introduce the topic to the reader, provide an overview of previous research on the topic and identify your own hypothesis" (Cherry, 2016).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

"The aims should not appear out of thin air, the preceding review of psychological literature should lead logically into the aims.

Write a paragraph explaining what you plan to investigate and why. Use previously cited research to explain your expectations. Later these expectations are formally stated as the hypotheses" (McLeod, 2011). 

 

 

A hypothesis is a tentative statement about the relationship between two or more variables. A hypothesis is a specific, testable prediction about what you expect to happen in your study.

 

 

 

"The next section of your lab report will be the method section. In this portion of your report, you will describe the procedures used in your experiment. Information you should provide includes number of participants, background of participants, your independent and dependent variables, and the type of experimental design you used" (Cherry, 2016).

 

"In the results section of the paper, describe statistical data gathered from your experiment. This section is usually quite short and does not include any interpretation of your results. Use tables and figures to display statistical data and results. Discover further details on what you should and should not include when writing a results section" (Cherry, 2016).

 

 

 

 

 

"In the discussion section in which you interpret the results of your experiment. Did the results of your experiment support or refute your hypothesis? You should also suggest possible explanations for the results of your experiment and what these results might mean in terms of future research on the topic" (Cherry, 2016).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

"After your discussion section, your lab report should also include a list of references used in your experiment and lab report. Remember, all references cited in text must be listed in the references section and vice versa. All references should be in APA format" (Cherry, 2016).

 

 

 

 

 

Examining Memory Through the Serial Position Effect

E. Atchison

Scotch College

 

Memory and recollection are an extremely prevalent part of life, the recollection of memories allows us to reflect and analyse situations and statistics – all drawn from information in our surrounding environment. In this investigation will analyse to what extent does the serial positioning of digits in a sequence effect our ability to memorise these numbers, and why this is important.

Research behind memory and cognition has found that short-term memory information can be stored in the brain for up to 30 seconds, and the capacity of said information is around 7 items, give or take 2 (McLeod, 2009). When asked to recall an extended list of over ~7 pieces of information, it is likely that an individual would only recall a limited amount of information - defined by the serial position effect. The ‘serial position effect’ recognises that people generally are able to recall items from the start and end of a list more frequently that items in the middle (McLeod, 2009). The impulse to recall earlier words is called the primacy effect; the impulse to recall the later words is called the recency effect. The term ‘Serial position effect’ was coined by Herman Ebbinghaus, based on a set of tests that he performed by himself (Wikipedia,2015). It was recognised by Murdock (1962) that the reason for the primacy effect is that the first sets of information are most effectively stored in the long-term memory, as there is a large amount of cognitive processing applied to them. This effect is reduced the faster information is presented to the participant, and vice versa. The reason for the recency effect is the easily recognisable pattern that this information is simply recent in the working memory at the time of recall, and makes it easy for a participant to remember.

 

The aim of this investigation is to determine the effectiveness of the short-term memory through the examination of the serial position effect, and examine the accuracy of recalled single digit numbers from the start to finish of a list of 10 numbers.

 

Based on the results of Murdock’s experiment in 1962, it is hypothesised that 16-17 year old male psychology students will recall the numbers serially positioned at the start and end of 5 different 10 digit sets more accurately than numbers in the middle of the sets, as measured by a memory test.

INDEPENDENT VARIABLE: The different sequences of numbers, as presented by the 5 sets.

DEPENDENT VARIABLE: The accuracy of recalled digits.

 

A total of 7 participants took part in the experiment, these consisted of 16-17 year old male psychology students, and were selected as a sample of convenience due to being part of the class being tested.

 

It was originally hypothesised that the teenage male psychology students will recall the numbers serially positioned at the start and end of 5 different 10 digit sets more accurately than numbers in the middle of the sets, as measured by a memory test. Based on the data gathered from 7 sample participants from the teenage male psychology student population, it is clear that there is a very strong correlation between the serial position of the number in a sequence and its impact on the recollection of said number. The results show that numbers in the middle of a sequence (~5-7) are far less frequently recalled compared to the digits at the start and end of the sequence. The original hypothesis was heavily based off the research and findings of Murdock and Glanzer and Cunitz, meaning that any sort of similarities between this experiment and their findings would prove to be supportive of the hypothesis. This was the case, as the ‘distinct “U” shape’ that was described by Murdock in his 1962 experiment was able to be recognised in my experiment even with a smaller sample.

REFERENCES:

Glanzer, M., & Cunitz, A. R. (1966). Two storage mechanisms in free recall. Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior, 5(4), 351-360.

McLeod, S. (2015). Serial Position Effect | Simply Psychology. Retrieved from http://www.simplypsychology.org/primacy-recency.html

Murdock, B. B. (1962). The serial position effect of free recall. Journal of Experimental Psychology, 64(5), 482–488.

Wikipedia,. (2014). Serial position effect. Retrieved from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serial_position_effect