INTERNATIONAL BACCALAUREATE

DIPLOMA PROGRAM

May 2024

Psychology Internal Assessment

An experiment to see the effect of face and name stimulus on recall of

information/facts.

Candidate Code: lcz902

Group Member!s Candidate Code: lcz838, lcz897

Number of Words: 2187

Year of Submission: May, 2024

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Table of content

Introduction……………………………………………………………………………..3

Exploration…………………………………………...….……………………………...5

Design………………………………….…...…………………………………...5

Sampling……………………….………………………………………………..5

Materials………………………….……………………………………………..5

Procedure………………….…………………………………………………….6

Analysis…………………………………………………………………………………8

Descriptive……………...……………….………………………………………8

Inferential……………...…………….…………………………………………..9

Evaluation…………………………………..………………………………….………..10

Conclusion…………………………………..……………………………….………….12

Bibliography………………………………...…………………………………………..13

Appendix………………………………………………………..………………………14

Appendix A- Letter of consent……………………………..………………….. 14

Appendix B – Debriefing form……………………………..…………………..15

Appendix C – Standardised instructions………………………….…………….16

Appendix D – Distractor task for face stimulus condition…………….……….17

Appendix E – Distractor task for name stimulus condition……………………18

Appendix F – Face stimulus condition power point………...…………………19

Appendix G – Name stimulus condition power point………………...………..21

Appendix H – Raw Data……………………………………………..………...24

Appendix I – Inferential statistics ………………………………..……………24

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Introduction:

IA is a replication of the study by Phillip Kargopolus et.al (2003)1 on the effect of

face and name presentation on memory for associated verbal descriptors. Cognitive

psychology focuses on cognitive processes. Cognitive process includes thinking, decision

making and memory. Memory is used to encode, retrieve and store information2. One of the

theories of memory suggest that cognition involves the work of two subsystems. This theory

is known as dual coding theory. The Dual coding theory of cognition proposed by Allan

Paivio.3 The two systems in this theory are the verbal system and non-verbal system. Verbal

system is responsible for dealing with language and the nonverbal system is responsible for

nonverbal objects and event3. Dual coding theory states that memory is modality specific, and

the two-systems function independently. They work on different presentations, Logogens are

verbal units of information and imagogens are non-verbal units of information3. When

nonverbal information is paired with verbal information it is stored in both systems thus it is

dually coded. As a result, the information can be recalled more successfully. According to

Allan Paivio, pictures are easier to remember because they can be visualised and there’s a

greater chance that they are dually coded when the pictures are paired with words1.

The original study conducted by Phillip Kargopolus et.al (2003)1 consisted of 64

participants. They were shown 6 people paired with 7 facts about them in one condition and 6

names paired with 7 facts about them in the other condition. Participants were able to recall

more information when it was paired with the picture of the person.

1 Kargopoulos, Philip, et al. “Effects of Face and Name Presentation on Memory for Associated Verbal Descriptors.” The American Journal
of Psychology, vol. 116, no. 3, 2003, p. 415., https://doi.org/10.2307/1423501.

2 Learning, Lumen. “Introduction to Psychology.” Lumen, courses.lumenlearning.com/suny-hvcc-psychology-1/chapter/how-memory-

3 “Dual Coding Theory (Allan Paivio).” InstructionalDesign.Org, 30 Nov. 2018, www.instructionaldesign.org/theories/dual-coding/.

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 This IA aims to investigate the effect of face and name stimulus on the recall of facts/

information on high school students. The relevance of doing this study is to help students

acknowledge that if they study with both verbal and visual stimuli, they will be able to recall

information better.

Independent variable – Type of stimulus (face/name) provided along with

information.

Dependent variable – Number of facts the participants recalled under each condition.

Units of facts about the name and picture recalled out of 5 facts.

Research hypothesis - Participants in the face stimulus condition (person’s face and

facts) will recall more facts than in the name stimulus condition (person’s name and facts).

Null hypothesis - There will be no significant difference in recall of facts between the

face stimulus condition (person’s face and facts) and the name stimulus condition (person’s

name and facts). This is a directional, one tailed hypothesis.

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Exploration:

Design

This IA used a repeated measures design. Repeated measure design is an

experimental design in which the participants are exposed to both conditions of IV(face

stimulus and name stimulus conditions). This was done to control inter-participant variability.

This IA was counterbalanced as well. The reason counterbalance was done was to prevent

fatigue effect and practise effect by making half of the participants to go through the face

condition first and then the name condition. Vice versa for the other half.

Sampling

This IA used opportunity sampling. Opportunity sampling is when people most

conveniently available are chosen for the experiment. This method of sampling is very time

efficient. The sample consisted of IBDP students. All the students were 16+ years of age (6

females and 4 males) so they could give consent themselves. Participants were non-

psychology students to avoid any previous knowledge in the subject biasing the result.

Participants were all proficient in English because they were IBDP students. This was

important as the materials for the experiment were in English.

Materials

1. Standardised instructions to ensure all the participants were going through the similar

proceedings and to increase the reliability of the study.

2. Letter of consent was given to maintain the ethical considerations.

3. 1 minute Distractor task for both conditions - distractor task was used to make sure

activities during the delayed recall is similar across the participants and the individual

nature is not affecting the results. The face stimulus condition distractor task was to

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 rewrite jumbled sentences in the correct order. The name stimulus condition distractor

task was to repeat a set of numbers given on the sheet of paper twice.

4. Name condition PowerPoint - Had 4 names and each name had facts associated to it.

Face condition power point - The four pictures in the ppt were taken from the internet.

All pictures were black and white, this was to prevent colour from interfering with

how much the participants can remember. The pictures chosen had no prominent

features like moustaches or glasses. Each picture had 5 facts related to it and each

name also had 5 facts related to it. The information/facts had the same structure in

both ppts for example I like_____, I am _______, I hate_______. This was done so

that the length of the sentence wouldn’t interfere with how much the participants

could remember.

5. Projector was used so that the amount of time participants viewed the ppt could be

controlled.

6. Pen and paper was used so participants could write what they recalled.

7. Debriefing form was given to maintain the ethical considerations.

Procedure

10 participants entered the classroom. There were 2 separate classrooms for each

condition. These classrooms were very quiet, and this was done so that any noise wouldn’t

distract the participants. Randomly 5 participants were assigned to the face stimulus

condition, while the remaining 5 were assigned to the name stimulus condition. They were

asked to sit calmly. They were then given letters of consent to sign which explained the

confidentiality of their data and the right of the participants to withdraw at any moment from

the study. This was done to gain their willingness to participate in the experiment.

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 A PowerPoint presentation with information and pictures was shown to participants in

the face stimulus condition. A PowerPoint presentation with information and names was

shown to participants in the name stimulus condition. Each slide was projected for 30

seconds. After this participant were asked to complete the distractor task. The face stimulus

condition distractor task was to rewrite jumbled sentences and name stimulus condition

distractor task was to read numbers of a page twice. They got 1 minute to finish the tasks.

After the participant finished the task, they were instructed to write down anything

they could remember about the faces and names while just looking at the faces and names

without the information associated with it. They had 2 minutes to finish. The time allocated

for each task was uniform and this was done to ensure that time doesn’t become an unfair

advantage to recall better.

The participant's sheets were collected. The participants were shifted to the other

condition to repeat the experiment according to the condition. This was done to

counterbalance.

Once they were done with both conditions, they were given a debriefing form which

explained the true aim of the study to eliminate any potential doubt within the participants

about the experiment.

All their data remained confidential, and participants could withdraw anytime.

Participants didn’t face any harm during the experiment.

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Analysis:

Scoring of points - Participants who correctly recalled the entire sentence received one point.

When the second part of the statement was written, a half point was given. If the meaning

was communicated, the entire point was rewarded, for example if the participants wrote

"software developer" instead of "I am a software developer."

Descriptive results

This data was collected on a ratio scale. Ratio scale data is a quantitative measure where there

is a true zero and equal intervals between points.

Mean and Standard deviation calculations

Conditions Mean Standard deviation

Face stimulus condition 9.30 2.54

Name stimulus condition 6.25 3.59

The mean was calculated to estimate the average units of information recalled. The

standard deviation was used to estimate how dispersed the data is from the mean. The mean

for the face stimulus condition is 9.30 and the mean for the name stimulus condition is 6.25.

The standard deviation for the face stimulus condition is 2.54 and the standard deviation

for the name stimulus condition is 3.59. The standard deviation for the face stimulus

condition was smaller than the standard deviation for the face stimulus condition. This shows

that participants in the face stimulus condition recalled almost the same number of units of

information. The mean was larger for the face stimulus condition in comparison to the name

stimulus condition which shows that participants were able to recall more information in the

face stimulus condition and this supports the research hypothesis.

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Mean and Standard deviation graph

Mean units of information reclled for each condition

10
Mean units of information recalled

7.5
for each condition

2.5

0
face stimulus condition name stimulus condition

Inferential results

Wilcoxon test4 was used further to calculate the significance level. Wilcoxon signed-

rank test is a non-parametric test used to compare matched samples and to estimate if their

mean differs. The value of z is -2.4973. The p-value is .00621. The value of W is 3. The

critical value for W at N = 10 (p < .01) is 5. Since W value is 3 which is less than 5 and p-

value less than 0.01, the result is statistically significant. Thus inferential statistics states that

test was significant because the mean of the two conditions was different. This indicates that

the null hypothesis is rejected, and the research hypothesis which is that participants in the

face stimulus condition (person’s face and facts) will recall more than in the name stimulus

condition (person’s name and facts) is accepted.

4“The Wilcoxon Signed-Ranks Test Calculator.” Social Science Statistics, https://

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Evaluation:

The mean units of information recalled by the participants were higher in the face

stimulus condition than in the name stimulus condition and this supports Allan Paivio’s dual

coding theory. According to his theory, participants were able to recall more information in

the face condition because while they were looking at the presentation they saw both the

picture and the facts which helped them to encode the information twice utilising both the

modalities, visual and verbal, which increased the likelihood of remembering the information

better. By looking at the face while recalling they were able to visualise the facts which didn’t

happen in the name condition because of the verbal cues on the presentations limited their

recalling when comparing to the face condition.

Repeated measure design was used that is each participant was exposed to both the

name condition and the face condition. A strength of using repeated measure design is it

controls for inter-participant variability. Since it was the same participant in both conditions,

the differences in the number of facts correctly recalled could not be attributed to differences

in memory capacities as each participant was being compared to their own self. These

strengths the cause-and-effect relationship between IV and DV. A limitation of this design is

that participants might be affected by demand characteristics. Since they were exposed to

both conditions, they might be able to understand the purpose of the study which can lead

them to consciously or unconsciously perform according to what they think the researchers

may be expecting. This would confound the results of the study and decrease its internal

validity. One modification that could be done to the design would be to change it to an

independent measures design. In an independent measures design participants are exposed to

only one condition so this decreases the likelihood that they would understand the aim of the

experiment and therefore change their performance accordingly.

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 The strength of the sample is that it only included students who did not study

psychology. Since they were non-psychology students, they would have not been aware of

this theory and their knowledge would have not influenced the processing of informations

during the study. One limitation of the sample is that all participants are IBDP students and

from the same school of age 16 years. Individuals who are older and those who are from

different schools may have different memory capacities therefore a homogenous sample in

terms of age and school reduces the generalisability of the finding to the larger population.

The possible modification could be to make the sample more diverse in terms of age as well

as taking participants from different schools would allow the study to have higher population

validity.

One strength of the procedure was that several variables such as time given to

participants to view the presentation were kept constant which helped standardise the

procedure of the experiment. Highly standardised procedure allowed for this experiment to

have greater replicability. One limitation of the study is that the participants were made to do

the activity in the group and this could have made them anxious and more competitive which

may affected the way the informations were processed. This could have biased the result. One

modification could be to make participants do the experiment individually by providing

them the stimulus piece in the sheet so they would not be aware of others which would allow

them to perform to the best of their ability without allowing the presence of others affect their

performance.

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Conclusion:

This IA aims to investigate the effect of face and name stimulus on the recall of facts/

information on high school students. The p value is 0.00621 (p<0.01) shows the results of the

IA are significant. Therefore this supports the dual coding theory that states when information

is encoded through both subsystems, visually and verbally, it can be recalled more efficiently.

This supports the research hypothesis which is participants in the face stimulus condition

(person’s face and facts) will recall more facts than in the name stimulus condition (person’s

name and facts).

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Bibliography:

1) Dual Coding Theory (Allan Paivio).” InstructionalDesign.Org, 30 Nov. 2018,

2) Kargopoulos, Philip, et al. “Effects of Face and Name Presentation on Memory for
Associated Verbal Descriptors.” The American Journal of Psychology, vol.
116, no. 3, 2003, p. 415., https://doi.org/10.2307/1423501.
3) Learning, Lumen. “Introduction to Psychology.” Lumen,
courses.lumenlearning.com/suny-hvcc-psychology-1/chapter/how-memory-
functions/. Accessed 15 Oct. 2023.
4) Popov, Alexey, et al. Psychology: Course Companion. Oxford University Press,
2017.
5) “The Wilcoxon Signed-Ranks Test Calculator.” Social Science Statistics, https://
www.socscistatistics.com/tests/signedranks/default.aspx.
6) “Wilcoxon Signed Ranks Test.” Wilcoxon Signed Ranks Test - an Overview |
ScienceDirect Topics, https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-
dentistry/wilcoxon-signed-ranks-
test#:~:text=Wilcoxon%20rank%2Dsum%20test%20is,their%20population%20mean
%20ranks%20differ.

Links for photos:

1) https://www.espncricinfo.com/player/sabir-ali-35265/photos

2) https://www.flickr.com/photos/mrmorodo/49838664643

3) https://www.flickr.com/photos/vokasional/5494188480

4) https://ars.els-cdn.com/content/image/1-s2.0-S1383762199000399-gr7.jpg

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Appendix

1. Appendix A – Letter of consent

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2. Appendix B – Debriefing form

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3. Appendix C – Standardised instructions

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4. Appendix D - Distractor task for face stimulus condition

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5. Appendix E - Distractor task for name stimulus condition

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6. Appendix F - Face stimulus condition power point

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7. Appendix G - Name stimulus condition power point presentation

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8. Appendix H - Raw data

9. Appendix I - Inferential data

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