Product Description

OCR Psychology: AS Core Studies prepares students for all elements of the OCR AS exam. All of the twenty core research papers are covered and explanations of why and how the studies were carried out are included.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #243389 in Books
• Published on: 2006-06-29
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 256 pages

Review

'This book is visually stunning and will be highly appealing to both teachers and students. It is also designed to aid a reader’s comprehension of the material. The book’s overwhelming visual appeal, logical formatting, accuracy, psychological insight and inspiration should all guarantee its success.' - Beth Black, former senior examiner and teacher, Long Road Sixth Form College

'I think this a fascinating and wonderful book. The students will love it and so will the teachers.' - Diana Dwyer, Head of Psychology, Joseph Whitaker School, Rainworth

'This book is visually stunning and will be highly appealing to both teachers and students. It is also designed to aid a reader’s comprehension of the material. The book’s overwhelming visual appeal, logical formatting, accuracy, psychological insight and inspiration should all guarantee its success.' - Beth Black, former senior examiner and teacher, Long Road Sixth Form College

'I think this a fascinating and wonderful book. The students will love it and so will the teachers.' - Diana Dwyer, Head of Psychology, Joseph Whitaker School, Rainworth

From the Publisher

As the Editor at Psychology Press, responsible for `OCR Psychology: AS Core studies', I would like to respond to the comments made on this book by Andy B. His main concerns seem to be with regards to the layout of the book and the supposed lack of answers provided to the questions posed throughout.

The layout has been specifically designed to resemble magazine style spreads. Our feedback suggests that students respond really well to this style, as many prefer to read in this way. The course content is made accessible, understandable and teachable in bite-sized chunks. The presentation of the core study material is very clearly laid out, splitting the study into abstract, aims and procedure, results etc and the level of detail is just right for students preparing for the OCR examination.

This layout also includes a number of features designed to help students understand the material such as:

• `Connections' icons (based on London tube map) which facilitate and underline connections between the core studies.


• Starters and Afters to provide interesting detail to place the studies in context, by making links to real-life situations so the studies come alive.


• Summaries of the core studies which are given as flow charts at the end of each chapter to provide students with helpful revision cues.

We are publishing a new edition of this book in July 2008 which will be designed in full-colour, whilst maintaining the same layout and strong visual
appeal.This information provides students with a thorough indication of how to answer all questions, but as the answers are not given in the book, they are encouraged to think for themselves first rather than being spoon-fed the answers. Evaluation skills are a key part of the OCR specification and this book allows students to develop these skills by use of searching questions related to key issues.

We do, however, provide student answers complete with examiner comments to all the exam questions at the end of each chapter in the book. These are designed to help students with exam preparation as we appreciate that there is a lot to cram in to term-time teaching so it helps to focus specifically on the exam requirements as well. The examiners' marks and comments really give readers insight and working knowledge of how to target their responses.

In conclusion, in our view this is an excellent book and a key element of our successful A-Level programme. We believe that the market agrees as sales have exceeded our expectations and we had to reprint twice in quick succession after just over a year.

From the Back Cover

Endorsed by OCR for use with the OCR AS GCE Psychology specification, OCR Psychology: AS Core Studies prepares students for all elements of the OCR AS exam. All of the twenty core research papers are covered and explanations of why and how the studies were carried out are included. The text also explores the conclusions that can be drawn and looks at what happened next. Students are encouraged to make links from the historical studies to everyday issues and contemporary events, and to raise questions that challenge our understanding of people in the modern world.

The book mirrors the design of the course both in its exploration of research studies, and in its sections on key issues and debates in psychology, which can be used for evaluation. Material is provided for all three AS papers including the practical component of the course.

Specifically it covers,

• The core studies: an abstract of each plus ample details of aims, method, results, and conclusions. Guidance is given on how each study can be evaluated, and short-answer questions, practical activities, discussion ideas, multiple-choice questions, and past exam questions are provided.
• The background to each core study: information about related research and biographical details of the researcher(s) provide a context that makes the studies more understandable.
• Key issues: 20 issues and debates are discussed in detail to prepare students for the long-answer questions.
• A research methods chapter guides students in conducting and reporting the four activities for their practical investigations folder. It also provides suggestions for the activities and practice exam questions.
• Exam guidance: each chapter ends with a selection of short- and long-answer exam questions, with answers by students and examiner's comments.

The whole book is presented in magazine-style spreads to aid the learning process. It is written in a style accessible to all students, whilst also providing some challenging material for the more confident student.

Key features of the book include:

• 'Starters' and 'Afters' to place the study in context
• 'Questions' and 'Activities' and 'Debates' related to each core study to offer students the opportunity to really engage with the material
• Evaluation suggestions for each core study
• Multiple-choice questions
• A bank of past exam questions
• Key issues covered in depth to promote greater understanding
• Summaries of core studies in the form of mini 'mind maps' to provide helpful revision cues to candidates
• Student answers to exam questions with examiner's comments

This book will be an invaluable resource for all students and teachers following the OCR AS course.

'OCR Psychology: AS Core Studies' is accompanied by a free website of supplementary resource material. It contains suggested answers to all exam questions, study questions, evaluation points and core study questions in the book, as well as extra exam and study questions and answers.

These resources are under development and will be available at the beginning of September 2006.

Customer Reviews

An excellent text for OCR psychology
This is the business: it picks out all the key points for each of the 20 core studies in terms of background, the study itself, evaluation questions and it has self-check questions too.

Learn what is in here and get an 'A' grade!

Appalling from start to finish
This book is a complete mystery to me. Or rather how such a high profile publishing house, which specialises in psychology, would publish such an ill-conceived product is a mystery.

To start with, the layout is utterly appalling. No other word will do.

According to the back cover blurb, Beth Black of Long Road Sixth Form College is impressed by the book's "overwhelming visual appeal, logical arrangement, accuracy, psychological insight and inspiration..."

I don't think so.

Firstly, it is indeed visually "overwhelming." But appealing? No way. In fact it is a total mess.

For some unfathomable reason the contents are set out in "coloured," erratically arranged blocks of pale orange, dark (1960's) orange, white, mid-grey and black. Most of the text is in black, except where it is white on black or in mid-strength orange on pale orange or on mid-grey. Did anyone at the publishers stop to consider how difficult it would be for many people to read the text in those last two colour combinations? Presumably not!

It is also a complete mystery why the text is set out in coloured blocks, of differing proportions, at all. The practise presents the information in a totally fractured manner with no natural flow from one block to the next, and certainly nothing resembling "logical formating." Worse yet, this confusing layout also conceals the fact that the authors ask questions for which they have not provided any answer. Which wouldn't be so bad if it weren't for the wealth of *irrelevant* material that IS included - like the totally uneven "biographical notes" - Elizabeth Loftus gets over half a page (page 6), Beatrix Gardner gets about one sixth of a page (page 31), and Jan Deragowski gets six lines in a tiny little box in the bottom right-hand corner of page 15!
Great idea for a textbook - not!

As an example of what's missing, on pages 33 and 75 the authors write (top left hand corner in both instances): "This study was a case study. What are the strengths and limitations of this research method in the context of this study?" But where have they provided such information? Even the larger box at the top of page 203 - "Case Studies" - fails to give even a fleeting indication of how to answer that question.
Moreover the whole of the material on Freud's case of Little Hans (pages 72-75) seems to be referred to as a "case history" rather than a "case study", until we get to the question on page 75. Does this mean that "case history" and "case study" are synonymous? Who knows? The book doesn't provide the necessary information.

Of course it might be an interesting topic for debate if we had a few hours to spare, and reaching an accurate conclusion didn't much matter. But students using this book have something like 20 weeks of term time in which to cover 20 so-called "core studies" before they take the three part AS exam.

As for accuracy, check out the table on page 22. Surely only a someone who was completely numerically illiterate could fail to notice that the numbers are arranged incorrectly?

In the next study, on the training of Washoe, the authors claim that the chimp produced "her own novel combinations such as 'open food drink' ([meaning] open the fridge)..."
Which wasn't, in fact, the case. Washoe actually signed "to open + to eat + to drink."
The difference may have seemed unimportant to these authors, but in terms of learning a language, the two versions of Washoe's communication were definitely significant.

Just my opinion, but I really think students deserve a textbook that adheres to far higher standards than this.