Course Content – AQA Syllabus (7182)
A Level Psychology
Unit 1 – Social influence
- Types of Conformity
- Explanations for obedience
- Resistance to Social Influence
- The role of social influence processes in social change
Unit 2 – Memory
- The Multi-Store Model
- Explanations for forgetting
- Interference theory
- Retrieval failure
- The Cognitive Interview Technique
Unit 3 – Attachment
- Caregiver-infant interactions
- Stages of attachment
- Multiple attachments and the role of the father
- Cultural variations in attachment
Unit 4 – Psychopathology
- Behavioural, emotional and cognitive characteristics of disorders
- Depressive and bipolar disorders
- OCD and anxiety disorders
- The behavioural approach to explaining and treating phobias
- The cognitive approach to depression
- The biological approach to OCD
Unit 5 – Approaches in psychology
- Origins of psychology
- Social learning theory
- Cognitive approaches
- Biological approaches
- Psychodynamic approaches, including Freud and the Structure of Personality
- Humanistic approaches
- The eclectic approach
Unit 6 – Biopsychology
- The Nervous System
- The Endocrine System
- The Fight or Flight Response
- Localisation of brain function
Unit 7 – Issues and Debates in Psychology
- Gender
- Culture
- Free will and determinism
- Nature vs nurture
- Holism and reductionism
- Idiographic and nomothetic approaches
- Ethics
Unit 8 – Relationships
- Partner preferences
- Factors affecting attraction in romantic relationships
- Filter theory
- Virtual relationships
- Para social relationships
Unit 9 – Aggression
- Neural mechanisms and the limbic system
- Hormonal mechanisms
- Genetic factors and the MAOA gene
- Twin studies and aggression:
- Ethological and evolutionary explanations
- Social psychological explanations
- Dispositional and situational explanations
- Media influences
Unit 10 – Schizophrenia
- Classification of schizophrenia
- Different types of schizophrenia
- Biological explanations for schizophrenia
- Psychological explanations for schizophrenia:
- Treatments for schizophrenia
- Defining mental illness
Unit 11 – Research Methods in Psychology
- Lab experiments
- Field experiments
- Natural experiments
- Quasi experiments
- Types of observation
- Self-report techniques
- Sampling
- Experimental design
- Ethical issues
- The BPS Code of Ethics and Conduct
- Peer review
- Types of data
- Distributions
- Choice of statistical testing
- Report writing
Preparing for the Examinations
It’s now time to get yourself ready for the big day and do some exam preparation.
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