IB Psychology HL 2.4 Research methodology Question Bank

Describe one research method used in one study related to the brain and behaviour.

Cognitive approach to understanding behaviour

In Western culture, romance is the main theme of many movies, songs and books. However, the
media’s representations of love are not often what people experience in their own lives. This may
be a source of frustration.

The aim of this qualitative study was to investigate the extent to which heterosexual women’s
perceptions of romantic love matched what they had experienced in their own romantic love
relationships. The researcher was a female psychologist who also worked as a couples’ therapist.
She said that her reason for doing the study was that ever since she was a young woman she had
tried to understand her own emotional responses when she was in love. She had seen other women
struggling with the same questions and emotional responses as she herself had experienced.
This study was conducted in New Zealand. The purposive sample consisted of eight heterosexual
women who were either therapists or psychology students. They were recruited through the
researcher’s own social networks.

The data were collected using semi-structured interviews. With the permission of the participants,
the interviews were recorded on audiotape and later transcribed. The transcriptions were shown
to the participants to ensure that they were accurate. The transcripts were then analysed using
inductive content analysis. The analysis revealed themes such as “romantic love is an illusion”
but also that “romantic love provides intimacy and physical closeness”. All the women talked
about how they have to “struggle for equality” in their romantic relationships, and that there is
a “danger of losing friends and of giving up other interests” through focusing too much on their
partners. The researcher acknowledged in the research article that reflexivity was important in
this study.

The study revealed that the women had mixed perceptions of romantic love. On the one hand,
they desired to experience and express love fully, but at the same time they did not want to give up
their independence. Negative experiences in previous romantic love relationships had taught these
women to resist being too dependent on their male partners and not to give up their own friends and
interests. According to these women, maintaining some degree of independence results in more
equal and satisfying love relationships. The researcher concluded that these women’s experiences
of love are different from stories about love in literature and the media

Evaluate the sampling technique used in this study.

Evaluate the purposive sampling technique used in this study.

Explain two or more considerations involved before conducting the interviews in this study.

Evaluate the use of covert participant observation in this qualitative research study.