A follow-up investigation involved 420 adults attending evening classes at four UK colleges. Participants completed an online questionnaire measuring their use of a social networking site, number of online contacts, envy and depressive symptoms.
The researchers calculated association coefficients. A positive coefficient shows that as one variable increases, the other tends to increase. Larger positive coefficients show stronger associations. An asterisk (*) shows a statistically significant association.
| Variables compared | Association coefficient |
|---|---|
| Site-use frequency and envy | +0.34* |
| Number of online contacts and envy | +0.05 |
| Envy and depressive symptoms | +0.39* |
| Site-use frequency and depressive symptoms, after envy was included in the analysis | +0.18* |
The final coefficient was calculated to test whether site-use frequency had an association with depressive symptoms that did not operate through envy.
Using your knowledge of Tandoc et al.'s (2015) study, describe what the data show about whether this investigation replicates Tandoc et al.'s findings and conclusion.
144 exam-style questions on OCR GCSE Psychology 3.2 Theories/Explanations, covering 3.2.1 Clinical characteristics of schizophrenia, 3.2.2 Key statistics of schizophrenia, 3.2.3 Dopamine hypothesis of schizophrenia, 3.2.4 Brain structure and function in schizophrenia; criticisms, 3.2.5 Social drift theory of schizophrenia, 3.2.6 Schizophrenia research study: Daniel et al. (1991), 3.2.7 Clinical characteristics of clinical depression, 3.2.8 Key statistics of clinical depression, 3.2.9 Social rank theory of clinical depression, 3.2.10 ABC Model of clinical depression, and 3.2.11 Clinical Depression research study: Tandoc et al. (2015). Each one has a worked solution and a mark scheme showing where the marks go.