A psychologist investigated whether a peppermint scent affected performance on a two-minute proofreading task containing 30 spelling errors.
Before collecting the data, two possible alternative hypotheses were considered:
Hypothesis A: Adults completing the task in a peppermint-scented room will identify more spelling errors than adults completing the task in an unscented room.
Hypothesis B: There will be a difference in the number of spelling errors identified by adults completing the task in a peppermint-scented room and adults completing the task in an unscented room.
| Condition | Number of spelling errors identified |
|---|---|
| Peppermint-scented room | 18, 20, 19, 21 |
| Unscented room | 24, 23, 25, 24 |
Use the data to explain whether Hypothesis A and Hypothesis B are each supported.
182 exam-style questions on OCR GCSE Psychology 7.1 Planning Research, covering 7.1.1 Hypotheses, 7.1.2 Variables, 7.1.3 Experimental Designs, 7.1.4 Populations and Sampling, 7.1.5 Ethical issues, and 7.1.6 Dealing with ethical issues and BPS Code. Each one has a worked solution and a mark scheme showing where the marks go.