2019 AP PSYCHOLOGY EXPERIMENT BASED FRQ

Directions: ​Answer the following question. It is not enough to answer a question by merely
listing facts. You should present a cogent argument based on your critical analysis of the
question posed, using appropriate psychological terminology. Turn in your answers by 4:00 pm
on Wednesday, 2/20.
1. Imagine that you are a TA for a professor of developmental and cognitive psychology
who is conducting research in different memory and studying techniques of high school
students. You have been asked to design an experiment to test the hypothesis “Higher
levels of glutamate result in higher levels of short-term semantic retention in teenagers.”

A. Summarize your experiment to test this hypothesis. You should identify TWO of the
following elements of your experiment; definitions alone will not suffice (only
answer two bullet points):
● Dependent variable
● Independent variable
● Control group
● Random assignment

For my experiment, I will divide the high school students into two groups: one group which will
receive glutamate pills and one group which will be the control group (meaning that they will not
receive glutamate pills and will perform as normal). The two groups will then take the same
memory test (a test involving pairing cards of identical shapes and colors on the reverse side)
which will be administered by the same scientists with neutral expressions over a course of ten
minutes to prevent sources of error. This will lead to the dependent variable of resulting memory
performance being able to evaluated.

B. Explain how TWO of the following concepts relate to this study or its conclusions
(only answer two bullet points).
● Action potential
● Working memory
● Semantic encoding
● Hunger drive

 
 

● Glutamate
Relating to the study, we want the high school students to utilize their working memory to
proceed through the test. Working memory is temporary storage memory which is limited in size
and only directly applicable to current processes. Since the high school students will be pairing
shapes and colors, they will not necessarily utilize long term memory, which deals with
processes that are continuously called upon (such as multiplication on a math test). This working
memory will deal with declarative memory as students will memorize the relative positioning of
cards, rather than dealing with procedural memory, which is the memory of processes. A Hunger
drive can be a confounding variable, as students who have not eaten will likely not be able to
focus on the memory test. Hunger drives involve the stimulation of the lateral hypothalamus to
recognize hunger. If our participants have not eaten, their bodies will prioritize receiving food
over performing highly on cognitive tasks such as our memory test.