Practice 4.3 Technology with authentic IB Psychology (First Exam 2027) exam questions for both SL and HL students. This question bank mirrors Paper 1, 2, 3 structure, covering key topics like cognitive processes, biological bases of behavior, and research methods. Get instant solutions, detailed explanations, and build exam confidence with questions in the style of IB examiners.
Paper
Level
Question 1
HLPaper 3
Source 1:
Graph showing results of a study in which students from different countries were asked to complete an anxiety scale (scores converted to percentage of students showing high anxiety symptoms). All participants used social media for at least 3 hours per day over the past month.
Source 2:
Researchers conducted semi-structured interviews with 12 university students who reported struggling with mental health. Interviews focused on their experiences with social media. Responses were transcribed and analysed using thematic analysis.
Source 3: A psychology undergraduate wanted to explore the relationship between social media use and depression. They surveyed 100 students from their university, all of whom they personally knew to be frequent users of Instagram or TikTok. Students self-reported their average hours of social media use per day and completed a self-rated depression scale.
Source 4:
Researchers investigated the relationship between daily social media use (in hours) and self-reported loneliness (score from 1 to 100) among 30 university students.
r(28) = 0.854, p = 0.007
1.[3]
Explain one issue that limits the interpretation of the data in source 1.
2.[6]
Analyse the findings from source 2 and state a conclusion linked to the claim that social media use may have a negative effect on students’ mental health.
3.[6]
Discuss how the researcher could avoid bias in the study described in source 3.
4.[6]
To what extent are the findings of source 3 transferable to other populations or contexts?
5.[15]
Using at least three of the sources above (sources 1-4), and your own knowledge, answer the following question: To what extent can we conclude that the use of social media may have negative effects on students’ mental health?
Question 2
HLPaper 3
Source 1:
A clinic that specialised in couples therapy enlisted a team of researchers to explore predictors of relationship satisfaction in young adult couples. The researcher team was curious about the connection between the frequency of daily texting and/or instant messaging and relationship satisfaction. The participants included over 400 young adults in long-term romantic relationships, enrolled through an online ad; the age of participants varied between 18 and 30. Individuals filled out a virtual questionnaire that asked them to report the average number of messages exchanged daily with their partner, and relationship satisfaction on a 1–10 scale (scale was on a slider that allowed decimal values).
Based on message frequency, participants were grouped into three categories:
Source 2:
The same team of researchers mentioned in Source 1 also conducted a qualitative study on how couples experience technology in their relationships. The researchers randomly picked 15 couples from online volunteers, ages of the individuals varied from 25 to 40. Each couple participated in semi-structed interviews with a researcher. Interviews were audio-recorded, transcribed and analysed between researchers for recurring themes.
Source 3 An undergraduate student with an interest in technology and the psychology of human relationships wanted to explore whether friendships formed online would be considered as important as offline ones. The sample included 50 university students, all peers or friends, that were aged between 18 and 22. The student researcher sent the participants a short survey that asked: a) “Do you have any “close” online friends?” and b) “Are your online friendships as important as your offline ones?” The open-ended responses were coded by the student researcher into categories like “Yes” and “No”. The researcher discovered the following: 62% of the sample reported having at least one close online friend, and of those, 48% said their online friendships were as important as offline ones.
Source 4
A large-scale correlational study was conducted with the intention of examining whether time spent on social media was related to loneliness. The study consisted of 600 individuals, spanning between 16 and 30; the sample consisted of individuals who frequented the campus wherein this study took place. Participants self-reported the daily hours spent on social media, and also completed the UCLA Loneliness Scale (higher scores = greater loneliness, scale of 20-80).
r= 0.598, p < 0.05
Source 5 An experiment investigated how the presence of a mobile phone affected interpersonal conversation. The sample consisted of 120 adults (over the age of 18) who were strangers to each other and paired randomly. Each pair engaged in 10 minutes of conversation before being asked to rate the quality of the conversation on a scale of 1-10. Pairs were randomly assigned to one of two conditions:
Phone present: Participants were allowed to have phones on the table, and look at them at any time if they wanted to.
No phone: No phones were present.
Researchers found that in the “phone present” condition, the mean rating of conversations was 6.1. In the “no phone” condition, the mean rating was 7.8.
1.[3]
Explain one issue that limits the interpretation of the data in Source 1.
2.[6]
Analyse the findings from Source 2 and state a conclusion linked to the claim that technology influences relationship quality.
3.[6]
Discuss how the researcher could avoid bias in the study described in Source 3.
4.[6]
To what extent are the findings of Source 3 transferable to other populations or contexts?
5.[6]
Discuss how the researcher could improve the credibility of the findings in Source 3.
6.[15]
Using at least three of the sources in the resource booklet (sources 1-5), and your own knowledge, answer the following question: To what extent can we conclude that technology influences relationship quality?