The following article is written by Lucinda Pike of ITS Tutorial School Hong Kong. To learn more about ITS tutorial services visit the following links.

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Psychology is becoming an increasingly popular subject to study at IB, as part of the choices for Group 3 subjects “Individuals and Societies”. Psychology is the scientific study of the mind and human behaviour. The IB Psychology course is comprised of three externally assessed examination papers. The first paper looks at four psychological perspectives (humanistic, biological, cognitive and learning). These perspectives are studied in order to give students a solid foundation and understanding of key psychological theories and concepts. Furthermore, students are required to apply these to “real-life” settings and to debates within society. Whilst many students find the biological, cognitive and learning perspectives to be quite straightforward, scientific and logical (albeit somewhat challenging), in contrast the humanistic perspective offers a much richer, qualitative view on human behaviour.

The second paper allows students to select two modules from a total choice of seven, which include health psychology, social psychology and the psychology of dysfunctional behaviour. These choices allow students to focus and specialize in areas of psychology that they often find very interesting and thought provoking (for instance, dysfunctional behaviour). Finally, the third paper focuses on research methodology within psychology, placing particular emphasis on the importance of ethics, quantitative and qualitative research methods. Understanding the methodology utilized in psychology is fundamental to understanding and analyzing empirical research, however I often find that many students struggle to fully grasp these methods and come to ITS in order to have a greater understanding of these techniques.

Lastly, many students come to ITS in order to have help with their internal assessments. The Psychology Internal Assessment requires students to conduct their own psychological experiment, based on previous empirical research. Many students struggle to choose an appropriate topic and are unsure of how to write their assessment in the style of a psychology journal. Psychology is such a diverse and varied subject, ranging from neuroscience to psychoanalysis, from cultural psychology to health psychology, that most students always find one area that they are particular interested in.

ITS website is also available in Chinese at 研習學校香港 – 英語, 數學導師, 國際文憑大學預科課程.