Summary Table: Key Studies of Explanations for Major Depressive Disorder (MDD) (SL IB Psychology)

Revision Note

Claire Neeson

Expertise

Psychology Content Creator

Key Studies Summary of Explanations for MDD

SUMMARY TABLE: KEY STUDIES OF EXPLANATIONS FOR MAJOR DEPRESSIVE DISORDER

Topic

Two Key Studies

Biological Explanations of MDD

  • Use both of these studies to answer a question on biological explanations of MDD
  • McGuffin et al. (1996) can also be used to answer a Paper 1 question on Genetic Similarity
  • Caspi et al. (2003)n can also be used to answer a Paper 1 question on Genes & Behaviour (the 5-HTT gene) and Neurotransmitters (the effect of serotonin on behaviour)

McGuffin et al. (1996)

Caspi et al. (2003)

Cognitive Explanations of MDD

  • Use both of these studies to answer a question on cognitive explanations of MDD
  • Riso et al. (1996) can also be used to answer a Paper 1 question on Schema Theory

Beck et al. (1974)

Riso et al. (2006)

Sociocultural Explanations of MDD

  • Use both of these studies to answer a question on sociocultural explanations of MDD
  • Karasz (2005) can also be used to answer a Paper 1 question on Acculturation

Lewinsohn et al. (1990)

Karasz (2005)

How do I use these studies in an exam question on this topic?

  • IB students have a lot of content to cover (particularly students taking Psychology at Higher Level) so the purpose of this revision resource is to slim down and streamline the number of studies you need per topic/exam question
  • Remember that all Paper 2 questions are ERQs (Extended Response Questions) which are worth 22 marks, take an hour to write and need to be rich in critical thinking
  • The exam question command term will be one of the following:‘Evaluate’, ‘Discuss’, ‘Contrast’ or ‘To what extent’ 
  • Each command term requires you to answer the question in slightly different ways, using the content as shown in the summary table above i.e. specific studies per topic/question
  • In order to slim down the content you need to revise you can see above how some of the studies can be used for more than one potential exam question
  • McGuffin et al. (1996), Caspi et al. (2003) and Riso et al. (2006) can be used to answer more than one potential exam question so you may decide to keep all of these studies and ‘throw away’ any studies which you find that you don’t need to revise

You've read 0 of your 0 free revision notes

Get unlimited access

to absolutely everything:

  • Downloadable PDFs
  • Unlimited Revision Notes
  • Topic Questions
  • Past Papers
  • Model Answers
  • Videos (Maths and Science)

Join the 100,000+ Students that ❤️ Save My Exams

the (exam) results speak for themselves:

Did this page help you?

Claire Neeson

Author: Claire Neeson

Claire has been teaching for 34 years, in the UK and overseas. She has taught GCSE, A-level and IB Psychology which has been a lot of fun and extremely exhausting! Claire is now a freelance Psychology teacher and content creator, producing textbooks, revision notes and (hopefully) exciting and interactive teaching materials for use in the classroom and for exam prep. Her passion (apart from Psychology of course) is roller skating and when she is not working (or watching 'Coronation Street') she can be found busting some impressive moves on her local roller rink.