Interviews on Predicted Grades: Sampling, Ethics and Trustworthiness
An HL psychology student in Hong Kong wants to investigate how students experience academic pressure during the IB Diploma. She plans semi-structured interviews with six classmates she knows well, recording them on her phone, transcribing them herself, and using thematic analysis. Her research question is: "How do IB students describe the impact of predicted grades on their wellbeing?" She has 45-minute interview slots, no budget, and a supervisor who is also her psychology teacher. The school requires parental consent for under-18s and has a policy that any disclosure of self-harm must be reported. The student wants to include direct quotations and keep raw recordings on a shared drive so her supervisor can check her coding. She is unsure whether to use friends or recruit through the school counsellor, and whether to ask about self-harm directly.
1. Evaluate the sampling and ethical decisions and propose a revised plan.
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The sampling plan is convenient but ethically and methodologically risky. Interviewing six close friends creates a dual role: she is both researcher and friend, so participants may feel unable to refuse or to disclose honestly, and she may interpret data through prior knowledge. It also limits transferability because the sample is one friendship group in one school. Recruiting through the counsellor is better for voluntariness, but students may think the counsellor will see their answers; she must make clear that the counsellor will not.
Parental consent and assent are required. Recording on a personal phone is insecure; use an encrypted recorder and store files on a password-protected, institution-approved drive, not a shared drive with identifiable recordings. Supervisor access is acceptable only with consent and pseudonymisation. Direct quotations need consent and should be checked for identifying details. Asking about self-harm directly requires a protocol: warn participants of the limits of confidentiality, have a counsellor on call, and know the safeguarding policy. A revised plan would recruit via a neutral notice, interview in a private room, use pseudonyms, and offer a debrief.
2. Explain how the student could strengthen trustworthiness and reflexivity.
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Trustworthiness in qualitative research is judged differently from validity and reliability. Credibility: use member checking, asking participants whether the interpreted themes fit their meaning, and triangulate with a second coder or with documents. Transferability: provide thick description of the school context, participants and interview guide so readers can judge applicability. Dependability: keep an audit trail of decisions, interview-guide changes and coding, and ask the supervisor to review a sample of transcripts. Confirmability: acknowledge her own assumptions and show how themes are grounded in data, not imposed.
Reflexivity is central: she should keep a reflexive journal about being a friend and an IB student herself, and discuss how her position shaped what participants said. She should also consider power: as an HL student, she may be seen as an expert. A second coder can reduce solo interpretation bias, but disagreement should be discussed, not averaged. Ethical reflexivity means being willing to stop an interview if a participant becomes distressed.
3. If she instead had to convert this into an experimental IA on predicted grades and stress, outline the design decisions and one analysis.
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Convert the question to an experiment: does knowing a predicted grade affect state anxiety or performance? Design decisions: use independent measures or repeated measures; operationalise the independent variable as false feedback (for example, "your predicted grade is 5" versus "7") after a baseline task; measure state anxiety with a validated scale such as the STAI short form and performance with a timed task. Randomly assign participants, counterbalance task versions, and control for actual predicted grades and prior anxiety. Ethics: deception about feedback must be minimal and debriefed; no real predicted grades should be changed; avoid undue distress. Use an opportunity sample of consenting IB students, with parental consent if under 18.
Analysis: an independent-samples t-test on anxiety scores, with effect size and confidence intervals, checking assumptions; if repeated measures, a paired t-test. The qualitative interview could be a follow-up to explain the quantitative result, but it would not be part of the experimental IA unless carefully justified. Report descriptives, inferential statistics and a cautious interpretation.