Important: these pages provide guidance on how to write your assignment. Please ensure you read this information all the way through, including the checklist at the end.

Further information can be found in the Assessment Guidance for this module. Additional support and guidance, including advice on plagiarism, referencing and the marking system, can be found in the Social Sciences & Global Studies and Psychology & Counselling Assessment Information pages. These links direct you to Faculty policies on assessment-related matters, which you need to follow when you are writing your assignments.

Please do consult your tutor if you are unsure about anything related to assessment as failure to comply with relevant guidance could result in the loss of marks or other penalties.

On the following pages you will find guidance on how to complete both parts of this assignment. Please ensure that you read to the end of this guidance.

Part A: Essay

Drawing on the material in Chapter 7 and the online material in Week 9, evaluate the claim that individual differences are responsible for a person's experience of stress.

Word limit: 1200 words.

Weighting: 60% of the mark for TMA 03.

Part B: Scatterplot interpretation

Describe the scatterplot provided and interpret what it shows about the relationship between mindfulness and stress.

Word limit: 200 words.

Weighting: 40% of the mark for TMA 03.

What to submit for TMA 03

You should submit one Word file containing your responses to both tasks:

PartA	a 1200-word essay
PartB	description and interpretation of scatterplot

Before you complete your assignment, make sure you read these guidance notes carefully so that you can follow the advice and instructions they contain.

On the following pages, you will find:

learning outcomes addressed by this assignment

student notes for each part of this assignment

a checklist to ensure you have done everything required for this assignment.

Each TMA is designed to help you to develop particular skills and knowledge. These are referred to as learning outcomes. By completing this assignment, you will be working towards achieving the following learning outcomes:

Knowledge and understanding

Show understanding of key concepts and describe key theories, studies, methods and debates within psychology.

Show awareness of the ways in which psychological knowledge is embedded in the historical, social and cultural context, and the way in which it develops through a process of questions, arguments, evidence and evaluation.

Recognise and describe research methods employed by psychologists and identify the merits of qualitative and/or quantitative approaches.

Recognise the role of evidence in building psychological knowledge and how this relates to, and can be made relevant to, everyday experience and real-life contexts.

Cognitive skills

Select and interpret key information from a range of sources, and represent it accurately and appropriately.

Analyse and interpret different forms of data, including qualitative data, descriptive statistics and inferential statistics.

Analyse and evaluate types of evidence and methods, and identify some of their strengths and weaknesses.

Interpret and integrate a range of evidence to develop an argument, including some primary sources.

Key skills

Write using a clear and logical sequence of sentences and paragraphs appropriate for the level of study, subject, purpose and audience.

Plan and organise an essay with an appropriate structure and referencing.

Interpret information from tables, graphs, charts and diagrams.

Demonstrate basic skills in the use of ICT, including accessing and searching web pages and using ICT tools appropriate to support distance learning (accessing email, learning from online-based study materials and using the eTMA system).

Practical and/or professional skills

Plan study sessions to manage a sequence of work that meets a deadline and complies with relevant academic conventions.

Part A: Essay

Drawing on the material in Chapter 7 and the online material in Week 9, evaluate the claim that individual differences are responsible for a person's experience of stress.

Word limit: 1200 words.

Weighting: 60% of the mark for TMA 03.

You are asked to write an essay to evaluate the claim that individual differences are responsible for a person's experience of stress. This is the second essay you will write on D120, but this time you have a slightly larger word count, and you are asked to evaluate evidence. Make sure you look at the guidelines for writing an essay, to ensure that you are clear on structure and focus. For this essay, you need to identify and evaluate evidence relevant to the claim that individual differences are responsible for a person's experience of stress. You will need to identify a number of different points by drawing on the module materials to which you have been directed.

Before you start work on your essay, the first thing you need to do is make sure you understand exactly what the question requires, which means identifying and understanding the process and content words.

Process and content words

The process word for this essay is 'evaluate'. This means identifying the strengths and weaknesses of evidence to inform the argument you make in your essay. The content words are 'drawing on material in Chapter 7 and online material in Week 9' and 'the claim that individual differences are responsible for a person's experience of stress'.

This means that the essay should focus specifically on the evidence that individual differences are responsible for a person's experience of stress. In evaluating the claim, you will also need to consider the argument that individual differences are not responsible for a person's experience of stress. Considering the evidence both for and against the claim will help you to create a balanced argument and draw a conclusion based on the evidence.

Relevant material

The essay question specifies the need for you to use resources from Chapter 7. You can also draw on the online materials associated with this chapter, in VLE Week 9. The following materials will be of use as you complete this assignment:

Content

• Chapter 7: Relevant material to discuss the claim that individual differences are responsible for a person's experience of stress can be found in Section 4 which discusses personality as one of the individual differences which may make a person more vulnerable to stress. This section discusses research on personality types in relation to stress. Remember to take note of any criticisms of the research that has been conducted, as this will be helpful for constructing your own argument, and will help to address the 'evaluate' aspect of the question. Section 5 is also useful for evaluating the claim. This section discusses the role of the environment as a factor for experiencing stress. There is a lot of research discussed in this section so it is important to be selective in the material you choose to include. Again, looking at the research evidence and any criticisms of this will be helpful in constructing your argument.
• Section 6 introduces another factor that has been investigated in relation to stress, that of stress management, coping and resilience. Here you find research which discusses the idea that stress is linked to both personality and the environment.
• Resilience is also discussed in Week 9, Section 1.2.?
• You are not expected to use material from outside the module materials.

Skills

You may want to revisit the guidance on writing in paragraphs in Week 5, Section 2.

Week 9, Activity 9.5 contains guidance on planning an essay introduction and conclusion.

Week 2, Section 1.2 introduces you to the PROMPT criteria, which you can use to evaluate the evidence in relation to the claim in the question.

Week 10, Section 3.1 has guidance on reflecting on TMA feedback, which may help you identify areas for improvement in your writing.

Activity 10.6 in Week 10 links out to guidance on essay writing. You may find Section 3.3 of this guidance (a section on constructing an argument) particularly helpful for this assessment.

ips for writing your essay

As with the previous essay you wrote for TMA 02, you should carefully plan how you intend to approach the essay, paying close attention to the question as you do so. If you find the task difficult, start by asking yourself the following:

• What is the evidence that individual differences are responsible for a person's experience of stress?
• How reliable is that evidence?
• What is the evidence that other factors are responsible for a person's experience of stress?
• How reliable is that evidence?
• What is the evidence that individual differences and the environment are responsible for a person's experience of stress?

You will need to be selective in what information you choose to include in your answer. Keep your focus firmly on the question: the claim that individual differences are responsible for a person's experience of stress. Do not try to include every example or spend too much of your essay describing the studies in detail. Instead, try to focus on a smaller number of important points that you can elaborate on and support with examples.

Referencing

In TMA 02 you began applying referencing in your work. You will be expected to do the same in this TMA, using in-text citations and providing a reference list at the end of your essay. To help you with this, references for the module sources you have been directed to use are provided here. You can cut and paste these into your reference list. As before, remember to update the accessed date to match when you accessed the VLE.

• Dann, C. (2023) 'Stress', in L. Lazard and A. Strathie (eds.)Encountering psychology in context 1. Milton Keynes: Open University, pp. 231-271.
• Adeseko, K., Lazard, L. Latif, M., Frances, T. and Strathie, A. (2025) 'Week 9: Stress'.D120: Encountering psychology in context. Available at:https://learn2.open.ac.uk/mod/oucontent/view.php?id=2345321 (Accessed: 10 June 2024).

When marking PartA of TMA03, your tutor will be looking for:

• an essay answer that addresses what the essay question is asking you to do (see content and process words)
• evidence that you understand the relevant material
• good paraphrasing skills and evidence that you are writing in your own words
• your ability to structure the essay in a logical way
• clear and concise writing
• provision of evidence to support points made in the essay
• referencing of sources
• an answer that keeps within the word limit of 1200 words.

Part B: Scatterplot interpretation

Describe the scatterplot provided and interpret what it shows about the relationship between mindfulness and stress.

Word limit: 200 words.

Weighting: 40% of the mark for TMA 03.

Your task is to describe the scatterplot provided and interpret what it shows about the relationship (if any) between the variables. Before looking at the scatterplot, read the information below regarding the focus of the study.

Look at the scatterplot in Figure 1 which plots the association between mindfulness and stress. 50 participants were asked questions via a scale to assess stress levels. Participants were asked to complete a 10-item questionnaire which asked participants about stressful life events. Participants were then given a score (0 = not at all stressed, 30 = extremely stressed). For mindfulness, participants were asked to record the number of minutes they spent each week practising mindfulness.

The data shown in the scatterplot are from a group of 50 participants who had attended mindfulness training at a local medical centre. What does the scatterplot show about the relationship between stress and mindfulness?

30 25 20 Participant stress rating 15 10 50 100 150 200 250 Number of minutes spent on mindfulness practise per week