To make a psychology explainer video for class, decide first whether your topic is a study or a mechanism. A study (Milgram, Asch, Loftus and Palmer) is explained through its aim, procedure, results with real numbers, and the criticisms your syllabus names. A mechanism (what anxiety does to the body, how memory is encoded) is explained as a sequence of steps, each drawn where it happens. Write 450 to 600 words, one paragraph per step, check every number against your textbook, paste it into a tool like openCanviz with your wording kept, and it drafts a three to four minute narrated drawn video. The marks are in the accuracy, so the checking matters more than the drawing.

Study or mechanism

Psychology class topics split into two kinds, and they need different scripts.

A video that tries to be two kinds at once, say anxiety as a mechanism plus three studies about anxiety, runs long and gets marked as unfocused. Pick one.

Worked example 1: a classic study told through its numbers

Milgram's obedience study (published 1963) is the most taught study in school psychology and the most often described wrongly. The details are the whole point, so the script has to get them right.

Aim. To test how far ordinary people would obey an authority figure who instructed them to hurt another person.

Procedure. Forty men aged 20 to 50 from the New Haven area answered a newspaper advertisement for a study of memory at Yale. Each was assigned, by a fixed draw, the role of 'teacher'. The 'learner' was an actor working with the experimenter. The teacher was told to give the learner an electric shock for each wrong answer, rising in 15-volt steps on a generator labelled from 15 to 450 volts. No real shocks were given. When the teacher hesitated, the experimenter used four standard prods, starting with "Please continue" and ending with "You have no other choice, you must go on."

Results. All forty participants went to at least 300 volts, the point at which the learner pounded on the wall and stopped answering. Five stopped there. Twenty-six of the forty, 65 percent, continued to the final 450-volt switch. Many showed signs of extreme stress: sweating, trembling, nervous laughter.

Evaluation. The usual points, as your specification will phrase them: deception and the stress caused raise ethical problems; the sample was all male and all American; later variations showed obedience falling when the experimenter gave orders by telephone or when the setting moved away from Yale. Some later researchers have also questioned how many participants believed the shocks were real.

Each bold heading is one scene. The procedure scene is where a drawing earns its place: teacher at the generator, learner in the next room, experimenter standing behind the teacher. That layout is the study, and a viewer remembers the room long after the sentence.

The results scene needs the numbers spoken and shown. "Most people obeyed" loses marks. "Twenty-six of forty, 65 percent, went to 450 volts" gets them.

Worked example 2: a mechanism, what happens in your body during anxiety

The fight or flight response is a process, so it is scripted as a chain where each link has a place in the body.

1. The threat is detected. The amygdala, deep in each temporal lobe, flags something as dangerous, often before you are consciously aware of it.
2. The hypothalamus is signalled. It acts as the link between the brain and the body's stress systems.
3. The fast route: the sympathetic nervous system. Nerves from the sympathetic system stimulate the adrenal medulla, the inner part of the adrenal glands above the kidneys, to release adrenaline and noradrenaline into the blood within seconds.
4. The effects you feel. Heart rate and blood pressure rise, breathing speeds up, pupils dilate, glucose is released into the blood, digestion slows. This is the racing heart and the knot in the stomach.
5. The slower route: the HPA axis. The hypothalamus releases CRH, the pituitary gland releases ACTH, and the adrenal cortex releases cortisol, which keeps glucose available over minutes to hours.
6. Return to normal. When the threat passes, the parasympathetic nervous system slows the heart and restarts digestion.

The last paragraph of the script is the application: anxiety disorders can be described as this response firing when there is no real threat, or failing to switch off. That one sentence turns a biology diagram into psychology.

Draw it as an outline of a body with the brain and adrenal glands marked, and light each part as the narration reaches it. Two arrows, one fast and one slow, make the difference between the sympathetic route and the HPA axis visible at a glance, which is exactly the distinction exam questions test.

The myths that slip into scripts

Psychology has more popular myths than most subjects, and drafting tools trained on the internet repeat them. Check your script for these before it becomes narration.

Also check findings that did not replicate. Godden and Baddeley's 1975 study, in which 18 divers learned 36 words on the beach or about 20 feet underwater and recalled them better in the same place, is still taught. A 2021 replication by Murre did not find the effect. If your course has moved on to the replication crisis, a scene saying so is a mark, not a digression.

Make it

1. 1

   Choose study, mechanism or debate

   One kind per video. If your topic is anxiety, decide whether you are explaining the body response or a study about it.

2. 2

   Write the script in your specification's words

   Use the headings your exam board uses, such as aim, procedure, findings and evaluation, and the exact terms, such as adrenal medulla rather than 'stress gland'.

3. 3

   Copy every number from the textbook, not from memory

   Sample sizes, percentages, voltages, ages, dates. Write each one in figures and in words in the narration.

4. 4

   Paste it into openCanviz and keep your wording

   Choose Keep my wording so the narration matches the script you checked, set three to four minutes, and pick whiteboard so each step is drawn as it is explained.

5. 5

   Check every label and arrow

   Pause on each scene. Is the adrenal medulla labelled on the inner part of the gland, does the fast arrow come before the slow one, is the learner in a separate room from the teacher. Fix anything wrong in the editor.

6. 6

   Watch it once as the marker

   Ask whether every claim could be backed by a named study. Anything that sounds like a general truth with no source should be cut or sourced.

Ethics and your own video

A psychology video should follow the same rules your course teaches. Do not film classmates for an 'experiment' without permission. Do not present anyone's mental health as a case study. If you describe symptoms of anxiety or depression, keep it general and, if the video will be shared, add a line pointing to where help can be found.

On AI tools: write the script yourself, because the script is where your understanding shows, and check what your school allows. There is a general guide in how to make a video for a school project, and if you are making the video as a revision aid rather than coursework, how to study from video instead of rereading notes covers how to use it without fooling yourself.

Common questions

How long should a psychology video for class be? Usually two to five minutes, as set by your teacher. At 150 spoken words a minute, a three-minute video is about 450 words, which is enough for one study described properly or one six-step mechanism.

Should I act out the study? Re-enactments look fun and usually lose marks, because they eat time and invite inaccuracy. A drawn diagram of the setup is clearer and quicker.

Can I use real footage from the original studies? Milgram filmed his experiments, and clips are widely shown in classes. Using copyrighted footage in a video you post publicly is a different matter from showing it in class. For a submission, drawing the setup avoids the question.

How many studies should I include? For a mechanism video, one supporting study at the end is enough. For a debate, one strong study per side.

Does whiteboard style suit psychology? For mechanisms and study procedures, yes. Cutout style can suit a debate video, where two positions face each other.