Psychological Sciences 2: Research Methods

Psychological Sciences 2: Research Methods

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Your assignment is to complete an APA style (6th Edition) introduction section explaining the research project we conducted in class.  In order to complete this assignment, you will need at least five empirical articles from peer reviewed journals (one can be the Bryan et al. article from class).  Please note that articles from “popular” publications such as magazines or newspapers, websites, chapters, or books, while acceptable references, will not count towards your five articles requirement.  You should write this paper as if it were being written for submission to an APA journal.

Psychological Sciences 2: Research Methods

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The Basics:
6-8 pages (not including the reference section)
12 pt Times New Roman Font
Double spaced
1” margins all around

Cover Page
*Running Head
*Page Header
*Title, Author, Institution

Introduction

Within the first few paragraphs of your introduction section, you should identify the research topic/problem. This sentence or two should address why the research is important and what you are hoping to accomplish. What is the problem under investigation?  Look at the published research to see how authors go about doing this.

Psychological Sciences 2: Research Methods

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In this introductory section, write a few paragraphs that give an overview of your topic and background information.  Tell why the study problem is important. Support this with findings from the literature and cite them according to APA Style, 6th ed.  As O’Leary (2010) says, “the main job of this section is “to … convince your readers that the problem you want to address is significant and worth exploring” (p. 64).

All source material used in this paper must be documented in the body of the paper by citing the authors and dates of the sources.  The full reference to each citation must appear on a separate reference page(s) entitled ‘References’.

Your introduction section should smoothly transition into your problem statement.  It should flow logically from the information you provided.  Include your inquiry question that will provide direction for your work.

Psychological Sciences 2: Research Methods

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Through the use of previous research, you should develop the general background of the research problem and identify any holes that exist in the literature. Make sure you include your hypothesis in this section, as well as, the independent and dependent variables (unless you are using correlation or chi-square analysis for your data analysis).

Method

In this section you should discuss how you met the goals discussed in the introduction. This portion of the proposal is broken down further into questions you should answer within each subsection.

Participants

*Who were the participants? (i.e., What was the total number of participants? What is the average age of the sample? How many males and females were there in the sample?)
*Where there any inclusion/exclusion criteria?
*How were participants recruited?

Psychological Sciences 2: Research Methods

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Measures

*Describe the measures that were used to collect data for the variables under investigation in your paper

Procedure

* Describe how/where the data for this study were collected
* Describe how participants were compensated

Results

*Report your statistical analysis findings (test statistic, group means and standard deviations, p value)

Discussion

*Was your hypothesis confirmed?
*What are the implications of your results?
*What are some strengths of the study?
*What are some limitations of the study?
*What are some future directions for further research?

Psychological Sciences 2: Research Methods

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References
*This is your reference list of literature cited in the proposal.  Again, all citations and the reference section should use APA style.

Some general pointers:

1.    Spellcheck and read your paper a few times.  Spellcheck/grammar check will not catch all of your errors.  For example:

INCORRECT:  “He was emitted to the hospital.”
CORRECT:  “He was admitted to the hospital.”

Really think about what you are trying to convey and do so succinctly.  I would much rather read a well written 8-page paper than a 10-page paper with poorly thought out ideas.  The following sentence is very long and takes up space but is not particularly insightful.

Psychological Sciences 2: Research Methods

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Example:  “The presence of olfactory hallucinations is a good indication that something with the brain is not right.”

2.    Be careful about using jargon.  ‘Cause is not appropriate shorthand for the word because.

3.    If a sentence requires more than 2 commas consider rewriting your idea in a more lucid fashion.

4.    Resist the urge to throw extraneous material into your paper. Writing a good paper is a matter of judgment­—about what to take out as well as what to put in—and irrelevant material detracts from the overall quality of your paper.

5.    Be respectful in your papers.  As much as possible, avoid insulting language and colloquialisms.  Use gender neutral language as much as possible.

Psychological Sciences 2: Research Methods

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By admin in Essays on March 21, 2017