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Research Methods Paper Part 1
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Research Methods Paper Part 1
Running head: PAPER I: MINI-LIT REVIEW INSTRUCTIONS 1
Instructions for Paper I: Mini-Literature Review (Study One) (Worth 25 Points)
Ryan J. Winter
Florida International University
PAPER II: METHODS AND RESULTS INSTRUCTIONS 2
Purpose of Paper I (Mini-Literature Review)
1). Psychological Purpose
This paper serves several purposes, the first of which is helping you gain insight into research papers in psychology. As this may be your first time reading and writing papers in psychology, one goal of Paper I is to give you insight into what goes into such papers. This mini-lit review will help you a). better understand the psychology topic chosen for the course this semester (the hindsight bias), b). learn about the various sections of an empirical research report by reading three peer-reviewed articles (that is, articles that have a Title Page, Abstract, Literature Review, Methods Section, Results Section, and References Page), and c). use information gathered from research articles in psychology to help support your hypotheses for your first study this semester (the hindsight bias).
In this relatively short paper, you will read three research articles, summarize what the authors did and what they found, and use those summaries to support your hindsight bias hypothesis. You should start your paper broadly and then narrow your focus (think about the hourglass example provided in the lecture). My suggestion is to give a brief overview of the paper in your opening paragraph, hinting at the research variables you are looking at for study one. Your next paragraphs will review prior research. Make sure to draw connections between studies, using smooth transitions between paragraphs. Final paragraphs should use the research you just summarized to support your research hypothesis. In other words, this mini-lit review paper will look like the literature reviews for the three research articles you are summarizing for this assignment. Use those articles as examples! Here, though, you will end the paper after providing your hypothesis. In Paper II, you will pick the topic up again, but in that future paper you will talk about your study methods and results.
2). APA Formatting Purpose
The second purpose of Paper I: Mini-Literature Review is to teach you proper American Psychological Association (APA) formatting. In the instructions below, I tell you how to format your paper using APA style. There are a lot of very specific requirements in APA papers, so pay attention to the instructions below as well as Chapter 14 in your textbook!
3). Writing Purpose
Finally, this paper is intended to help you grow as a writer. Few psychology classes give you the chance to write papers and receive feedback on your work. This class will! We will give you extensive feedback on your first few paper in terms of content, spelling, and grammar. You will even be able to revise aspects of Paper I and include them in future papers (most notably Papers III and V). My hope is that you craft a paper that could be submitted to an empirical journal. Thus readers may be familiar with APA style
PAPER II: METHODS AND RESULTS INSTRUCTIONS 3
but not your specific topic. Your job is to educate them on the topic and make sure they understand how your study design advances the field of the hindsight bias research.
PAPER II: METHODS AND RESULTS INSTRUCTIONS 4
Instructions for Paper I: Mini-Literature Review (Study One) (Worth 25 Points)
Students: Below are lengthy instructions on how to write your mini-literature review. There is also a checklist at the end of this document, which I recommend you print out and “check off” before submitting your final paper (we are sticklers for APA format, so make sure it is correct!)
1. Title Page: I expect the following format. (5 Points) a. You must have a header and page numbers on each page.
i. If you don’t know how to insert headers, ask your instructor or watch this very helpful video! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9pbUoNa5tyY.
ii. The header goes at the top of the paper and it is left justified. 1. Use “Insert Headers” or click on the top of the page to open the
header. Make sure to select the “Different first page” option so that your title page header will differ from subsequent pages
2. The R in Running head is capitalized but the “h” is lower case, followed by a colon and a short title (in ALL CAPS). This short running head title can be the same one as the rest of your paper or it can differ – the choice is yours, but it should be no more than 50 characters including spaces and punctuation
3. Insert a page number as well. The header is flush left, but the page number is flush right.
iii. Want an example header? Look at the title page of these instructions! You can use other titles depending on your own preferences (e.g. HINDSIGHT BIAS; FORESIGHT; I THINK SO, BUT ONLY IN HINDSIGHT; etc.).
b. Your Title should be midway up the page, with your name (First Last) and the name of your institution (FIU) beneath the title. For this class, only your own name will go on this paper. Double space everything!
i. Again, see my “Title” page above as an example ii. You can also refer to Chapter 14 in your textbook
c. This Title Page section will be on page 1 2. Literature Review Section (12 points)
a. First page of your literature review (Page 2) i. Proper header with page numbers. Your running head title will appear in
the header of your page WITHOUT the phrase “Running head”. To insert this header, use the headers program.
ii. The title of your paper should be on the first line of page two, centered. It is IDENTICAL to the title on your title page.
iii. The beginning text for your paper follows on the next line b. Citations for the literature review
i. Your paper must cite a minimum of three (3) empirical research articles that are based on studies conducted in psychology. That is, each of the three citations you use should have a literature review, a methods section, a results section, a conclusion/discussion, and references.
PAPER II: METHODS AND RESULTS INSTRUCTIONS 5
1. For this first paper, you MUST use two of the three articles provided in the blackboard folder, and you must find one more article using PsycInfo. However, there are some conditions for this third article that you must follow:
a. First, the third article cannot be any of the five found in the blackboard folder.
b. Second, for your third article, it can be based on a wide variety of topics, including hindsight bias, counterfactual thinking, cognition, emotions, decision-making, etc. Just choose one that will help you support your experimental hypothesis for your hindsight bias study. That is, it has to help you justify your study one hypothesis (all students are using this same hypothesis, so make sure to read it. You can find it in the researcher instructions along with the questionnaires you are giving to participants. I suggest copying and pasting that hypothesis into this first paper at the end).
c. Finally, you can have more than three references if you want, but you must have a minimum of three references.
2. Proper citations must be made in the paper – give credit where credit is due, and don’t make claims that cannot be validated.
3. If you use a direct quote, make sure to provide a page number for where you found that quote in the citations. Do not directly quote too often, though. I prefer no more than two direct quotes in the whole paper (though none would be even better). Instead, I would like you to paraphrase when possible
c. Requirements for the information in your literature review i. Your mini-literature review should use prior research as a starting point,
narrowing down the main theme of your specific project – think about the hourglass example I gave in class.
ii. The last part of your literature review should narrow down your focus onto your own study, eventually ending in your study hypothesis. However, DO NOT go into specific details about your methods. You talk about your specific methods in Paper II in a few weeks.
iii. Again, to make it clear, at the end of your paper you will give an overview of your research question, providing your specific predictions/hypotheses.
d. The literature review must have minimum of two (2) full pages of text and a maximum of four (4) pages (thus, with the title page and references page, the paper should be between 4 and 6 pages)
3. References (6 points) a. The References section starts on its own page, with the word References centered.
Use proper APA format in this section or you will lose points. b. All three references that you cited in the literature review must be in this section
(there should be more than three references here if you cited more than three
PAPER II: METHODS AND RESULTS INSTRUCTIONS 6
articles). However, at least two must come from the article folder on blackboard while a third does not include one of the five in blackboard
c. For references, make sure you: i. use alphabetical ordering (start with the last name of the first author)
ii. use the authors’ last names but only the initials of their first/middle name iii. give the date in parentheses – e.g. (2007). iv. italicize the name of the journal article v. give the volume number, also in italics
vi. give the page numbers (not italicized) for articles vii. provide the doi (digital object identifier) if present (not italicized)
4. Writing Quality (2 Points) a. This includes proper grammar and spelling. This paper should be uploaded
through the Pearson Writer program prior to being uploaded on Blackboard. 5. Between the title page, literature review, and reference page, I expect a minimum of 4
pages and a maximum of 6 pages for this assignment. The above information is required for your paper, but I wanted to provide a few tips about writing your literature review as well. Students often struggle with the first paper, but hopefully this will give you some good directions:
• First, remember that you need 3 references, all of which MUST be peer-reviewed (two coming from the blackboard folder and one that you find on your own using PsycInfo).
• Second, I don’t expect a lengthy discussion for each and every article that you cite. You
might spend a page on one study and a sentence or two on another. The amount of time you spend describing an article you read should be proportional to how important it is in helping you defend your hypotheses. If you do a near replication of a prior study, then I would expect you to spend more time discussing that prior research since it has a big impact on your own study. If an article you read simply supports a global idea that ties into your study but has very different methods (like “frustrated people get mad!”), you can easily mention it in a sentence or two without delving into a lot of detail. Tell a good story in your literature review, but only go into detail about plot elements that have a direct bearing on your study!
• Third, this paper is all about supporting your hypotheses. Know what your hypotheses are
before you write the paper, as it will help you determine how much time to spend on each article you are citing. My suggestion is to spend some time describing and defining the concept of the hindsight bias, and then talking about studies that looked at this area. Use those studies to help defend your own study hypothesis. That is, “Since they found X in this prior study, that helps support the hypothesis in the present study”.
• Finally, make sure to proofread, proofread, proofread! Use the Pearson Writer for help, but note that their suggestions are just that – suggestions. It is up to you to make sure the flow of the paper is easy to understand. Good luck!
PAPER II: METHODS AND RESULTS INSTRUCTIONS 7
Checklist – Paper One: Mini-Literature Review
Use the check sheet below to make sure your paper is the best it can be! Make sure you answer “Yes” to all questions before submitting your paper or you will lose points!
General Paper Format Yes No
1. Is everything in your paper (including headers, the main body of your mini- literature review, and your references) in 12 point Times New Roman font?
2. Is everything in your paper double spaced, including references (here I mean the spacing above and below each line, not the spaces following a period)?
3. Do you have one inch margins on all sides of the paper (one inch from the top of the page, one inch from the bottom, and one inch from each side)
4. Are the first lines of all paragraphs indented roughly ½ inch? 5. Are your paragraphs aligned left? (That is, text should be flush left, with lines
lining up on the left of the page, but text should NOT line up on the right side of the page – it should look ragged)
6. Do you need help figuring out how to configure a word document in APA format (inserting headers, page numbers, proper indents, etc.)? If YES or NO, I highly recommend watching this video which walks you through setting up an APA formatted paper! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9pbUoNa5tyY
Title page
Yes No Header 1. Do you have the phrase “Running head” in your header (with a lower case h)?
2. Is the rest of your Running head title in ALL CAPS? 3. Is your Running head in 12 point Times New Roman font? 4. Do you have a page number that is flush right (also in 12 point Times New
Roman font)? Title / Name / Institution 1. Is your title 12 words or less (as recommended by the APA)? 2. Do all title words with four letters or more start with a capital letter? 3. Are your name and institution correct? 4. Are your title, name, and institution elements centered and in 12 point Times
New Roman font?
Literature Review Yes No Header
1. Is your header title present and identical to your header title on the title page? 2. Is your header title in ALL CAPS and 12 point Times New Roman font? 3. Does your header on this second page omit the phrase “Running head” 4. Do you have a page number starting on page 2 Title for the literature review 1. Do you have the identical title you used on the title page rewritten at the top
of your literature review? 2. Is this title centered?
PAPER II: METHODS AND RESULTS INSTRUCTIONS 8
Literature Review Continued Yes No Main body of the literature review
1. Does your literature review start broadly, giving a brief overview of the paper to come?
2. Does your literature review start to narrow down toward your hypotheses? 3. Do your paragraphs transition from one to the next? (That is, avoid simply
listing studies you read. Tie them together. How does Study A in paragraph A relate to Study B in paragraph B?)
4. Does your paper end in your hypotheses? Citations for the literature review 1. Did you cite a minimum of 3 citations? (Note that you can give a lot of detail
for some articles you cite but only a sentence or two for others. How much detail you go into depends on how important the article is in helping your support your hypotheses)
2. Are your citations in APA format (That is, ONLY the last name of the author(s) and date of publication)?
a. Note that you do NOT include first names, initials, or the title of the article the authors wrote when citing. That information belongs in the references pages only.
b. Also note that you only use an ampersand – the & symbol – when it occurs within parentheses. In other instances, use the word “and”
3. If you quoted, did you provide a page number for the direct quote? 4. If you paraphrased in any way, did you cite the source of that information?
References Page Yes No Title for the references page
1. Do references start on their own page? 2. Is the word “References” centered? References – Make sure these are in APA format! 1. Are references listed in alphabetical order (starting with the last name of the
first author listed)? 2. Are all citations from the literature review referenced? 3. Is the first line of the reference flush left while subsequent lines are indented
(Note: Use the ruler function for this. DO NOT simply tab)? 4. Did you use the “&” symbol when listing more than one author name? 5. Did you include the date of publication 6. For article references, is the article title (which is not italicized) present, with
only the first word and proper names starting with a capital letter? 7. For article references, is the name of the journal present with all major words
starting with a capital letter (Note: this journal title is italicized)? 8. For article references, is the volume number italicized 9. For article references, are the page numbers present (not italicized) 10. For article references, is the DOI present
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