6 Assignments

6.1 CITI Certification

In order to conduct research with human participants, all students must be CITI certified by completing the “Social and Behavioral Research-Basic/Refresher Course.” Instructions for certification are available on the course website. This is a credit/no-credit component of your grade but MUST be completed before further work can continue. Failure to complete this assignment by the deadline will result in automatic failure of the course.

6.2 Annotated Bibliography

Early in the semester student groups will conduct a literature review centered on their hypotheses. This literature review is critical to success and must precede work on the project itself for several very important reasons (all central to the scientific method):

To carry out a research study implies that there are questions that need answering and one or more hypotheses that needs testing. No matter your area interest, many such questions have already been asked and answered. A literature review provides historical context to a scientist, essentially “catching up” the reader on known discoveries and what modern researchers are currently investigating. This step ensures that you are asking relevant, cutting edge questions that haven’t already been answered.
Experimental psychology, like any other scientific enterprise, relies on communal (shared) progress. As researchers we don’t want to “reinvent the wheel” every time we have an intuition about a hypothesis. The literature reviews ensures that you, as a researcher, are informed on best practices, previous discoveries, past mistakes, etc. related to your area of interest. A literature review ensures that you aren’t starting from scratch–that you are instead building upon what came before your efforts.
Testing hypotheses requires care and knowledge in proper methods, and the results of a hypothesis test can vary wildly depending on how your data are measured. As such, the practice of selecting a proper methodology requires thoughtful consideration. The good news is that others before you have already made progress working out these methods. The literature review is necessary to determine how best to measure your phenomenon and to test your hypotheses.

The ensure that a proper literature has been completed, each group will complete and turn in an annotated bibliography by the deadline listed in the syllabus.

6.2.1 Specific requirements

This is a group assignment. Only one group member should turn in the completed assignment in PDF format on the course website.
The document should contain one entry for each reference your group plans to use.
The minimum number of entries is 15.
Every entry must be a peer-reviewed source related to your research topic.
Preference should be given to recent publications (within the last 5 years)
Every entry must contain the following, in this order:
- An APA formatted (7th edition) reference, as would appear in a bibliography. Your entries should be arranged in alphabetical order by the first author’s last name, as in a standard APA bibliography.
- A summary of the article/book chapter.
  - For experimental findings, this should include why the study was conducted, what the study was investigating, what the results were, and how the study was conducted (that is, the methodology used).
  - For review papers, summarize the major discoveries and theories that are discussed.
- A reflection on how this reference either (i) can be used to develop your own methodology, and/or (ii) can help shape your own hypotheses. This requirement will be given extra weight during grading.
- The name of the group member(s) that created the entry.
  - Each group member is expected to contribute equally.

Warning

This assignment requires that you actually read each of your references. Responses require a more detailed understanding of each reference than what is provided in the abstract. Also, the requirement to connect each reference to your group’s study requires a deeper understanding of the knowledge imparted in the reference.

This work should be spread across your individual group members to lighten the work load.

6.3 Research Proposal

Before beginning a research study, creating a proper research plan is critical. Working as a group, you will want to thoughtfully and thoroughly answer the following questions about your project in as much detail as possible before beginning. Although Dr. Van Horn is here to help, it is important that each group fully consider and create their research battle plan independently at first. This will ensure that each group understands the motivations and purpose of each component of the project, and will hopefully encourage creativity.

To complete this assignment, create a new shared document (using Office 365, Google Docs, etc.). Within that document, create your proposal using the Research Proposal chapter. This document, once complete, should be converted to PDF and uploaded to the appropriate dropbox on the course website.

6.4 Survey Draft

In the research proposal, you and your group created a detailed outline of your proposed survey. For this assignment, you will create the survey in Qualtrics. Before beginning, please see the survey creation todo list. Most notably, each student in your group must create a Qualtrics account before work on the survey can begin.

6.4.1 Detailed Instructions

This is a group assignment. Only ONE survey should be completed for the entire group.
This assignment must be completed in Qualtrics. Do not turn in a text document (PDF, Word doc, etc.). Your submitted assignment should be a fully functional survey implemented in Qualtrics.
Create a blank survey in Qualtrics.
Make each group member a collaborator.
Add Dr. Van Horn as a collaborator.
Fill out the survey with an informed consent, survey questions, and a custom “thank you” message that redirects your participants to the appropriate follow-up research experience credit questionnaire (while providing your study’s unique completion code). Follow the advice and requirements described in the survey creation todo list during this work.
Notify Dr. Van Horn via your Discord group channel when the survey is complete (but by the deadline in the syllabus).

Note

After the assignment is graded, Dr. Van Horn will provide feedback regarding any necessary revisions. You are expected to complete these revisions as soon as possible. After all necessary revisions are completed, Dr. Van Horn will activate your study. At this point, you will start to receive survey responses!

6.5 Peer Review

Critical to the publication process is peer-review. One way to think of this is to consider again the goal of the literature review. We want to make sure that our research acknowledges what has already been learned elsewhere, and that our interpretations, theory, hypotheses, and more are consistent with what other experts have gleaned from their own experiences. A peer-review provides a mechanism for your scholarly peers to double-check your work. The peer reviewer gives their educated feedback, helping to determine if mistakes were made, how things could be improved, etc.

We will conduct a similar process in this class. Granted, we are all learners at this point, rather than experts. But our peer reviews will provide a means for us to each get feedback on our grammar/syntax, APA formatting style adherence, the quality of our logical arguments, etc.

For this assignment, you will submit a draft of your final paper near the end of the semester. You will be assigned a peer to exchange papers with, and you will each provide constructive feedback on one other’s drafts. Grades will be determined by both the peer review itself (you must give careful, thoughtful feedback to your peer to earn credit) and for your own individual draft of your paper.

Warning

If you do not turn in a copy of your own paper by the deadline in the syllabus, you automatically earn zero points for the assignment.
If you submit a partially complete draft, you will only earn partial credit for your peer review work.

6.5.1 Detailed Instructions

To participate in the peer review and earn credits for the assignment, you must do the following:

Create a new post in the appropriate peer review forum on our class website.
In the post, please include
- Your name and paper title
- An attached copy of your paper in PDF format only. Converting to PDF is an important step as your classmates (or I) may not have access to the program you used to write your paper. This is possible with all major word processors. Google Docs allows you to export as PDF. Microsoft Word has the same exporting functionality. For those of you with Apple computers, you can always “print” your document to PDF. This involves selecting the print option (or pressing Command+P on your keyboard), but then selecting the “PDF” option in the lower-left corner of the print dialog box.
Create the above post by the start of class on the due date listed in the syllabus.

To complete the peer review, please note the following:

You will be notified in advance of your randomly chosen peer review partner.
You will need to go back to the peer review forum and download a copy of your peer’s paper.
Your job is to carefully read their paper and provide feedback on how they could improve their work. You can do one or both of the following:
1. Type your feedback out carefully in a separate document. If you do this, please refer to each page of the original paper when writing a comment, quote a portion of their original sentence(s) so that they know what you’re referring to, etc.
2. Use your computer/iPad to mark up your peer’s original PDF by adding comments directly to it. The Apple pencil is very convenient for writing feedback directly on your peer’s PDF.
Once you are finished, please convert your comment document into a PDF as well.
You should then reply to your peer’s original forum post. Attach your feedback document to this reply.
This feedback is due by the end of the day on the scheduled date.

Because everything will be addressed in the forum, each of you will have immediate access to your feedback, which you can then use to revise your own paper as you move forward. Please remember to be professional. Peer reviews can be stressful, as having people read our work can make us feel defensive. It’s important to be kind, as the goal is not to hurt one another’s feelings. But it is very important to be honest–otherwise the value of peer review is lost. In other words, don’t just tell someone they did well to be nice.

Once everyone has completed the assignment and uploaded their responses, I will grade each peer review and post grades to Canvas. Remember: you are being graded for your peer review. If you don’t type up many comments, then there won’t be much to grade!

Tip

A good peer review does much more than say things like, “This is good!”, or “I love your project idea!” You need to include advice on how to improve things.

Below you will find the required sections of your final paper. Those sections marked in bold font are required for the peer review. While the other sections are not required, you are free to include content from those sections as well:

Title Page (start new page)
Abstract (start new page)
Introduction (start new page)
Method
- Participants
- Materials and Procedure
- Data analysis (optional)
- Results
Discussion
Bibliography (start new page)
Appendix (start new page)
- You must at least include ONE appendix that includes a well-formatted copy of all of your survey questions (if you completed a survey). This can simply be a indented bullet list of questions and their possible answers.
Tables (1 per page, with captions and table numbers)
Figures (1 per page, with captions and figure numbers)

6.5.2 Peer Review Rubric

What follows is a rubric for you to use while reviewing your peer’s paper. This is meant to help you, but not constrain you. For each of the categories, provide an overall assessment (“Good,” “Excellent,” etc.) along with a justification for that particular score.

Category	Acceptable	Good	Excellent
Introduction		X
Focus & Sequencing			X
Support		X
Conclusion	X
Grammar & Mechanics			X
APA Style & Communication	X
Citations & Reference		X

In addition to scoring things with the rubric, you are expected to type out detailed comments/suggestions. These comments should be combined with the rubric checklist/scoring into a single document that you will then attach to your reply in the forum. Remember, the details matter here. Show your peer that you read their paper, and provide constructive advice.

For example, consider the following peer feedback:

It’s not clear from your introduction what exactly your study is focused on. Consider rewriting this.

If true, then this is helpful to point out. However, try to engage further with your peer’s text by providing a possible pathway to improving their writing. Something like,

It’s not clear from your introduction what exactly your study is focused on. Maybe it would help to add an explicit statement at the end of the intro that spells out exactly why you think phone usage and anxiety are connected. And if you can connect this statement to prior research it would really help make it clear why your study is doing what it is.

Note

If you choose to markup your peer’s original PDF directly (e.g., using your Apple pencil), you can simply add/draw this scoring rubric on the last page of their PDF.

6.6 Descriptive Statistics Report

This section explains the detailed formatting requirements of this assignment. Please first read the chapter on performing data analysis to understand why one would want to conduct such an analysis, and what statistical tools are available to complete this assignment. This assignment has several motivations:

This assignment ensures that you are beginning your analyses in a timely manner. Data analysis can take a lot of time and mental energy. Better to be moving slowly ahead, one day at a time, well in advance of your final presentation and paper.
You need to understand your data set before you can attempt to draw inferences from your results. The best way to begin to understand your data is to describe what it “looks like.” This assignment is partially about getting to know your own data.
In addition to point #2 above, it’s important that you can explain your (complex) data set to someone else. This assignment starts that process, by requiring you to explain to your reader, in clear terms, what you have to work with.
It’s important to get feedback early on to prevent wasted time and energy. By providing a succinct picture of your data, others can more easily provide constructive feedback.

6.6.1 Detailed Instructions

Each group should work together to turn in ONE single HTML document for the descriptive statistics assignment. This document doesn’t need to be huge with lengthy paragraphs. In fact, it should be a simplified summary of your results. You should aim for succinct, but clearly and thoughtfully written summaries of each result. We will discuss how to complete this assignment in great detail in class well before it is due, but here are some helpful things to keep in mind while completing the assignment:

The HTML document you turn in must be created using Positron’s Quarto system. That is, you will create an Quarto document that contains a mixture of prose (explanations, in plain English, of what you did for your analysis) and data analysis (code blocks that complete your actual statistical analysis), and then “knit” the document into a completed HTML file.
The document must be logically organized by sections and subsections to make things easy to find and understand.
Descriptive statistics must be included for every meaningful thing you measured. Depending on the data, this could be the mean, median, standard deviation, etc.
Graphs must accompany each statistical result. For example, if you measured continuous data on a single variable, include a histogram of the data. If you calculated the mean response for two groups, create a bar plot showing the mean difference between both groups, etc.
The final section of your report must contain a brief breakdown of each group member’s contribution to the analysis. Make a subsection for each group member and include a paragraph and/or bullet list detailing what aspects of the analysis they contributed to.

The most important rule for data applies here: data never speak for themselves.

You’re writing this for someone that didn’t do the analysis, so it should be in plain English, but with numerical summaries justifying each observation. There are no hard and fast rules as to how this document should be formatted, but there are formatting strategies to avoid.

Do not include screenshots of spreadsheets (e.g., Excel tables).
Do not just copy and paste a bunch of notes, analyses, thoughts to yourself, etc. The document should be considered a “presentation” of sorts, such that a naive reader can understand what you are writing about.
Creating this report is likely to be a process of trial and error. Take a moment before submitting this document to clean things up. Remove previous failed analyses, re-order sections if things have gotten messy, etc.

One strategy is to break your document down into sections and subsections, much like how this book is written. Here’s one approach:

Section 1: Participants
--> Total number of participants
--> Number of women/men/non-binary
--> Other demographics
--> Summary description explaining what you've found above

Section 2: Hypothesis 1 -- Women will have higher rates of anxiety from phone usage than men.
--> Summary chart and written description (e.g., "men" vs. "women" on some anxiety score)
--> Another such chart (if applicable)
--> Summary description explaining what you've found above

Section 3: Hypothesis 2 -- etc. etc.
--> etc.
--> etc.
--> etc.

Section 4: Group participation
--> Jane Doe did X, Y, and Z
--> John Doe did X, Y, and Z
--> etc.

Give each section a clear heading, and take a brief moment to format things so that it’s readable. Remember: not only will this document be graded based partially on its readability, it will also serve as a useful summary and reminder for your group while preparing your final poster and paper. Take good notes so that future-you will be able to understand what you’ve written!

Note

This assignment will be completed using Quarto. Your report will be generated using the Quarto document functionality. We will go over how to do this in class.

6.7 Inferential Statistics Report

This assignment follows the same requirements and guidelines as the descriptive statistics report. Please read that section, along with the chapter on performing data analysis before beginning this assignment. You will be provided much more information in class about how best to complete this assignment due to the group-specific differences that are likely to be necessary.

6.8 Poster Draft

For this assignment each group is responsible for creating an artistic mockup of what your final poster will look like. For this assignment, the poster may include fake text, fake graphs, etc. The goal is to create a skeleton poster with placeholders so that when your results are finally in, you will be able to quickly swap in the real information at the last second.

There are two example prototype files (in PowerPoint) on Canvas. Each group must start with one of these files to ensure that the final poster formatting is set up correctly for printing. This poster will become the poster you use during your final oral presentation and poster assignment. If you decide to submit your project to Capital’s Symposium on Undergraduate Scholarship for extra credit, this will also be the same poster you will print and use to present at that time.

6.9 Abstract Draft

The abstract is a succinct, and precisely-written text that summarizes the purpose, design, and results of a research study. It also serves to situate the goal of the project in the greater context of the field of study it arises in. Despite this complex set of goals, this typically must be accomplished in a frustratingly limited number of words. To those who have never written an abstract, it can be quite challenging. The purpose of this draft assignment is to give everyone a chance to receive feedback on their first attempt before turning in the final version. Groups will work together to write a single abstract draft. Only one group member should submit the draft.

6.9.1 Requirements

Each group must turn in a single abstract. Please format the abstract as a single paragraph that addresses the following requirements. Please read on below for details and resources that will help you when writing this document.

Your abstract:

Must not exceed 200 words
Must include:
- introductory statement
- purpose of the project
- your methodological approach
- findings or expected findings
- contribution your work makes to the discipline (why is this important)

6.9.2 Helpful resources and general advice

Please read, “Writing the Empirical Journal Article” on Canvas before writing your abstract. This paper has fantastic advice for writing your paper, and this includes writing a good abstract. I will refer you to this paper often. Seriously—it’s great. Please read it first.
Please read, “How to Write an Abstract” on Canvas before writing your abstract. This short document will help you organize your thoughts/plan before you begin writing.
Check out the example Symposium program on Canvas. This is a previous Symposium’s program that contains many actual abstracts written by students that got accepted to the symposium. If you have no idea where to begin, see points 1 and 2 above. After that, look here for inspiration, language tricks, etc.
If you have never written an abstract, be prepared for it to take some time. It is not easy to summarize any study in <200 words. If you have sentences that meander around, or if you repeat anything at all you’re likely doing it wrong. Abstracts have an information density greater than any other written text. Seriously, if you’re not trying to find a way to remove words like “the” your abstract likely isn’t written properly. Check out those example symposium abstracts from point 3 above!
That 200 words is a HARD limit. Your submission will be rejected without review if you have 201 words. It’s partially a test to see if you can follow directions.
If you’re missing one of the required components, your abstract will be rejected. Again—follow directions.
You don’t actually have to label each component with sentences like, “The purpose of our study was to…” You just need to ensure that you address each requirement somehow. In fact, you won’t have room with <=200 words to actually label things this way.
Unless you have good reason to do otherwise, write your abstract so that it follows the ordering of requirements listed above (intro statement, followed by purpose, etc.)
Avoid personal pronouns as much as possible. It is OK to say things like “We did this…,” but you can almost always avoid it. For example, the statement “We conducted a survey of…” could be reworded as, “A survey that measured student engagement was administered…”
200 words is VERY difficult to achieve. If your abstract writes itself easily in 200 words, you’ve done a bad job (or you’re an experienced abstract writer). Expect this to take a lot of revisions.

6.9.3 Example Abstract Language

What follows are some examples of language often seen in first drafts, and ways to improve upon them.

Example 1 of poor abstract writing:

We conducted a survey of 57 undergraduate college students at a midwestern university. The survey was given on Qualtrics and contained questions that measured how and when college students use online dating applications over traditional means.

That example contains 36 words (18% of the 200 max), and includes unnecessary information about what software tool was used (Qualtrics). Here are two other ways to say the same thing is much less space:

A survey measuring online dating habits was administered to 57 undergraduates. (11 words)

“Online dating habits were assessed via survey (n = 57). (9 words)

Abstracts should read like the previous two sentences. Every word counts. Extra words simply cannot be included. Science favors precision over fluff, and abstract requirements just don’t allow for extra words.

Example 2 of poor abstract writing:

Survey responses were Likert responses that were combined into several composite scores. An analysis in Microsoft Excel proves that people are happier with relationships developed through traditional means than online apps.

There are several issues here. First, this is again too long. Second, we once again see a reference to software choices–this is too much detail. We also see the word “prove.” Avoid this word. Never use this word in academia (unless you’re a mathematician). This example also illustrates another common problem: losing sight of the forest for the trees. The abstract isn’t the place for low-level details like what kind of questions were used (Likert vs free response), or how you approached your data analysis. This is unimportant at the level of the abstract. Here are some succinct replacements for the above passage:

Relationship satisfaction was estimated to be higher in traditional than in online relationships. (18 less words)

Or, if space is limited:

Relationship satisfaction was higher in traditional relationships. (24 less words)

Finally, avoid language that talks about the class or project itself. No meta-commentary is required. Just get to the details. Don’t talk about the project. Talk about what the project did. Also, avoid any historical statements about how the project evolved. For example, don’t say things like:

“For our project…”
“In this class we…”
“We changed our initial hypothesis X to Y after seeing the data…”

Warning

Never claim that your results prove anything. Science isn’t in the business of proving things. The goal of science is to provide evidence to support hypotheses.

6.10 APA Manuscript Style Paper (Journal Style Research Article)

The culmination of a research project is often a peer-reviewed journal article. This is a well-defined structure meant for the clear communication of theory and results to the scientific community. Each student will be responsible for completing a paper on their own that follows conventional APA manuscript style. Although papers will be based on research from group projects, each group member will submit their own separate paper. To be clear:

Group Work Elements: You are permitted to share the following components with your group members for use in your final paper
- Abstract
- References. You are allowed to work together on a shared bibliography. However, given that a bibliography can only contain references that have been cited properly in-text, and that you will be working separately on the text of your paper, it is unlikely that each group member will have exactly the same bibliography. You are in no way required to use the references that your group members share with you.
- Statistical Analyses. You can, and should work together on all analyses of your results. The resulting t-tests, ANOVAs, correlation coefficients, etc. can be shared with one another.
- Data visualizations/figures. Graphical summaries your results (e.g., bar plots, frequency distributions, etc.) should be created as a group, and can be shared across papers.
- Tables of results. Tabular summaries of your results can be shared verbatim with fellow group members.
- Title. You can have the same paper title as your group members. However, you are not required to use the same title.
- Appendix. Every paper is required to contain at least one appendix that contains all of your survey questions. These questions should be well-formatted to be readable and match the document formatting (rather than pasted in directly from Qualtrics). You can work on this as a group and use the same appendix verbatim in each of your papers.
Individual Work Elements: The following components of your final paper must be done alone. You can not share, reuse, paraphrase, copy/paste, or otherwise plagiarize the following components from your group members. The only exceptions are the inclusion of the shared elements listed above.
- Title page
- Introduction
- Method
  - Participants
  - Materials and Procedure
  - Data Analysis. While you are allowed to share statistical results, you must describe the methods in your own words.
  - Results. While you are allowed to share statistical results and figures, you must summarize and describe your results in your own words.
- Discussion
- Addition appendices (aside from the required appendix described above)

6.10.1 Specific Length and Formatting Requirements

An APA journal article is a very well structured and formal document. A manuscript style article is a document formatted in a way that a researcher would submit to a publisher for review. The official APA Style Guide listed in the syllabus contains the full details of what is required. Additional resources (including example documents) for the formatting of this style of document are available on Canvas, and will be discussed in detail in class. Please also consult the document, “Writing the Empirical Journal Article” available on Canvas for great advice on how to write a successful paper. In addition to APA-specific requirements, your final paper must meet the following formatting requirements.

Minimum length of 4,000 words. The following components do NOT count toward your word count
- references in your bibliography
- words in tables
- the required appendix containing your survey questions
- the abstract
- the title page
Minimum of 15 peer-reviewed references. This can include some of the articles we read as a class, but should also contain articles you researched specific to your project. A good rule of thumb is to have at least half of your references come from new sources unique to your paper. Even better would be 10 of the 15. Don’t include the articles we read in class just to include them, or worse, to avoid having to find more articles yourself. If an article we read in class doesn’t fit in your paper’s narrative, don’t cite it (see the FAQ question about introductions below).
Every reference in your bibliography should be cited at least once in your paper, and every citation should appear in your bibliography.
A reasonable and consistent typeface throughout (Calibri, Times, etc.)
Double spacing
All APA manuscript style formatting requirements (e.g., proper headers, citation style, reference style, etc.)

6.10.2 Content Requirements

Your final paper must include the following elements of an APA manuscript style journal article. The required elements should appear in the order listed below. According to APA convention, page breaks only occur for certain sections of the paper. Those sections are marked below—you should start a fresh page for each of these.

Note

Elements marked in bold font are required for the first peer review.

Title Page (start new page)
Abstract (start new page)
Introduction (start new page)
Method
- Participants
- Materials and Procedure
- Data analysis (optional)
- Results
Discussion
Bibliography (start new page)
Appendix (start new page)
- You must at least include ONE appendix that includes a well-formatted copy of all of your survey questions (if you completed a survey). This can simply be a indented bullet list of questions and their possible answers.
Tables (1 per page, with captions and table numbers)
Figures (1 per page, with captions and figure numbers)

6.10.3 Grading Rubric

	Capstone 4	Milestone 3	Milestone 2	Benchmark 1
Topic Selection	Identifies a creative, focused, and manageable topic that addresses potentially significant yet previously less-explored aspects of the topic.	Identifies a focused and manageable/ doable topic that appropriately addresses relevant aspects of the topic.	Identifies a topic that while manageable/ doable, is too narrowly focused and leaves out relevant aspects of the topic.	Identifies a topic that is far too general and wide- ranging as to be manageable and doable.
Existing Knowledge, Research, and/or Views	Synthesizes in-depth information from relevant sources representing various points of view/approaches.	Presents in-depth information from relevant sources representing various points of view/approaches.	Presents information from relevant sources representing limited points of view/approaches.	Presents information from irrelevant sources representing limited points of view/ approaches.
Design Process	All elements of the methodology or theoretical framework are skillfully developed. Appropriate methodology or theoretical frameworks may be synthesized from across disciplines or from relevant subdisciplines.	Critical elements of the methodology or theoretical framework are appropriately developed; however, more subtle elements are ignored or unaccounted for.	Critical elements of the methodology or theoretical framework are missing, incorrectly developed, or unfocused.	Inquiry design demonstrates a misunderstanding of the methodology or theoretical framework.
Application/Analysis	Uses the analysis of data as the basis for deep and thoughtful judgments, drawing insightful, carefully qualified conclusions from this work.	Uses the analysis of data as the basis for competent judgments, drawing reasonable and appropriately qualified conclusions from this work.	Uses the analysis of data as the basis for workmanlike (without inspiration or nuance, ordinary) judgments, drawing plausible conclusions from this work.	Uses the analysis of data as the basis for tentative, basic judgments, although is hesitant or uncertain about drawing conclusions from this work.
Conclusions	States a conclusion that is a logical extrapolation from the inquiry findings.	States a conclusion focused solely on the inquiry findings. The conclusion arises specifically from and responds specifically to the inquiry findings.	States a general conclusion that, because it is so general, also applies beyond the scope of the inquiry findings.	States an ambiguous, illogical, or unsupportable conclusion from inquiry findings.
Communication	Uses findings in connection with the argument or purpose of the work, presents it in an effective format, and explicates it with consistently high quality.	Uses findings in connection with the argument or purpose of the work, though data may be presented in a less than completely effective format or some parts of the explication may be uneven.	Uses findings, but does not effectively connect it to the argument or purpose of the work.	Presents an argument for which evidence is pertinent, but does not connect that argument to the data. (May use words such as “many,” “few,” “increasing,” “small,” and the like in place of actual quantities.)
Limitataions and Implications	Insightfully discusses in detail relevant and supported limitations and implications.	Discusses relevant and supported limitations and implications.	Presents relevant and supported limitations and implications.	Presents limitations and implications, but they are possibly irrelevant and unsupported.
Control of Syntax, Mechanics, and APA Formatting and Style	Uses graceful language that skillfully communicates meaning to readers with clarity and fluency, and is virtually free of APA formatting and style errors.	Uses straightforward language that generally conveys meaning to readers. APA formatting in the paper has few errors.	Uses language that generally conveys meaning to readers with clarity, although writing may include some APA formatting errors.	Uses language that sometimes impedes meaning because of errors in usage.

6.10.4 Frequently Answered Questions

How long should my introduction be?
- Answer #1: The answer is, “long enough for it to do what it’s supposed to do.” That’s more than a throw-away answer. I actually mean this—read the “Writing the Empirical Journal Article” (Bem, 2003) paper on Canvas for explicit details.
- Answer #2: If you are trying to hit a specific length at the outset of writing your paper, you’re probably doing it wrong. You should be telling a story in your research paper rather than hitting some pre-ordained benchmark. Text that was written to fill a quota comes across as just that–pointless (and often repetitive) filler. Writing that attempts to tell a story succeeds much better.
Does this non-peer-reviewed newspaper article, doctoral thesis, etc. count toward my 15 references?
- No. But if it is well-written and contains citations of peer-reviewed research to back up its claims, you might be able to include it as an extra reference. But be careful. The internets are alive with know-it-alls that know little…
Should my introduction summarize each of my references?
- No. “Research papers” for typical college courses will often have you read one or more primary sources, and then summarize each (and perhaps then further add commentary about the broader topic(s) covered by your sources). This is not that kind of research paper. This paper should be written as a scientific journal article, as if you are an actual research scientist submitting your paper for publication. In other words, it should be written just like the peer-reviewed articles you had to read for class (and that you include in your references). Introductions in this style of paper tell a story. The story begins broad, introducing the reader to the general topic of investigation. Slowly, you unfold a narrative that walks the reader through what is known about your topic, what gaps exist in the scientific understanding, and how your study seeks to answer questions that fill those gaps. Along the way, you will make statements of facts, briefly report interesting/relevant findings from past studies, and justify your methodology and hypotheses. At each of these steps you MUST bolster your claims with evidence. That evidence will take the form of a citation to something in your bibliography. Sometimes you will briefly summarize some aspect of a paper you cite. Other times your citation will accompany only a small statement of the results. Rarely will you summarize the cited resource at length. While you are reading your references to prepare for writing your paper, take note of how their introductions are written. THAT is the style you should be writing in.
Where in my paper should my citations appear?
- Mostly in your introduction (see previous question). A few citations might appear in your method–for example, to cite a study from which you borrowed survey questions, to cite an analysis method you borrowed from another paper. etc. Finally, you will likely include more citations in your discussion section, though typically less than your introduction.
Can I use quotations in my paper if I cite the source?
- No.
- OK, technically the answer is “yes.” However, in APA style (and particularly for scientific reports) quotations are highly discouraged. Here is the rationale. You are trying to convey information to your reader by doing the work for them. In contrast, in a paper written in the humanities, you might include many quotations—even paragraph-length block quotes—to let your reader inspect the source material that you are reflecting on. In science, the text of previous works do not typically matter like they do in say, an English paper. Rather, the ideas are what matter. So in science, we don’t bother quoting what Smith and Jones (2019) said, because who cares what words they used? What we care about is what methods, observations, and findings they shared. This is almost always stated more succinctly in your paper using your own words (because the words will match the context of the paper, rather than you having to make your paper match the context of the quote). So the first answer to this question (“no”) is how you should proceed. Only quote something in your paper if the words used by the original source are what matter. This is unlikely. Usually the ideas in the original source are what matter. Don’t quote. But if you do, you must include a citation.

6.11 Oral Presentation and Poster

6.11.1 Presentation Content Requirements

In addition to the final paper, each group will work together to present their project in poster format. This is intended to simulate the experience of presenting a poster at an academic conference. While the preparation for this presentation will be identical to what you would do for such a conference presentation, there are a few small differences in the format. Most notably, in a typical poster session you do not have a designated time “on stage” where everyone listens to your poster presentation. In class, however, you will have a dedicated presentation time wherein your group will present your project, using your poster as a visual guide. In this sense, your oral presentation assignment will be like giving a presentation wherein you use one big “slide” (i.e., your poster) rather than a series of slides.

Consider the following requirements when preparing your presentations. In brief, you should plan to present your poster by moving through the standard APA sections roughly in order: introduction/background, participants, materials/procedure, results, and discussion.

Include an explanation of the theoretical context of the topic. That is, what is the historical context? For example, if your topic involves how decision-making is impaired by social media pressure, what prior research led you to consider asking the research question you chose to ask? This is similar to the spirit of a “literature review” found at the beginning of peer-reviewed articles.
A summary of the phenomena related to the topic is also required. What are some of the major properties of the topic? For example, if your project focused on online decision making, you might focus on how social pressure affects individuals’ capability of making independent decisions. Or in what ways does the effect augment the behaviors of online individuals? Does this scenario reduce their ability to make wise financial decisions? Is it group conformity that changes their decision making, or a bunch of factors? What are those factors?
What population were your studying? How to did you target that group? What does your sample look like?
Describe your method. What materials did you use? What was your procedure? Why did you ask the questions on your survey that you chose to ask? What were you hoping to measure? Remember that simply stating that, “we used an online survey” is not a proper description of a method. While it’s important to note that it was a survey, the real method is your choice of independent and dependent variables, how you defined things operationally, how you combined scores into composite scores (and why!), etc.
Describe and walk the audience through your results. This is what the audience is waiting for, so be sure to spend some time on this. Remember a few key points:
1. Statistics do not speak for themselves. It is never OK to just say things like, “the t-test was significant.” That kind of statement will mean little to nothing to the audience without proper context. A better statement would look like this: “Remember that we measured the difference in individuals’ fear of missing out on social activities, comparing heavy social media users to non-users. We found that heavy social media users had greater amounts of this fear than non-users. A t-test confirmed this result.” (and then you point to your actual statistical result on the poster).
2. It is difficult for the audience to remember everything you’re telling them. So avoid saying things like, “hypothesis 1 was confirmed.” Your audience will have forgotten what hypothesis 1 is by this point. So take care, like the in previous example, to remind them of what matters at each step.
Finally, you need to conclude your project by discussing your results in a broader sense. Similar to the discussion section of a scientific paper, the goal here is to take the results (which you’ve just finished talking about) and re-connect them back to the conversation you set up in the literature review component of your presentation. The key is to not simply repeat what you said when talking about your results. The discussion is meant to reflect a deeper consideration of what your results mean outside of your individual study.

6.11.2 Length Requirements and Recommendations

You will have 20 minutes max to present your poster. If your presentation extends past this time, you will be prompted to wrap things up. This is very much how academic conferences proceed. Because of tight time constraints, you are given a limited window of time and held to that limitation. This is all the more reason why practicing your presentation is critical for success.
There will be Q & A after each presentation for up to 10 minutes.
You will present using just your poster. Please do not prepare additional powerpoint slides or use any other visual media. The goal is to make a poster that does everything you need.
This should be a rehearsed presentation. It should be clear that you understand what you’ve done, and that you can make it understandable to your audience. Spend time in advance thinking of ways to simplify your work for an audience. Even though different group members will be presenting different aspects of the project, it is required that your presentation be a cohesive, rehearsed performance. It is always clear when groups delineate work and then show up on presentation day each presenting their own isolated chunk of the story. This approach leads to repetition (because students end up covering each other’s work), missing information (wait, I thought you were going to cover that?!?), and a fragmented narrative in which nothing flows well. It also virtually guarantees that the big picture is missing in your presentation. Because each person worked in isolation on “their part of the poster,” there was no one in charge of ensuring that the overall narrative explained the big picture. This happens very frequently in university and is a major risk for losing points on this assignment.

Note

While you will be presenting with your poster, you will not actually print a physical copy for this presentation. Your digital poster will be displayed onscreen instead during your presentation.

6.11.3 Grading Rubric

This grade is based on the following components:

Knowledge of the topic: you must show that you understand the topic. Points will be deducted if you are just reciting information that you read. Please work to incorporate your knowledge in a way that shows you understand what you are sharing. Do not simply create bullet points taken from another source, and then read them to the class. Instead, get creative and show a mastery of the content.
Organization: Don’t just give a laundry list of random facts about your topic. You’re telling a story to an audience, so please present it carefully and in an interesting fashion.
Research: This is a research project. This is your chance to demonstrate that you read and understood your literature view. Show us how your project connects to the bigger picture.
Project understanding: Every group member needs to demonstrate that they understand what their project was. You must demonstrate that you know why you did what you did, how you did it, and what your statistical results say about it.
Discussion: This is your presentation, but it’s always good to hear what your audience has to say. There will be a Q & A following your presentation, and you are expected to manage this period of the presentation.
Participation: Every group member is expected to talk an equal amount of time.

6.12 Group Feedback

There is no grade for this optional assignment. At the end of the semester, after the group presentation has occurred, students may optionally provide feedback on their fellow group members. This is a private document in which each student can provide an account of how well or poorly their group members contributed to their project. If you believe that all of your group members contributed approximately equally to the group project across the semester, you can skip this “assignment.” If, however, you feel that one or more group members did not help out equally, you can prepare a short document such as the following, submitting it individually to the appropriate dropbox on Canvas. The goal is to briefly describe how much each group member contributed, listing evidence where necessary. Something like the following is appropriate:

Jane Doe (40%)
- Helped out equally all semester!
John Smith (40%)
- Helped out equally all semester!
Erin Errands (20%)
- Didn’t respond to group messages
- Missed several out of class meetings
- Skipped class often
- Said she was going to create a bar plot for our second hypothesis but never delivered
- Was on TikTok on her phone during class while the rest of us worked on the project

6.13 Group Research Participation

The success of group research projects relies heavily on the equal contribution of those involved. The purpose of this assessment is to ensure that each student is doing their part by helping in the research, design, implementation, analysis, and presentation of their group project.

This grade is based on three components:

Attendance. Each student is permitted up to 2 unexcused absences. Each additional absence reduces this grade by 20 points. Note that it is mathematically impossible to skip class and get an A in this course!
Contribution. I will be working with each group all semester in class. If you are not engaged in the work by helping in tangible ways during class, or are otherwise spending your time doing other things such as texting, doing homework for other classes, etc. you will lose points for this assignment.
Peer Feedback. At the end of the semester (see the due date in the calendar below), each student will optionally provide feedback on how fairly their peers contributed to work outside of class. You are expected to be available for your group OUTSIDE of class time. It is impossible to complete your research project successfully by working on it in class only. As such, you must be available to your peers. You are expected to check and respond to emails, texts, social media, or any other agreed upon forms of communication. If your group members collectively provide evidence that you did not help out with the project, your grade can be impacted.