designing a research project

Instructions

In this assignment, students will summarize what they have learned throughout the class related to psychological research methods.

Thus, students are required to imagine and write about a research design they would like to conduct. It can be a non-experimental (naturalistic, quantitative, existing data research, survey and correlational), quasi-experimental and experimental research designs (one-group, nonequivalent control group, time series, single-case experimental, or between-subjects). 

• Write an 4 pages long paper (excluding the Title/Cover and References pages) using sources that are not older than five (5) years.
• Follow the American Psychology Association (APA) writing style (Two-spaced, 12 points Times New Roman font, 1-inch margins).
• Do not quote.
• Use the third person pronouns in this academic paper.
• Use past tense. 

2. Content Pages

a) Introduction (1-2 pages): Identify a problem.  Determine your area of interest. Review the literature and develop a research hypothesis/question/goal. 

• What should you write in the Introduction section of your paper? 
  • Include a brief summary of the general background of your topic chosen for this paper. Has your question or experiment been completed before by professionals? What is the existing research on your topic? You should incorporate psychological principles and concepts to which your topic relates throughout your project. Have in-text and/or parenthetical citations of your sources and list them within the References section. 
  • Review at least three (3) peer-reviewed articles. 
  • Include the name/title of your research project.
  • Include the research hypothesis (research question/goal).  Describe what results would you estimate to get, and why?  Can you relate these results to what was published previously?  

b) Methods (2-3 pages): Develop a research plan.  Define the variables being tested. Identify participants or subjects and determine how to sample them. Select a research strategy and design.  Evaluate the ethics of the proposed research.  

• What should you write in the Methods section of your paper?
• Include information about the research design which you are thinking to incorporate in your research project. You may choose an Experimental (e.g. single-case designs; within-subjects designs; between-subjects design; factorial designs); Quasi-Experimental(e.g., one-group designs; time-series designs; developmental designs; nonequivalent control group designs) or Nonexperimental (e.g., correlational; naturalistic; survey; existing data; phenomenology; ethnography; or case study) design.  Explain why did you choose one of these research designs?
• Include information about the participants. Write about the sampling method you are going to use in your study.  Why did you choose this particular sampling method?  How many participants are you going to select? What are their characteristics (e.g., gender; age; ethnicity; location)?
• Include information about the variables (i.e., continuous vs. discrete) and scale of measurement (i.e., nominal vs. ordinal vs. interval vs. ratio) you will use in your study.  Explain why did you choose that particular variable and scale of measurement?
• Include information about the instrument(s). If you are going to use a questionnaire, it should be described here. What kind questions are you going to ask (e.g., true-false; multiple-choice)? Give a few sample questions.  If you are going to do an observation, what specific behaviors are you looking for and how you measure them?  If you are going to use published psychological measurement instruments, cite the sources and include them in the References page.
• Include information about the procedure.  Describe exactly how are you going to collect your information. If you are going to have interviews, do you plan to ask everybody the same questions?  Are you going to administer an online questionnaire?  Where are you going to assess your participants?  You will probably need to 
• include some other information as well. 
• Include information about the statistics (descriptive vs. inferential) you are going to use in your study.
•  c) Communicating Research (1/2 pages). In 3-5 academically written paragraphs write why and how are you going to communicate the results of your research project (manuscripts vs. posters vs. talks).  

  d) Strengths and weaknesses of your study (1/2 page). Include 3-5 academically written paragraphs that express the strengths and weaknesses of your research project.

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