You have a choice of which of two types of papers you would like to write: a literature review or a research proposal. Both types of papers are about the same amount of work. Your choice should primarily be based on what you like to do: 1) think about theories and what results mean (then write a literature review) or 2) think about how experiments are designed and what it is like to be a subject (then write a research proposal). One last consideration, you should have had Psych 391 if you want to do a research proposal.

If you do a literature review when writing the paper you will need to first summarize each of the articles. This will take about 5 or 8 pages to do. You should realize that there are different types of articles. Some articles are reports of a single experiment, some report multiple (3 or 4) experiments, and some outline a theory with a lot of experiments described very briefly in support of the claims of the theory. You should summarize each of these types of articles differently. If the article is a single study you should outline the purpose and hypothesis of the study and give some of the details of the methods and the results of the study and finish by stating what conclusions can be drawn. If the paper reports multiple studies, you should summarize the general hypothesis of the paper and relate how each study supports or refutes the general hypothesis. Very little detail about the methods and results is needed when summarizing this type of paper. Finish by stating what conclusion can be drawn from the studies. If the paper is a broad outline of the theory, you should try to outline the theory as it is presented in the paper. Very little detail if any about supporting experiments is needed. Finish by suggesting any important implications of the theory. I expect that you will review between 7 and 12 articles for your paper.

After you have summarized each of the articles you should write a section that summarizes and synthesizes what they suggest. You should also have a section about what problems have not been addressed by the current research and what research needs to be done to address these problems. This portion of the paper should be 5 to 8 pages as well.

If you write a research proposal you will have 4 sections in the paper: an introduction, methods, predicted results, and discussion. These sections should parallel the sections of an APA style empirical paper. The introduction should present the problem that is to be studied and review briefly what has previously been studied on that topic. You should then note the idea you plan to test and how it relates to previous research. Finally you should note how you plan to study the problem in a general sense (not the specifics of the methods section) and what your hypotheses are.

The Methods section should have several subsections that begins with a Participants and Design subsection that includes who you plan to use as participants and the design of the study–the dependent and independent variables. The next section should be the Procedure section which should explain in detail what the participants would experience in the study. You might also have a Materials and Apparatus section which would typically precede the Procedure section if there was a reason for it (i.e. you have some special apparatus or equipment or a special scale that you have developed).

The Expected Results section should present the results that you hypothesized in regular ordinary language (no statistics are necessary). However, you should have a figure (i.e. graph) or a table that presents hypothetical data that illustrates your predictions.

The Discussion section should begin with a simple summary of the expected results. You should next discuss the limitations of the study and what would still be needed to establish the case that you would want to make. Finally, you should discuss the significance of the study to the world at large.

Some notes for either type of paper. It should be 10 to 15 pages double-spaced. Use one inch margins and use a reasonable font—no condensed font and no font smaller than 10 point or bigger than 12 point. You should hand in a topic for the paper by Nov. 15^th which I will return to you as approved or not approved by Nov. 17^th. You are welcome to discuss the paper with me or the TA during our office hours. Good luck.