WRITING TIPS

UPDATES

INITIAL INFORMATION

TIME GUIDELINES &  OTHER INFORMATION

PRIOR EXAMPLES

YES, TIME CAN FLY!   DUE APRIL 24 (by noon): FINAL PAPER DUE MARCH 31: INITIAL PAPER DRAFT no foolin' MEANWHILE ACCESS "THE GOOD PAPER" SITE HERE AND here's another set of paper writing tips HARD COPY PLEASE No email attachments please

Here's the site for FSU's Human Subjects Committee (Institutional Review Board or IRB).

REMEMBER! YOU are not the one to decide if your project is exempt from IRB approval--that's what IRBs are for.
Trust me with my experience on there, everyone believes that they are exempt! That's a technical term. (Review the Federal guidelines on the IRB site HERE.) I saw projects that would curl your hair and almost certainly would have been harmful had they not been revised!
My favorite was the historian who said "we don't need Human Subjects Approval: everyone we study is DEAD."
But (a) that is not always true and (b) the subjects of study have descendents and even surviving friends who care about them.

DUE MARCH 31: FIRST DRAFT

Everyone may rewrite their course paper for a higher grade IF I receive your paper by March 31  (you WON'T get a lower grade, although--rarely--your grade may not change). ALL rewrites are due Monday, April 24 2009 BY NOON.  Of course, if you didn't turn in your draft before then, all papers are due by April 24 at noon, draft or rewrite!
 
 

1. In addition to hard copy of your paper, I must receive a CD etc with your paper on it in either MSWord or Word Perfect IBM format by April 24 (ground rule for EVERYONE).
 
 

Here are some writing tips

First off, don't worry about it when I underline the various stages of your projects in felt tip (yellow, pink, or otherwise). I do this to focus my eyes on the page and to ensure I don't miss anything.

ORGANIZE, ORGANIZE, ORGANIZE

Have a comprehensive introduction. Your introduction, in a few paragraphs, should tell me (1) what your paper will be about, (2) why the topic is important to study, (3) what your paper will contribute (e.g., a solid review of the literature, a new study on mate selection), and (4) the order of the subtropics that you will examine.

The introduction appropriately goes at the VERY BEGINNING of your paper.
 
 

SOMEWHERE IN THE FIRST PAGE OF YOUR PAPER, YOU WILL TELL ME WHAT YOUR PAPER IS ABOUT AND WHY IT IS IMPORTANT TO STUDY THIS TOPIC! Also what YOUR paper will contribute. You may wish to duplicate this information later in your paper too. I assure you that I am a total maniac on this one and will notice immediately if you do not do so.

It is helpful to write a couple of sentences or a paragraph that summarize the main topic of your paper. Place this paragraph before you as you write. If your sentences, paragraph, or section do not directly relate to that main topic, eliminate it or them, no matter how fascinating they may be. Remember you will probably be able to include that excised paragraph or section in a different paper later on.

(What I find helpful is to paste this extraneous wonderful section or paragraph that I hate to discard at the end of my paper. When I am pretty much done, I make a decision about whether I can use the section in THIS paper and where it belongs.If so, I merge it in. Otherwise, I save that section in a new file to be used for a different paper sometime.)

Working from outlines will help organize your ideas and the order in which you present them.

Use headings and subheadings to tell me what each major section of your paper is about (again, look at your readings for examples).

Remember that each paragraph should be about one main idea. Beginning and ending sentences make the transitions between paragraphs easier for your reader.
 

REFERENCE APPROPRIATE LITERATURE

Be sure to use professional journals, such as The Journal of Communication, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Journal of Educational Psychology, Social Psychology Quarterly, and other professional journals in your field. In general, AVOID popular magazines or newspapers; their authors typically are journalists, not trained behavioral scientists, and at best, only interview behavioral scientists.

YOUR PERSONAL EXPERIENCES

Your personal experiences as a counselor or a teacher make terrific illustrations. However, recall that in a professional conference paper or article, personal recollections constitute a VERY small part of what is presented to the reader (maybe 5 percent, certainly no more than 10 percent). Your emphasis for this course paper should be on concepts and the evidence supporting or refuting the concepts. Use a sentence or so of personal experience (if appropriate) as a springboard to introduce a topic, or as an illustration, no more than that.

MAKE YOUR MANUSCRIPT APPROPRIATE FOR YOUR AUDIENCE

If I present my data on science reasoning in a Social Psychology paper session, I emphasize how and why  social factors influence knowledge and reasoning rather than materials that focus more on science education per se. Most topics have several dimensions and depths to them. It is NOT "cheating" to focus most heavily on the perspectives that your audience wants to know about the most. Rather, you are providing a service for your audience of readers.

BE SELECTIVE

The best paper is not usually the one that mentions the largest number of concepts in the fewest number of pages. This is because the paper will not be able to adequately define, describe, and evaluate each concept in a small space. Similarly the best paper is not the one that manages to cram the largest number of citations into the smallest amount of room.  Your paper will be better if it selects a relatively small number of concepts and deals with them in depth. (See below)

ORGANIZE AROUND CONCEPTS, NOT AUTHORS (AND A NOTE ON CITATIONS IN TEXT)

What were the major findings about your topic? Were group processes more important than "personality" in studies of bullying? How does ethnicity and its associated social experiences affect eating disorders? What are the major influences of cartoon violence on children's aggression? Take a look at your readings. They will summarize a finding ("imitation of aggression increased when the model was rewarded") then cite a few studies as examples.

Citations typically follow American Psychological Association (APA) style: in the text, simply put the author's last name and the year the study was published (e.g., Jones, 2001). Give the full citation in a reference section at the back. If the author has more than one study in a specific year, designate them as 2001a, 2001b, etc. If an author has a common last name, add their first initial (e.g., M. Jones, 2001a).

PRIORITIZE

All concepts are not equally important, all theories not equally fruitful, all empirical studies not equally well executed or unambiguously informative. In selecting theories, concepts, and studies for your paper, emphasize those that are the most important and appropriate for your topic.

Examine theories and concepts for internal contradictions, ease of operationalization potential, and the available supporting evidence. Consider whether the studies you select for review could have multiple interpretations of the results or are too limited to be conclusive.

BIGGER IS NOT NECESSARILY BETTER

A shorter paper is often better, if it is well-organized, succinct, and avoids redundancy. Repetition is the most common problem that I see in novice papers, and it can be eliminated if you reorganize. Fortunately, word processors make it easy to block and press the delete key, move sections around and make substitutions.

HELP! I'M NOT DONE YET!

Several individuals, especially those who are either gathering or analyzing data, won't have their total paper done by the draft date. That's expected. Turn in what you can, and focus on the writing and conceptual review. Please DON'T turn in a mass of disorganized pages, of course, but showing where the results will go and a tentative description and explanation of the results is fine.

HELP! I'M DOING A LITERATURE REVIEW AND FINDING A MASS OF CONTRADICTIONS

This is actually a pretty typical experience. To help you through the maze, here are some suggestions:

Consider methodology first: Are the populations comparable in the  different articles and papers you examined? Findings derived from college student samples (truncated ages, socio-economic class, academic ability) may not generalize to other groups. This is a question of external validity.

More methodology: are the verbal and other measures used comparable? If not, this may cause discrepant results across studies.

More methodology: were control variables used in the analysis? Were the SAME control variables used in the analysis? Bivariate results may change when other independent variables are controlled.

Check out the age of the publication. Gender differences in math once found in high school students have narrowed dramatically. More recent generations are more sophisticated about science inquiry than earlier generations. The phenomenon you are interested in may have changed over time (that's an interesting finding, so be sure to include if that's what happened).

Got TOO MUCH literature? In view of what we know, your topic may be too broad. Narrow the scope of your review.

DUE MARCH 3: UPDATED PROSPECTUS

Here's what I need for the March 3 update (PLEASE Hard copy! No email attachments! [Many thanks.]):

Since each person has a unique topic and project, it's difficult for me to give a set of generalized instructions for the project update that "fits" everyone. Just recall that the true purpose of this update is to keep everyone on task! If you meet the milestones set at intervals throughout the semester, you are virtually certain to submit your first draft on time (March 31) and then you will be able to revise it, if you so choose, for the final deadline (April 24 at noon).

This is now the time to set down the exact journals, books, coding categories, any standardized tests or minute experimental manipulations that you plan to use or to read.

So, keeping these individualized caveats in mind, here's what you need to tell me by March 3:

(1) What is it that you are going to do? Literature review? Empirical study? WHAT KIND of empirical study? A brief--but cogent--review and a study design?

(2) What is your topic?  BE SPECIFIC!  At this point, you are involved in a subtopic (you need to include it again, and if you have changed it, now is the time to describe it in more detail!) For example, if you are studying group cohesion, that is a gigantic literature. What subfield are you examining (e.g., how sports teams coordinate their actions or how cohesion influences work performance.)

(3) Do you have team members? If you are working with someone else, now is the time to tell me if you haven't already.

(4A) IF YOU ARE DOING AN EMPIRICAL STUDY OR DESIGNING AN EMPIRICAL STUDY: This is the time for me to see your procedures, see your questionnaire (if appropriate), star the variables you plan to analyze, review your field observation codes, etc. (And the Human Subjects Committee can take several weeks so please keep that in mind if you plan Human Subjects approval. If you would like your measures put into action at a future date, now is probably the time to explore the Human Subjects website (IRB) approval.)

(4B) IF YOU ARE DOING A LITERATURE REVIEW: Now is the time to describe some of the journals, the books, the sites, the other people or literature that you are investigating. Give me a topical outline of the areas that you will review. If you must interpolate from a related literature (e.g., from individual emotional intelligence to emotional intelligence in groups), describe that parent area.

IT WILL BE HELPFUL TO YOU AND TO ME: Give me a total outline of your project as you envision it. Delineate the subareas clearly.

Coming after March 3, more writing tips. Meanwhile, remember the "good paper" website HERE.

DUE FEBRUARY 10: PRELIMINARY PROSPECTUS

Here's what you need to tell me:

• (1) What is the general area of your project?

• (2) What is the particular topic within this area that you plan to study?

• (3) Tell me the names of all team members if you plan to work with someone else.

• (4) GIVE ME A GENERAL IDEA WHAT IT IS THAT YOU WILL DO:

• (5) PUT IT ALL TOGETHER IN A FEW SENTENCES:

EXAMPLE:I will conduct a literature review on the effects of group versus individual learning styles in algebra achievement. I am reading journals in both group dynamics and math education.

EXPECTED PROPECTUS LENGTH: 1-3 double-spaced typed pages or equivalent. (Obviously somewhat more detailed than my examples!)

DON'T: be too specific. I don't need to know your exact journals, books, coding categories, any standardized tests or minute experimental manipulations. That information will be on the MARCH 3 update.
 

Here are some possibilities for your paper:

Research existing literature in an area of interest to you.

Analyze or reanalyze existing data.

Design a study to be carried out in the future.

Complete a small original study such as an experiment, survey, or observation.

TIME GUIDELINES

A short preliminary prospectus of your Course Paper is due FEBRUARY 10.

An updated prospectus of your course paper is due MARCH 3.

A initial draft of your Course Paper is due by MARCH 31 to allow you to rewrite it.

The final edition of your paper is due Friday APRIL 24 by NOON.
 
 

Teams find it easier than individuals to plan and execute a small experiment, survey, or observation. You may choose to work in teams for the Course Paper.  Please turn in the names of all team members on the Course Paper by February 10 with the preliminary prospectus. I also will alert you to possible teammates (but the choice is yours).

While there will be individual differences, the typical Course Paper is about 15 pages, including tables, figures, illustrations, and references. Team papers are typically 25-30 pages.

TOPICS FROM PRIOR YEARS:
 

Also, check out our Blackboard site for examples; explore the Presentations Folders under Course Documents.
 
 

If you plan to conduct a survey, an experiment, observations for your course paper and you also plan to use the data later (e.g., for a thesis, dissertation, conference paper, article), your project may need approval from FSU's Human Subjects Committee (also known as the Institutional Review Board or IRB). Plan early if so! A phone call or an email is often sufficient for the Committee Administrator to tell you if you need to make an application. More information and Human Subjects forms are online.

FOR HUMAN SUBJECTS COMMITTEE INFORMATION CLICK HERE

• It can take over a month, depending on the committee meeting cycle, to check your proposal. Studies that are exempt usually are reviewed more quickly because only a few members need to read your human subjects proposal. But THE COMMITTEE (not you) decides if your research is exempt (read more about that on their WEB site).

• If you will submit a study design involving human subjects for your project that you plan to conduct in the near future, say, this summer or fall, I recommend that you submit your proposal to the human subjects committee this semester. Then, if the committee wants more information, you can supply it long before you begin collecting data. Meeting dates are sometimes more erratic during the summer, too.

As a student, your major professor or advisor must sign in on the human subjects documents.

All students will do a class presentation based on their paper topic.

We will also periodically discuss the topics chosen for the course paper.

• THE SPELLING & GRAMMAR THING

• A NOTE ON REFERENCES AND CITATIONS

Within the text, identify your reference: use the author(s)' last name(s) and the year of publication, enclosed in parentheses. If there are two different authors with the same last name, add a first initial. If an author has two cited works the same year, distinguish them by "a" and "b".

For the last 25 years or so, APA style does NOT distinguish by the gender of the author. BOTH male and female authors are designated by initials, not their first names (the old practice of only using first names for female authors functioned more like a red flag than a courtesy and the APA dropped this decades ago.)

For example, you have two authors with the surname of Jones, Arlene Jones and Jerry Jones. Arlene Jones published two articles in 1999 and you want to cite them both. Here's my brief example with citations:

As Arlene Jones reported in two separate studies (A. Jones, 1999a; 1999b), sociable dogs run in packs. However, Jerry Jones (J. Jones, 1985) has reported that this is not true for "Alpha dogs."

The basic idea is that if someone reads your paper and wants to read any of your references, the complete information should be given to enable your reader to easily do so.

OVERVIEW

READINGS

CLASS PRESENTATION

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Susan Carol Losh
December 27 2008
February 24 2009
March 16 2009