RESEARCH III: LABORATORY

Dr. Arcus

Checklist: 17 point protection plan for final paper

You are responsible for producing a complete research report in APA style. Make sure to avoid the following most common mistakes. Check a draft of your paper for each of these points before considering it finished.

1. Title page is in APA format.

2. Paper has running head, appropriate margins, and double-spacing throughout.

3. Abstract is no longer a proposal and should include outcome.

4. Intro embeds your question in the literature. All relevant studies are cited with sufficient explanation of operational definitions and results to be meaningful. Studies do not have to do exactly what you are doing in your experiment to be relevant.

5. References are in APA format with all citations and only citations included.

6. Direct quotations are limited (or avoided entirely) to one (two at most).

7. Procedure includes only information required to replicate.

8. Materials include psychometric properties of any existing scales used and validity and reliability information on any scales you have developed.

9. Scoring includes reliability information especially for coding behavior or verbal responses.

10. Participant section includes appropriate demographic information and numbers.

11. Results include appropriate descriptive statistics. Means not reported without standard deviation.

12. Results include test statistics reported and interpreted using the statistical sentences and follow-up English sentences we have used in laboratory exercises.

13. Discussion begins with a simple summary of what you found and proceeds to interpret the meaning of your result, embed it in the current literature, identify limitations of the study, specify next steps.

14. Tables are clearly labeled in APA format and referred to in text. SPSS output is not acceptable. Tables should look like tables you find in articles and in your texts.

15. Figures are clear, readable, and relevant. Refer to them in text. Label appropriately. There are no spss output tables or figures cut and pasted with obscure variable names.

16. Spelling and grammar checks are complete.

17. Sections are distinct. All methods in methods, no interpretation in results, and no new results in discussion. Intro ends with hypothesis that sets up methods. No surprises in results—all instruments and scores are operationally defined in methods.