Writing method section

Writing a Research Proposal: The Method Section

Research Methods in Psychology Lab

Fall 2022

Review:

The Main Body is the third section of a research paper

What are the four parts of the main body?

 Answer:

Introduction, Method, Results, Discussion

TITLE PAGETITLE PAGE

ABSTRACT ABSTRACT

MAIN BODYMAIN BODY

REFERENCESREFERENCES

Review

Grab the reader’s attention

Define the topic & state why it is important to study

Provide relevant background (literature review)

Review the literature (empirical studies)

Integrate your review of relevant literature into your proposed idea

Discuss your proposed topic

Define variables

State your specific hypothesis and provide support for it

Next section….METHOD

INTRODUCTION

How are you going to test

your hypothesis?

What is the purpose of the Method section?

To describe in detail how the study was (or will be) conducted

• Describe in such detail that someone could replicate your procedures exactly

• Think of this section as your “instruction manual” for how to conduct your study

What kind of information do you think should be included in the

Method section?

Format of the Method section

 Typically, there will be four subsections within your Method section:

 Participants  Design  Procedure  Measures

For Method section subheadings you

should use these exact words!

Participants

 How many participants?  How many were in each condition?

 How/where were they recruited?  Random sample? Convenience sample? Recruited

from psychology classes?

 What population?  College students? Teens? Employees at a company?

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Participants

 Specific characteristics  Examples: age, ethnicity, sex, grade level, socio-

economic status, relationship status  Include relevant information only

 For example, if you’re not comparing single men to married men, you don’t need to include relationship status

 Will participants be compensated or rewarded in any way?

 Example: Sona credit for undergrad student participants; money/giftcard for community participants

 This will not be relevant for all studies

Participants: Example

Participants

I will recruit approximately 70 heterosexual couples from a large university campus by making announcements in introductory psychology classes. Participants will be between 18 and 55 years old. To participate in the study, couples must have dated for at least one month. I will ask couples if they are married, nearly engaged, engaged, or casually dating. I will also ask each participant if their partner is their only current partner. My goal is to have a sample that is ethnically diverse. Participants will receive two hours of course extra credit for their participation.

Design

 What kind of design?  Correlational or experimental?  Cross-sectional or longitudinal?  If experimental, within-subjects (repeated measures)

or between-subjects (independent groups)?

 Restate your independent and dependent variables  How are you operationally defining your variables?

Procedure

Step-by-step explanation of what was done (or what will be done)

If your study uses (or is modeled after) a procedure from a previous study, be sure to include the appropriate citation

Write with clarity and precision!

Procedure

 Explain your rationale for the procedural decisions you made

 Why is this design the most appropriate design?

 If you use any deception with participants, explain it in detail

 If your participants are given specific instructions or hypothetical scenarios, provide an example

 Look at sample papers in your lab manual and in journals for examples

 How did other researchers with topics similar to yours conduct their studies?

Procedure

 Examples of information that may be relevant to your Procedure section

 How will you assign participants to groups?  (applies to experimental studies)

 How will you distribute questionnaires?  How will participants be compensated?

 (if relevant)

Informed Consent and Debriefing:

What are they?

 Standard procedures in research designed to protect participants

 How/when will you provide participants with informed consent?

 How/when will you debrief participants?

 Why are these procedures important?  Gives participants a summary of the purpose of the study  Informs the participant of any deception (for example, the

use of a confederate or video recording)  Thanks the participant and provides contact information in

case he/she has future questions/issues

 Your Procedure section should include an explanation that you will give informed consent and that participants will be debriefed if needed

Measures

 What measures did you use, and why did you choose those measures?

 One place to start is to look at the measures/surveys that other studies used

 If you agree with those measures, use them  Search engine…

 http://inn.theorizeit.org/  PsycTESTS

 Create your own measure with caution!  Sometimes creating your own measure is

necessary  Using a measure that has never been used

before is not always the best option

Measures

 Describe measures (or questionnaires) used  Always include a citation if you use measures developed by

other researchers  List the number of items/questions in the survey  Explain what the items are designed to measure  Explain the type of scale that is being used (for example, a

7-point scale)

 Provide one or two items/questions from the full measure as an example

1 2 3 4 5 6 7

Strongly Disagree

Moderately Disagree

Slightly Disagree

Neither Agree Nor Disagree

Slightly Agree

Moderately Agree

Strongly Agree

Measures: Example

Measures

Jealousy. I will use the Perceived Threat Scale (White, 1981) to measure jealousy. The scale has six Likert-type items that measure the perceived threat of rival relationships. Response options range from 1 (“not at all”) to 7 ( “very much”). An example item is “At this moment how much do you worry that your partner wants to start a relationship with someone else?”.

Make sure your example items are between quotation marks

Measures

• Describe any other materials used

• Examples

• Specific computer programs

• Video-taped conversations

Review of APA Format

 Title  The word “Method” is in bold and centered at the

beginning of the section  The Method section does not start on a new page unless

it happens to fall on a new page by coincidence

 Remember to write out any numbers that begin a sentence

 Example: Seventy-five participants...

 You can write in future tense because you are proposing a future study

 Example: “I will recruit participants by…”

Review of APA Format

 Remember to use appropriate APA headings!

Example of Correct APA Headings

Method (Level 1)

Participants (Level 2)

Describe participants…

Design (Level 2)

Describe design…

Procedure (Level 2)

Describe procedure…

Measures (Level 2)

Stress. I will measure stress by… (Level 3)

Self-Esteem. I will measure self-esteem by… (Level 3)

Results (Level 1)

Discussion (Level 1)

The length of the Method section

 The length of your research proposal : at least 11 pages (Including the title page, abstract, and references page)

 The length of the Method section should be 2-4 pages