Research Presentation

Research Presentation instructions

****NOTICE****

1) PLEASE BEFOR YOU START YOU HAVE TO READ THE INSTRUCTIONS AS WELL(CAREFULLY)

2) PLEASE CHOSE TOPIC AS EXPLAINED HERE AND WRITE CITATIONS BETWEEN 3-4 REFERENCES AND THEN START WITH THE Research Presentation I HAVE TO SEND THE TOPIC TO MY TEACHER BEFORE.

TOPIC

3-4 CITATIONS NEEDED TODAY BUT THE Research Presentation AFTER 4 DAYS

3) I WILL PAY FOR THIS HOMEWORK FOR 15 pages=50 $

Evaluation Rubric for Research Presentation

Total Assignment = 100 pts (=23% of course grade) 10 pts -- Your research question/ appropriate selection of articles and presentation length--total presentation should be no shorter than 20 and no longer than 40 slides 45 pts -- Summary of each study; please include for each study the following. a. Purpose of Study--what are the study's research questions? (6 pts)  b. Design --First, answer this question: is this study experimental?, quasi-experimental?, or correlational? Experimental=are there randomly assigned groups that were treated differently?, Quasi-Experimental--are there groups that naturally occurred--e.g., smokers vs. non-smokers--that were treated differently by the researcher?, Correlational--a group is described and the results show differences among the group members?  Second, IF the study has a developmental focus, analyze the developmental design: cross-sectional, longitudinal, or sequential. (6 pts) c. Methods--include participants, materials/instruments, data collection techniques, and data analysis techniques. After summarizing the methods, analyze what the researchers did in terms of the criteria of 1) objectivity, 2) reliability, 3) validity, 4) representative sampling, and 5) replication. (21 pts) d. Findings--look for information indicating significant differences--connect the findings back to the research hypotheses. The findings should be contained in the Results section of the paper (6 pts) e. Conclusions--summary of authors' interpretations from Discussion section (6 pts) 15 pts--Theoretical Perspective--what are the researchers' (probably implicit) perspectives on human development?--defend your decisions for each study with reasons (from the purpose, design, data collection and analysis, results, and interpretation); you should 1) identify (2 pts), 2) explain (5 pts), and 3) defend (8 pts) whether the perspective of each study is organismic, cognitive-developmental, cognitive-learning, behavioral, psychodynamic, contextual, or humanistic.  If possible to determine the specific theory being tested by the study, further analyze the origins of the developmental approach being used.  Be sure to defend your point of view. 15 pts -- Take Home Message--having read these two studies (notice this is a comparative analysis), what do you now believe? (=conclusions, 5 pts) What other questions do you have? (=future research questions, 5 pts) What can you not know for sure? (=limitations, 5 pts)  15 pts -- Communicative Effectiveness a. Presence of a brief introduction and conclusion (2 pts) b. Does paper flow? (please use headings) (3 pts) c. Are words misspelled or used incorrectly, are subject-verb agreements correct? (4 pts) d. Correct use of in-text citation (e.g., refer to studies by the authors' last names and year of publication)--please note that the only proper way to refer to a study in formal writing is by the last names of the authors and the year of publication. No article titles should appear in the narrative. (3 pts) e. Style of references (3 pts) For both d. and e. please follow the APA Manual of Style, 6th ed. An APA tutorial is available under the Cunningham Memorial Library's home page (see online tutorials). Please post your presentation as an attachment (with document in Power Point or Word or rtf, preferably) under the Research Presentations Forum of the Discussion Board by the due date listed in the Calendar (under Tools).

Citations and Research Question The Research Presentation begins with a research question and a bibliographic search.

You should identify 2 to 4 studies that address the same research question from different research laboratories (look for different authors). Please send your References to me with citations written in APA style --see APA Manual of Style, 6th ed.

no later than the date listed in the Calendar. I will use your Research Question to peruse the titles to make sure they look like original reports of empirical studies that are all on the same research question, and I will do an APA check on one of your citations.

part of your presentation grade depends on using appropriate articles and writing your References page in APA style.

If you are in doubt about whether a study is an "original report of an empirical study," feel free to attach it to the Citations and RQ email.

Please start early on this assignment and plan to spend several hours searching for the right kind of articles that are all on the same research question.

If you need assistance with APA style, please consult the Kail and Cavanaugh text References for many examples of APA-style reference citations.  You may also take the APA Style Guide tutorial available on the library's website. 

The APA Manual of Style upgraded to the 6th edition in June, 2009. I will only accept citations in 6th edition style.

Citations and RQs that include your name, your research question and 2 to 4 article citations in APA style are due no later than the date listed in the Calendar

Research Presentation

The Research Presentation should be focused on a comparative analysis of the designs, methods, and results of the two most closely related studies from your bibliography. One of the purposes of this assignment is to develop your research awareness as a consumer. How do we know when to believe a research report? In order to take full advantage of the wealth of research that is published on given topics, it helps to consider the theoretical and methodological orientations of the authors.

The first task in this assignment is to summarize accurately the studies (since your readers will not have access to the articles themselves.) You should summarize the PURPOSE (include the research hypotheses, if these are mentioned); the METHOD (including the design, the participants, the materials, the data collection procedures, and the data analysis procedures); the RESULTS; and the DISCUSSION.

With regard to the design of the study (first item under method), please explain why the design is experimental, quasi-experimental, correlational, or qualitative. Experiments must contain more than one group of participants, all of whom are randomly assigned to their group by the researcher, and there should be references to the control group versus treatment group(s). A subset of experiments is quasi-experimental studies that begin with the selection of different groups, but there is no random assignment by the researcher to the groups (e.g., alcoholics vs. non-alcoholics). However, quasi-experimental studies treat the non-random groups in an experimental fashion--with control and treatment groups. Correlational designs begin with a single sample (which may include two or three groups, e.g., students older than grade level, students right age for grade level, and students younger than grade level), and look for correlations among variables measured in common (e.g., self-esteem and peer relations quality). A final design is qualitative, ethnographic, or grounded theory. Qualitative designs typically do not begin with hypotheses and depend on interviews or extended observations. The goal is usually to explore why people act as they do or to uncover different ways that people approach an issue (in bereavement, for example).

Another dimension in research design is the quality of the developmental design. There are three broad categories: cross-sectional, longitudinal, and sequential. Decide if your studies are utilizing a developmental design and explain why it is either cross-sectional, longitudinal, or sequential. Please note that many studies that are interesting to us and appropriate for this assignment do not actually have a specifically developmental design.

Regarding procedures, if we apply scientific criteria, there are ideals. A scientific study’s procedures should be a) objective, b) reliable, c) valid, d) capable of being replicated, and e) have a sample that is representative. One of your tasks in this assignment is to figure out how close these studies’ methods come to the ideals and explain your reasoning.

Another important task in the assignment--worth 15% of your RP grade-- is to label and defend the authors' perspective on development. I am specifically looking for you to argue that a given study is organismic, developmental, learning/behavioral, contextual, psychodynamic, or humanistic. Please include a spirited defense of why you think the theory or perspective applies.  Think about what the author argues makes development happen in each study. Consider the research question, the methods used, and the interpretation of the findings in particular. Use these sections (purpose, methods, and discussion) to defend the label you've selected for the study's developmental perspective. You need to include at least three specific examples (from the purpose, the methods, and the discussion) to receive full credit. Finally, having read these two studies, what is the take-home message? Summarizing across both studies, what information is still needed? Which questions are left unresolved? How might these aggregated research findings be applied to help real people? Make sure you address three issues in your comparative take-home message analysis:  a) conclusions that can be drawn from reading both of these studies, b) limitations of the research, and c) future research. My evaluation of the Research presentation will be based on accuracy and coherence of summaries (including your design, methodological, and theoretical analyses), communicative effectiveness, and analysis of the comparative take-home message (focused on conclusions, limitations, and future research). A rubric for the evaluation of presentations is located under Course Documents and it will be used by me.  Note that all 100 points of the RP assignment are accounted for in the rubric.  If you do not include the appropriate sections, you will lose all the points for those sections.  Please post the presentation under the appropriate forum on the Discussion Board (the one labeled Research Presentations).