Unit 12 - Writing Empirical Research and Becoming a Researcher

Steps before empirical report

1. Select your research design

2. Choose reliable + valid measures

3. Receive ethics approval

4. Hire a research assistant

5. Gather data from participants

6. Analyze data/PSYC 305

7. PREP YOUR REPORT

Purpose of empirical report

“Your overriding purpose is to tell the world what you have learned from your study” (Bem, 2003)

Steps OF an empirical report

1. Write simply and directly

   1. Direct your writing to your grandmother

2. Follow the format:

   1. Intro

   2. Method

   3. Results

   4. Discussion

Writing an intro

Write in English prose, not psychological jargon.

Do not plunge unprepared readers into the problem. Take them step by step.

Use examples to illustrate theoretical points or to introduce unfamiliar conceptual or technical terms. The more abstract the material, the more important such examples become.

Whenever possible, try to open with a statement about people (or animals), not psychologists or their research (This rule is almost always violated. Don’t use journals as a model here.)

1. Intro begins broadly

2. Becomes more specific

3. And more so

4. Until you're ready to introduce you're own study in conceptual terms

5. The method and results section are MOST specific

6. Discussion begins with implications of your study

7. It becomes broader

8. And more so

Bad examples

“Several years ago, Ekman (1972), Izard (1977), Tomkins (1980) and Zajonc (1980) pointed to psychology’s neglect of the affects and their expression.”

“Research in the forced-compliance paradigm has focused on the effects of predecisional alternatives and incentive magnitude.”

“Festinger’s theory of cognitive dissonance received a great deal of attention during the latter part of the twentieth century.”

Good examples

“The individual who holds two beliefs that are inconsistent with one another may feel uncomfortable.”

“For example, the person who knows that he or she enjoys smoking but believes it to be unhealthy may experience discomfort arising from the inconsistency.”

“This feeling of discomfort was called cognitive dissonance by Leon Festinger (1957) who suggested that individuals will be motivated to remove this dissonance.”

The literature review

Summarize the current state of knowledge in the area.

• What previous research has been done on the problem?

• What are the pertinent theories of the phenomenon?

Citing + references

If the idea is more important, use A. If the people MAKING the claim are more important, use B. Either works, just depends where you want put the emphasis

If the SPECIFIC words are more important, you can quote more specifically.

• Three or more authors--- et al.

  • (Couture et al., 2016)

  • Couture et al. (2016) suggest…

Ref. an online research article

Author (year of publication). Title of the paper: Caps for subtitle. Where they published it, Volume no. (Issue no.), page no. / range, DOI URL.

Ref. a book

Author, A. A. (Year of publication). Title of work: Capital letter also for subtitle. Publisher Name. DOI (if available)

Ref. a book chapter

Author, A. A., & Author, B. B. (Year of publication). Title of chapter. In E. E. Editor & F. F. Editor (Eds.), Title of work: Capital letter also for subtitle (pp. pages of chapter). Publisher. DOI (if available)

Hypothesis or research question

End the introduction with…

Sufficient detail for replication

The Methods section should provide…

Overview example

• Sixty male undergraduates were randomly assigned to three conditions.

• In the $1 condition, the participant was first required to perform repetitive laboratory tasks in an individual experimental session

  • The participant was then hired by the experimenter as an “assistant” and paid $1 to tell a waiting fellow student that the task was fun and interesting.

• In the $20 condition, each participant was hired for $20 to do the same thing.

• In the control condition, participants simply engaged in the tasks.

• After the experiment, each participant indicated how much he had enjoyed each task

Methods section

• Provide an overview of study

• Then:

  • Provide summaries or excerpts of what was actually said to the participant, including any rationale or “cover story”

  • Describe the relevant aspects of the room.

  • Show sample items from questionnaires and/or questionnaires themselves

  • Copies of stimulus materials or pictures of apparatus.

• Participants

• Materials

• Procedure

• Provide information on reliability and validity of measures

• Report on ethical issues

Results section

1) Explain what happened

• Example: The $1 participants rated the tasks as more enjoyable than did the $20 participants who did not differ from control participants.

The _________ section should (also) tell a story…

2) Remind us of the hypothesis…

• Remind us of the method and measures: Men should show more tears than women while watching the film

• Tell us the answer to the hypothesis in English: Men did cry more profusely than women

3) Then (and only then) report the statistics

• Example: The men produced an average of 1.4cc more tears than the women, F (1,112) = 5.79, p < .025, Effect size/d = .45.

Discussion section

1. Tell us what you learned

2. Point out the…

   1. limitations

   2. implications

   3. avenues for future research

Go out with a bang/find a conclusion that captures the audience!

Title

1. 10-12 words

2. Should be fully explanatory when standing alone

3. Should identify the theoretical issues or the variables under investigation.

4. Can be fun!

   • Fantastic yeasts and where to find them: the hidden diversity of dimorphic fungal pathogens

   • You Probably Think This Paper’s About You: Narcissists’ Perceptions of Their Personality and Reputation

Abstract

_______________ - should also have lots of care like the title as it’s the first thing ppl read

Include in order:

1. Intr

2. Methods

3. Results

4. Conclusions

Omit needless words

Writing advice

_____________ - excessive words gets confusing and is a waste of time

Avoid meta-comments

Writing advice

“Now that I have discussed the three theories of emotion, we can turn to the empirical work on each of them. I will begin with the psychoanalytic account of affect...” → “Each of these three theories has been tested empirically. Thus, the psychoanalytic account of affect has received support in studies that...”

• “I am writing to discuss how I believe climate change is a major problem.” → “I am writing to discuss how I believe Climate change is a major problem.”

‘Data’ is plural

Writing advice

• “The data are…”

• “These data…”

Bias

Writing advice

Avoid ________ in your language as it makes it not objective

Steps to become a researcher

Steps are…

• Get a bachelor’s degree → Honours

  • BSC or BA in psych

  • Develop honours thesis

  • Attend honours Impose

• Grad school → Master’s degree

  • Figure out: clinical or experimental psych?

  • Finish MA thesis

• Grad school → PHD

  • Finish comp exam

• Get a JOB!!!!!!