Observation Study:
Directions:
Introduction: Introduce your topic in the first paragraph and include operational definitions of the elements you are looking at (ex: positive female response was measured by smiling). Also include your hypotheses (both alternative- what you think will happen and the null- the opposite of what you think will happen or no change). Include at least one Empirical research article to support your topic and include an in-text citation and reference page in APA format.
In-text citations: Reference the article in your writing by using parentheses at the end of the sentence with the last name of the author and the year the article was published. Here is an example about how to write an in-text citation: (Brownlie, 2007). Please see below for more information about citations and references.
Method: In your second paragraph, discuss the type of method you used and how you measured or collected data (method= observational; tallied amount of times males made eye contact and females smiled). Also include where you collected data, the time, how you did it, and other important information about your procedure.
Results: In your third paragraph, discuss the results of your study. You might notice there was a slight relationship between your variables (or not). This will not be precise because we arent doing any statistical analyses to find out if there really was a significant relationship between the variables, but its still interesting to write about what you noticed. In this paragraph, be specific to responding to your hypothesis- did you prove your hypothesis or not?
Also include:
An explanation of your interpretation of the results (why you think your hypothesis was proven or not)
Any third variables that could have influenced your results
Ideas for future research that would make your study stronger (bigger sample size, using a control group, etc).
Tally Sheet: Include a tally sheet to track what you observed
Graph: Include a graph (bar graph or correlation); your graph can be hand-drawn. If you use a correlation graph, it should look like a bunch of dots. See if they form some kind of correlation (you can look at the correlation charts from the lecture as examples).
Reference page: In addition to the 2-3 pages, also include a reference list that includes at least 2 references. This is a separate page at the end of your paper titled: References. Use the American Psychological Association (APA) 6th Edition Formatting (Links to an external site.) (https://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/560/05/ (Links to an external site.)). This previous link includes examples and directions about how to write APA references.
You must format your reference page using APA formatting for the Empirical Article references. This is the format for citing a research article found online:
Author, A. A., & Author, B. B. (Date of publication). Title of article.Title of Journal, volume number(issue number), page range.
Here is an example:
Brownlie, D. A. (2007). Toward effective poster presentations: An annotated bibliography. European Journal of Marketing, 41(2), 1245- 1283.
This is where I found the directions and explanation about how to do an online Journal reference (Links to an external site.) (look under Article from an online periodical with DOI assigned): https://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/560/10/
Dont worry about including the DOI at the end unless you want to do that. Be careful to write the citation exactly as it appears in the examples above (some words are italicized and also note that it is single spaced for one reference, indenting the second line, and you separate the second reference by a space). Check the website I listed for more details.
Instructions about how to look up articles:
You cant use Wikipedia or other popular online blog sites or magazines, or other popular media types. Your articles must be from a legitimate research journal. These can be obtained from the library at Foothill College or through the online Library Database. The easiest way to search for articles is by clicking on “Library” on the menu bar on Canvas. From there, you can enter your information to sign in and click on “databases by subject”, click on “p” and “psychARTICLES”. It will open EBSCO host. Use the search options to look for articles for your subject. You can do a basic search or a more advanced search.
The write-up should be about 2-3 pages long in addition to the tally sheet and graph.
