Research Methods 2007

Purpose: This lab will compliment the lecture portion of the course by giving you direct exposure to the research process from the gleam in an investigator's eye (or thereabouts) to the submission of the finished project. The lab will encompass a range of research strategies and related computer applications. A cornerstone activity will be the use of SPSS for Windows to bring the statistical skills you acquired in Statistics for the Behavioral Sciences to bear on research questions from a variety of laboratory projects.

Guided by editorial feedback, you will write several brief APA style papers regarding these research activities. You will also formulate an independent research proposal and present it in a "Poster Fest" at the end of the semester. An exciting feature of this lab is our ability to access and post materials on the Worldwide Web. Throughout the semester, we will use the Web for a variety of purposes, culminating in our "virtual" poster-fest that can be viewed by peers around the world. Visit last year's at: Cyberfest 2006l.

Grading: One third of your lab grade will be based upon the execution of assignments pertaining to the independent research proposal (see below). The remaining 67 percent of the lab grade will be based upon the remaining lab assignments (see below).

Lab Deadlines: Late submissions for any graded assignment will be penalized at a rate of .33 per school day on the final grade for that assignment. Late submissions for most ungraded assignments (for exceptions, see the following) will be penalized at a rate of .2 per school day on the final grade for the most closely related graded lab assignment. Failure to meet a deadline either for completing a research project or for submitting research data for analysis by the class will result in the lowering of the overall lab grade by .3 per school day. The latter penalty is necessary because such delays disrupt data analysis for all 30+ people in the lab; your colleagues are counting on you. Finally, failure to complete any lab assignment will result in an earned grade of 0.0 on that assignment and a 1.0 grade reduction for the overall lab course.

Papers: Your grades on some papers will depend upon an editorial process by which you will be given feedback and allowed to revise your submissions.

Adherence to the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association is required for all papers. Each of your submissions will be evaluated for APA style. If a submission is obviously not in accordance with APA style, we will refuse to grade your submission and it will be returned to you with no feedback, having earned a grade of 0.0. If your revision fails to follow APA standards, it will receive a grade of 0.0 as well.

Hypothesis Tests: There will be six hypothesis test assignments, in which you will develop an hypothesis (for a particular data set) and then carry out the statistical procedures to test that hypothesis. Revisions will be allowed on the first three hypothesis tests. For these three, the grade on your first submission will count for 25, 50, or 75 percent, respectively, of the final grade for each hypothesis test.

Grading: Grades will be assigned on a 0.0 to 4.67 scale. At the end of the semester these numbers will be weighted according to the following table and a lab average calculated. Your letter grade in the course will be a direct conversion of this average into the school's system for calculating the grade point average. (For example, a weighted average of 3.1 will receive a grade of B in the course--the "B" range extends from 3.0 to 3.32)

LAB ATTENDANCE: You are responsible for all announcements made in lab and for having all lab assignments done on time. Remember, you (or someone dear to your heart) paid a bunch of money so you could take this class. I feel no need to impose additional contingencies for missed labs.

DISCUSSION BOARD: When you have questions or comments about the course, please use the course Discussion Board in BlackBoard. Here we can quickly share ideas, make corrections, and, hopefully, build a sense of community. I'll also regularly use this board to give you updates about lab assignments. Consequently, keeping up with the lab will require that you access this board every few days. Except during vacations, you shouldn't allow more than 3 days to elapse between board checks. The system records all of your accesses, so I'll be able to check on BlackBoard use. For each day beyond 3 school days between accesses, you will receive a late penalty for an ungraded assignment - see above.

TA MENTOR GROUPS: We have a TA mentoring process to facilitate the development of your individual research proposals. You will be expected to attend TA-facilitated discussion groups that will meet for approximately one hour, every other week for the first six weeks of lab. These groups are for your benefit, allowing for guided discussion of individual projects with your peers and mentor.