Your abstract should be a brief, comprehensive summary of your paper. It should concisely describe the following: the research problem, the participants, the procedure, the major finding, and the conclusions and implications, all in less than 250 words. The abstract is on its own page, following the title page.
INTRODUCTION (35 points)
Move from the general to the specific.
What is the major issue being investigated? Why is the problem interesting?
What is the theoretical background for your study? That is, what has previous research about this topic shown, and what possible explanations can be found in the literature that might help you predict what the outcome will be? Make sure the articles you cite are relevant to the study at hand and that you explain explicitly how they are linked to your study.
What are the limitations of the previous work (that make further work necessary)?
What knowledge can be gained from the current work?
What is the major question (restated)?
How (broadly stated) will this knowledge be gained? (overview of how you’ll address the research questions – not details)
What are the specific hypotheses being tested?
Should be between 5 and 8 pages
METHOD (15 points)
Participants.
What would the ideal participants look like? Explain both the demographic information (total number of participants, age range and mean age, gender breakdown, other relevant descriptions of your sample) and the method of selection (how were participants selected, how were they assigned to conditions if there were multiple conditions, etc.)
Apparatus/ Materials.
Describe any apparatus or materials that would be used.
How would they be constructed? How would they be used in the experiment?
Samples of stimuli (or questionnaire items) should be included. These examples may be presented in a table, if appropriate. Complete lists of stimuli (or complete forms of questionnaires) should be included in an Appendix.
Procedure.
Summarize each step in the data gathering procedure. Be sure to include:
Complete instructions to participants (verbatim or paraphrased)
Formation of experimental groups
Specific experimental manipulations
Any control features of the design: randomization, counterbalancing
RESULTS (10 points)
Set the stage.
How would the raw data be converted for analyses (e.g., scores, proportions, etc.)? If there would be coding, explain the coding scheme.
Present the findings as if you were telling a story.
State the hypothesis or question in conceptual terms: “We ask, first, whether the men or the women are more emotionally expressive.”
State the hypothesis or question in operational terms: “Do the men produce more tears during the showing of the film than the women?”
Give the answer: “As Table 1 reveals, men do, in fact, cry more profusely than women.”
Support the answer with direction and/or degree: “The men in all four conditions produced significantly more tears than the women.”
Elaborate or qualify the overall conclusion, if appropriate. “Only in the Father-watching condition did the men fail to produce more tears than the women”
Summarize where things stand: “Thus, except for the Father-watching condition, which will be discussed below, the hypothesis that men cry more than women in response to visually depicted grief appears to receive strong support.”
Lead into the next section with a transition sentence: “Men may thus be more expressive than women in the domain of negative emotion, but are they more expressive in the domain of positive emotion? Table 2 shows that they are not. . .”
Figures.
Include at least one figures. Use a figure when findings cannot be simply stated in one or two numbers.
Label both the independent and dependent measures clearly and completely on the axes.
Include a caption to explain in a sentence or phrase what is depicted in the figure.
In the text, refer to the table or figure at the appropriate point, and guide the reader through the figure: “As shown in Figure 1, men produce more tears than women . . .”
DISCUSSION (25 points)
Move from the specific to the general.
How would your results support your hypotheses? Open with a clear statement of support or non-support.
Recap but don’t repeat your results
What inferences or implications can be drawn from the findings?
Theoretical implications and significance?
Practical implications and significance?
Don’t just restate the findings – think critically about the findings and draw your own conclusions about what they tell us about how people behave in specific situations
How do your results relate to those of other investigators?
What are the shortcomings of your study? What threatens the validity of your conclusions?
What questions remain unanswered? What are some future directions for research on this topic?
Why does your study make an important contribution?
