The last five are the articles that have to be summarized and the first one is the full instructions on the paper with exact details on how it is to be done.

Running head: PAPER I: STUDY ONE LITERATURE REVIEW INSTRUCTIONS 0

Instructions for Paper I: Study One Literature Review Instructions (Worth 25 Points)

Firstname Lastname

Florida International University

Purpose of Paper I: Study One Literature Review

1). Psychological Purpose

This paper serves several purposes, the first of which is helping you gain insight into research papers in psychology. As this may be your first time reading and writing papers in psychology, one goal of Paper I is to give you insight into what goes into such papers. This study one-lit review will help you a). better understand the psychology topic chosen for the course this semester (belief perseverance), b). learn about the various sections of an empirical research report by reading five peer-reviewed articles (that is, articles that have a Title Page, Abstract, Literature Review, Methods Section, Results Section, and References Page), and c). use information gathered from research articles in psychology to help support your hypotheses for your first study this semester (belief perseverance). Of course, you’ll be doing a study two literature review later in the semester, so think of this Paper I as the first part of your semester long paper. I recommend looking at the example Paper V, actually, to see what your final paper will look like. It might give you a better idea about how this current paper (as well as Papers II, III, and IV) all fit together into your final paper of the semester.

In this current paper (Paper I), you will read five research articles, summarize what the authors did and what they found, and use those summaries to support your belief perseverance hypothesis. IMPORTANT: Yes you need five references, but keep in mind that you can spend a lot of time summarizing a few of them and just a sentence or two summarizing others. Thus spend more time on the more relevant summaries!

For this paper, start your paper broadly and then narrow your focus (think about the hourglass example provided in the lecture). My suggestion is to give a brief overview of your paper topic in your opening paragraph, hinting at the research variables you plan to look at for study one. Your next paragraphs will review prior research (those five references required for this paper). Make sure to draw connections between these papers, using smooth transitions between paragraphs. Your final paragraphs should use the research you just summarized to support your research hypothesis. In other words, this first paper will look like the literature reviews for the five research articles you are summarizing for this assignment. Use those articles as examples! See what they did and mimic their style! Here, though, you will end the paper after providing your hypothesis. In Paper II, you will pick the topic up again, but in that future paper you will talk about your own study methods and results.

2). APA Formatting Purpose

The second purpose of Paper I: Study One Literature Review is to teach you proper American Psychological Association (APA) formatting. In the instructions below, I tell you how to format your paper using APA style. There are a lot of very specific requirements in APA papers, so pay attention to the instructions below as well as Chapter 14 in your textbook!

3). Writing Purpose

Finally, this paper is intended to help you grow as a writer. Few psychology classes give you the chance to write papers and receive feedback on your work. This class will! We will give you extensive feedback on your first few paper in terms of content, spelling, and grammar. You will even be able to revise aspects of Paper I and include them in future papers (most notably Papers III and V). My hope is that you craft a paper that could be submitted to an empirical journal. Thus readers may be familiar with APA style but not your specific topic. Your job is to educate them on the topic and make sure they understand how your study design advances the field of psychology.

NOTE: There is a 30% maximum plagiarism limit on this paper

Instructions for Paper I: Study One Literature Review (Worth 25 Points)

Students: Below are lengthy instructions on how to write your study one literature review. There is also a checklist at the end of this document, which I recommend you print out and “check off” before submitting your final paper (we are sticklers for APA format, so make sure it is correct!)

1. Title Page: I expect the following format. (5 Points)

   1. You must have a header and page numbers on each page.

      1. If you don’t know how to insert headers, ask your TA or watch this very helpful video! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9pbUoNa5tyY.

      2. The header goes at the top of the paper and it is left justified.

         1. Use “Insert Headers” or click on the top of the page to open the header. Make sure to select the “Different first page” option so that your title page header will differ from subsequent pages

         2. The R in Running head is capitalized but the “h” is lower case, followed by a colon and a short title (in ALL CAPS). This short running head title can be the same one as the rest of your paper or it can differ – the choice is yours, but it should be no more than 50 characters including spaces and punctuation

         3. Insert a page number as well. The header is flush left, but the page number is flush right.

      3. Want an example header? Look at the title page of these instructions! You can use other titles depending on your own preferences (e.g. BELIEF PERSEVERANCE; SOCIAL COGNITION; BELIEF BIASES; etc.). Running head could be the short version of your paper title, or the entire paper title—just to make sure that less than 50 words including space.

   2. Do not use “Paper I”, “PSY Research Methods paper assignment”, “Literature Review”, etc., as your paper title. Your paper is an APA format paper, just like other published article in empirical journal! You need a real paper title, a title that tells readers what you are conducting, a title that reveals relationship between your variables. Think about it yourself.

   3. Your name (First Last) and the name of your institution (Florida International University) beneath the title. For this class, only your own name will go on this paper. Double space everything!

      1. Again, see my “Title” page above as an example

      2. You can also refer to Chapter 14 in your textbook

   4. The recommended length for a title is no more than 12 words.

   5. This Title Page is the first page of your paper

2. Literature Review Section (12 points)

   1. First page of your literature review (Page 2)

      1. Proper header with page numbers. Your running head title will appear in the header of your page WITHOUT the phrase “Running head”. To insert this header, use the headers program.

      2. The heading of literature review should be on the first line of page two, centered. It is IDENTICAL to the title on your title page. Just copy and paste it!

      3. The beginning text for your paper follows on the next line

   2. Citations for the literature review

      1. Your paper must cite a minimum of five (5) empirical research articles that are based on studies conducted in psychology.

         1. For this first paper, you MUST use at least three of the five articles provided in the blackboard folder. You can use four if you like, but you must use three at minimum – however, you cannot use all five. For that fifth article, you must find it using PsycInfo. There are some other conditions for this fifth article that you must follow:

            1. First, remember that the fifth article cannot be any of the five found in the blackboard folder.

            2. Second, for your fifth article, it can be based on a wide variety of topics, including general belief perseverance, priming, bio- or neuro-psychology, social cognition, confirmation bias, etc. Trust me, there are TONS of topics that can help you in your paper. Just choose one that will help you support your experimental hypothesis for your belief perseverance study. That is, it has to help you justify your study one hypothesis (all students are using this same hypothesis, so make sure to read it. You can find it in the researcher instructions along with the questionnaires you are giving to participants. I actually suggest copying and pasting that hypothesis into this first paper at the end).

            3. Finally, you can have more than five references if you want, but you must have a minimum of five references.

      2. Proper citations must be made in the paper – give credit where credit is due, and don’t make claims that cannot be validated.

      3. If you use a direct quote, make sure to provide a page number for where you found that quote in the citations. Do not directly quote too often, though. You can have no more than two direct quotes in the whole paper (though no quotes would be even better). Instead, I would like you to paraphrase when possible.

      4. You need to cite for every sentence that you summarized from literature review.

      5. Citations in text only includes Authors’ last names and year. For detailed in-text citation format, please refer to the lab lecture.

      6. For citations with 3-5 authors, list all authors’ last names at the first citation, then use “First author’s last name, et al.” for the following citation; For citation with 6 or more than 6 authors, use “First author’s last name, et al.” from the first citation.

   3. Requirements for the information in your literature review

      1. Your study one literature review should use background information about belief perseverance and a brief overview as a starting paragraph, narrowing down the main theme of your specific project – think about the hourglass example I gave in class. Pay attention: avoid using your daily life stories or anecdotal events as the background.

      2. The last part of your literature review should narrow down your focus onto your own study, eventually ending in your study hypothesis. However, DO NOT go into specific details about your methods. You talk about your specific methods in Paper II in a few weeks.

      3. Again, to make it clear, at the end of your paper you will provide your specific predictions/hypotheses.

   4. The literature review must have minimum of two (2) full pages NOT INCLLUDING THE HYPOTHESES. It has a maximum of five (5) pages (thus, with the title page and references page, the paper should be between 4.5 and 7 pages). If it is only two pages and a half pages (again, including the hypotheses), it better be really, really good. I don’t think I could do this paper justice in fewer than three full pages, so if yours isn’t at least three pages I doubt it will get a good grade.

3. References (6 points)

   1. The References section starts on its own page, with the word References centered. Use proper APA format in this section or you will lose points.

   2. All five references that you cited in the literature review must be in this section (there should be more than five references here if you cited more than five articles, which is fine in this paper). However, at least three must come from the article folder on blackboard while the remaining two can come from either the last blackboard paper or two new ones from PsychInfo. Only peer-reviewed articles are allowed here (no books, journals, websites, or other secondary resources are allowed for paper one).

   3. For references, make sure you:

      1. use alphabetical ordering (start with the last name of the first author)

      2. use the authors’ last names but only the initials of their first/middle name

      3. give the date in parentheses – e.g. (2007).

      4. italicize the name of the journal article

      5. give the volume number, also in italics

      6. give the issue number if has one, not italicized

      7. give the page numbers (not italicized) for articles

      8. provide the doi (digital object identifier) if present (not italicized)

      9. use hanging indent for each references

      10. only references cited in text can appear in the References section. DO NOT include any references that are not cited.

      11. For paper title, only capitalize the first letter of the first word. If there is a colon in the paper title, the first letter of the first word after colon is also capitalized.

4. Writing Quality (2 Points)

   1. This includes proper grammar and spelling. This paper should be uploaded through the Pearson Writer program prior to being uploaded on Blackboard.

5. Between the title page, literature review, and reference page, I expect a minimum of 4 pages and a maximum of 7 pages for this assignment. But like I said, the shorter the paper the less likely it is to get a good grade, so aim for 5 pages minimum.

The above information is required for your paper, but I wanted to provide a few tips about writing your literature review as well. Students often struggle with the first paper, but hopefully this will give you some good directions:

• First, remember that you need 5 references, all of which MUST be peer-reviewed (three coming from the blackboard folder and one or two that you find on your own using PsycInfo).

• Second, I don't expect a lengthy discussion for each and every article that you cite. You might spend a page talking about Article A and a sentence or two on Article B. The amount of time you spend describing an article you read should be proportional to how important it is in helping you defend your hypotheses. See if there is a prior study that looks a lot like yours (hint – there is at least one, which I based this study on, but you’ll have to find it on your own!). I would expect you to spend more time discussing that prior research since it is hugely relevant to your own study. If an article you read simply supports a global idea that ties into your study but has very different methods (like "frustrated people get mad!"), you can easily mention it in a sentence or two without delving into a lot of detail. Tell a good story in your literature review, but only go into detail about plot elements that have a direct bearing on your study!

• Third, avoid using daily-life or casual wording, e.g., I, you, we, me, I don’t think, I feel like, something like, you know,,,,, etc. Also avoid too long sentences or vague express. In APA format empirical article, we need clear, professional, and unbiased wording. Compare the following two paragraphs: (Obviously, the first paragraph is way much better than the second paragraph, right? The second paragraph is too casual, unprofessional, too long, wording awkward, biased, and confused.

1. 1. 1. “In 2000, Smith and Freedy examined the role of resource loss after Midwest flooding exposure, using COR stress theory. Their results suggested two significant relationships: the relationship between flood exposure and resource loss and the relationship between resource loss and psychological distress symptoms. They concluded that psychosocial resource loss appeared to be important even in an event in which financial and material losses were highlighted.”

1. 1. 1. “I found there is a very interesting article written by Smith and Freedy (2002). They really cared about the role of resource loss after Midwest flooding exposure, using COR stress theory, suggesting two very important relationships, which are the relationship between flood exposure and resource loss and the relationship between resource loss and psychological distress symptoms, therefore I think their conclusion is that psychosocial resource loss appeared to be important even in an event in which financial and material loss were marked, which I feel like it is meaningful.”

• Last, this paper is all about supporting your hypotheses. Know what your hypotheses are before you write the paper, as it will help you determine how much time to spend on each article you are citing. My suggestion is to spend some time describing how prior information affects people, and then talking about studies that looked at this area. Use those studies to help defend your own study hypothesis. That is, “Since they found X in this prior study, that helps support the hypothesis in the present study”. Do you remember your hypothesis? Okay, I’ll be really helpful here. BELOW is your hypothesis. In your paper, support it! Just remember that the rest of your paper needs to be at least two pages NOT INCLUDING the hypothesis below. In other words, including the hypotheses below, your actual text for your paper should be at least two and a half pages!

• “Based on previous research on belief perseverance, the purpose of this study was to examine whether belief perseverance will lead participants to believe the findings of prior discredited research will still apply to a future research study. The following hypotheses are addressed: If told a prior study found a threatened child ranked a forbidden toy lower than a non-threatened child, participant will think that result will persist in a future study with a threatened child finding the toy less attractive compared to a non-threatened child. Alternatively, if told a prior study found a threatened child ranked a forbidden toy higher than a non-threatened child, participant will similarly think that result will persist in a future study with a threatened child finding the toy more attractive compared to a non-threatened child. Those told the prior study didn’t find a difference between threatened and non-threatened children will similarly think that lack of difference will persist in a future study. Similar findings will emerge when the study is replicated in Tampa, Florida.”

• Finally, make sure to proofread, proofread, proofread! Use the Pearson Writer for help, but note that their suggestions are just that – suggestions. It is up to you to make sure the flow of the paper is easy to understand. Good luck!

Checklist – Paper One: Study One Literature Review

Use the check sheet below to make sure your paper is the best it can be! Make sure you answer “Yes” to all questions before submitting your paper or you will lose points!