As you study human life-span development, you will learn about all the factors that affect people throughout their life. These factors include physical, social, and environmental influences. While we

As you study human life-span development, you will learn about all the factors that affect people throughout their life. These factors include physical, social, and environmental influences. While we understand how many of these factors affect a developing child and continue their influence into adulthood, our knowledge is still developing. The same factors may affect two different people in very different ways, and many variables come into play. Research also gives us new insights; for example, as we learn more about genetics, we get more answers on the nature versus nurture debate. The final project is meant for you to propose a hypothetical study. You are not and should not be conducting human subjects research for this project. It is not necessary for the purposes of this assignment. All human subjects research requires written approval from the SNHU COCE Institutional Review Board in order to protect the welfare and ensure ethical treatment of the subjects. For the final project, you will prepare a research investigation, which includes a literature review and a proposed research design. You will examine research on one of two topics presented in the first three modules of this course (see further information in the prompt below) for how developmental psychology has changed, and you will investigate a potential gap in the research that has not been addressed by the provided articles. This assessment will allow you to foster and improve your skills at reading, interpreting, and writing psychological works. It will also help you to learn your place within the field and how to combine both your personal perspective and opinions with established, empirical research to make original claims. This project is divided into three milestones, which will be submitted at various points throughout the course to scaffold learning and ensure quality final submissions. These milestones will be submitted in Modules Three, Five, and Six. The final product will be submitted in Module Eight. In this assignment, you will demonstrate your mastery of the following course outcomes: • Describe foundational research regarding the human life span by examining the historical evolution of the field of developmental psychology • Determine appropriate research designs used in developmental psychology for application in the study of aspects of the human life span • Examine issues of ethics in foundational research in developmental psychology for informing appropriate conclusions • Interpret claims made by foundational research in developmental psychology for conveying appropriate conclusions that are supported by peer reviewed evidence • Develop basic research questions supported by peer-reviewed evidence by identifying gaps in the research of developmental psychology

Prompt For your final project, you will conduct an investigation of the foundational research in developmental psychology using the provided Literature Worksheet and Research Design Worksheet. You will choose one of two tracks of provided articles to conduct your literature review and develop your research design. You will analyze the research presented in the course for how knowledge around the human life span has changed over time, as well as how researchers have approached the study of the human life span. You will also consider the issues of ethics that are or are not addressed in the research. Following your review of the research, you will identify a gap and develop a research question designed to further explore that gap. This will include how the research supports your research question and how you would approach addressing your research question.