Observations about psychology
For your final paper, you will enact the ideas from your proposal to create a paper with a minimum of four full pages of text, plus a title page and references. A full page means that every line of the page has your writing on it. As stated on the syllabus, the paper is to be in Arial 12 pt. font, double-spaced with one inch margins on all sides and citations and references should be in ASA format. You must use the two peer-reviewed journal articles you previously submitted, plus the textbook, as references. If, as you write the paper, you realize you need to change one of your article sources, then you’ll need to upload the PDF of the new article for review. Make sure you are equally integrating your other sources and not just summarizing the text. Remember, you are writing this paper as an academic exercise! You need to fully explain ideas, put quotation marks around quotes and cite your sources appropriately. Write the paper as though you were explaining the ideas to someone who had never taken a sociology class and had never read the textbook. Adopt a formal, academic writing style. For example, you should not use contractions or other informal elements. In academic writing, it is important to be as objective as possible. It is fine to say, “In this paper, I will…” or “I saw…,” but each assertion you make should be backed up by the research you found that supports it. Remember, this paper is an application of academic literature to your observations of behaviors, not an opinion piece. Your paper should have three distinct parts: an introduction, a body and a conclusion. In your introduction, you tell your reader what topics they will read about in the paper. In the body, you discuss each of those topics. In the conclusion, you summarize those topics. As the saying goes “Tell me what you’re going to tell me, tell me, and then tell me what you told me.” To help structure your paper, ask yourself these questions: “What is the purpose of this paper?” “What information do I need my reader to understand about my topic?” Each of your sources should build into this overall purpose and you should move logically from one point to the next. Read Chapters 7 & 9 in the recommended text, if you chose to access it.
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