Does teaching yoga to older adults improve their overall health?
write short research report. Using the skills you have learned from class you should
identify an effective method for answering the research question (e.g., an
experiment, a survey, a content analysis). You should then describe the specific fashion in which
you would design a study to answer the research question, including conceptual and
operationaldefinitions ofthe variables, the subject population, the procedures you would follow, and the
statistical test you would use. Keep the paper focused on the specific question do not get
distracted by related issues that are not specifically apart of the assigned question (e.g., whether
there are gender differences when the research question does not specifically mention them).The paper should be arranged in the following fashion with the headings specified (i.e., method,
sampling, key variables, analysis):
Section 1:
METHOD
: Explain which method yo
u would use to examine the question (e.g.,
experiment, survey, content analysis), and why that method is most appropriate for the
specific question. Your explanation should specify the advantages of using the method you
choose over others, and/or specific
constraints
(e.g., feasibility)
that force you to use one
method instead of another. Consider the ethical implications of your research. Acknowledge
any limitations. Max: 300 words.
Section 2:
SAMPLING
: Explain who or what will be examined
–
people (Who?
Where from?
How many? How selected?), or other items like organizational units
(e.g., groups)
, newspaper
articles, magazine advertisements, and so on (How many? How selected? Where from?).
Define the population of interest (e.g., all people in the United
States
of a specific age
, all
newspaper articles from the last 50 years), and the specific sample (e.g., a convenience
sample of University of Arizona undergraduates). Explain why the sample is appropriate
(e.g., is it representative of
the population to w
hich you want to generalize
?), and what
constraints make it less than perfect. Acknowledge limitations in the sample. Max: 200
words.
Section 3:
KEY VARIABLES
: Say explicitly which variables are being examined
—
each
student’s research question contains two
variables so you must describe both in this section.
Provide
conceptual
and
operational
definitions of each
(and you can find these explained in
Chapters 3 and 4 in your text)
. These definitions should
be clear and explicit.
Providing
materials like an ex
act replica of questionnaire items or experim
ental stimuli will be rewarded
(e.g.,
describe the specifics of experimental stimuli, and so on, if applicable
)
. You are
encouraged to do some research to find out if others have already measured your variable,
and you may use an existing measure in your paper if it fits your research question and
hypothesis. Materials like questionnaire items are
additional
to this word limit and should be
included as an Appendix (labeled and referred to in your narrative, e.g.
, “See Appendix A”).
Your goal is to help the reader understand exactly how you generate NUMBERS in order to
do the statistical analysis. Max: 400 words.
Section 4:
ANALYSIS
:
Describe
which statistical test(s) would be used, and provide example
data (e.g.
, means, correlations, a graph, a table, etc.) that reflect your
expectation
of what you
would find
assuming
you
reject the null hypothesis
. It is not necessary to show complete
calculations with fake raw data
—
the goal here is to demonstrate your understan
ding of what
the data would look like, how they would be analyzed, and what the analysis might show. For
example, if your hypothesis
were
“Communication undergraduates have higher intelligence
than the general population,” you would provide two means (with
a higher mean for the
undergrads), confidence interval, standard error, and so on. Again, you do not need to supply
fake raw data (i.e., scores for each fictional person in your study).
Max 200 words (plus
possibly graphs/tables of numbers).
TO REITERA
TE: YOU WILL NOT COLLECT
ACTUAL DATA FOR THIS PAPER!
Formatting Instructions:
The paper should be typed, double
–
spaced with 1” margins all around.
Standard grammar, spelling, and presentation expectations apply. The maximum number of
words is a MAXIMUM.
You can check this easily with the “word count” feature (under “tools”
in the file menu) in MS
–
Word. Other applications have similar tools. We’ll use it to check so you
should use it to! (By the way, you may be able to achieve a top grade using significa
ntly fewer
words.) Should you provide citations in your paper, you must use APA format. There are many
“crib sheets” online th
at you may use as guides
(e.g.,
“
http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/560/01/
”).
Failure to follow these instructions
will
significantly worsen your grade.
The paper is due on Friday,
April
26
th
, 2013
by 4
pm
.
How You Will Receive Your Topic:
I will send your topic via email to your university account.
If you’ve never used it, now is a good time to start. Go to
UITS
’s we
bsite
(
http://uits.arizona.edu/
) for more information.
How to Submit Your Paper
: Papers are to be uploaded to our D2L site. Instructions for doing
so are as follows:
•
Your paper needs to be in one of the following
formats: MS
–
Word (*.DOC or *
.DOCX),
or Open Document Text
(
*.O
DT), which is the default for both OpenOffice
, LibreOffice
and NeoOffice (the Mac port of OpenOffice). You don’t have to use these word
processors; you need, however, to use one that will save
in one of the acceptable formats
(e.g., OpenOffice
, Pages,
and Google Docs will allow one to save files in MS
–
Word
format). Please do not, however, upload a PDF version of your document because we
cannot edit it.
•
Save the document with your first initial a
nd last name (e.g., if I were handing in a paper
it would be “jbonito.doc” or “jbonito.odt”).
•
Click on “dropbox” then upload your paper to the folder named “Paper 2.”
Follow the
instructions on the screen.
•
Make sure the document is in your dropbox! If it
is, you should see the document name
in the D2L dropbox itself. If the upload was not successful then repeat the process, and if
it still doesn’t work contact the D2L help staff. We will not accept late papers for any
reason, including the failure to mak
e sure the upload was successful.
•
Check to make sure you’ve uploaded the correct paper! If you mistakenly upload a paper
from another class, (e.g., your Spanish 101 homework
—
it has happened!
), then we will
grade that paper, which will likely earn a 0 for
Comm 228 (even if your Spanish syntax
and grammar are perfect…).
•
Please, make backups of your paper frequently!
We
will not accept late papers under any
circumstances, so make sure you practice safe computing. If you need advice on how to
backup your
fi
les
, contact
UITS
at 621
–
HELP.
Or go to Dropbox.com or use iCloud or…
