1. Method Section!
RM2
WF07
Townsend

2. 2
Organization of a Research Article
• “APA format” or “APA style”
– Publication Manual of the American
Psychological Association (“APA manual”)
– 5th
Edition (2001)
• hardbound Heiman based on 4th
Edition (1994), so
refer to APA Manual instead
– useful web sites:
www.apastyle.org
www.psychwww.com/resource/apacrib.htm

3. 3
APA Format
• Once you learn APA format, becomes
easier to read (and write) research articles
– cookbook analogy
• Goal of writing style: clear and concise
– not creativity of expression
– assumes a knowledgeable reader
• Goal of content: provide readers the
information necessary to understand,
evaluate, and literally replicate the study

4. 4
Major Sections of a Research
Article
• Introduction
• Method
• Results
• Discussion
• General  Specific  General

5. 5
Components of a Manuscript
– Title page
– Abstract page
– Introduction
– Method
• Participants
• Materials (or Apparatus)
• Procedure
– Results
– Discussion
– References
– Appendixes
– Tables and Figures

6. 6
Method
• describe what you did
– enough detail for reader to understand,
evaluate, and literally replicate study
– operational definitions of variables
• Participants (not “Subjects” since 1994 if
Human)
– important and relevant characteristics
(number, age, gender, ethnicity, SES, etc.)
– how sampled
– how assigned to conditions (if any)

7. Writing the Method Section
• Participants--who, how many, how
recruited
• Procedure--what happened from the
participants’ perspective. If applicable,
include
– Differences between conditions
– Sample items from questionnaire

8. 8
The “Funnel” Approach
beginning
middle
end
general
specific
general
Method

9. 9
Method
• Materials (or “Apparatus”)
– sometimes combined with Procedure
• Procedure
– what you did with participants
– how conditions (if any) differed
– some details (e.g., verbatim instructions) may
go in an Appendix

10. • Describe the population of concern and
sampling procedures.
• Provide a rationale for the method you choose to
study your topic.
• Describe the overall research design including
the number of participants per condition, the
apparatus or materials, procedure for collecting
data.
• Discuss any ethical issues that might be implied
by your procedure.
10
Method

11. • As you have not carried out the
experiment yet, there are some important
differences between your proposal Method
and the Method section of research
article:
• In the Participants section of the proposal
Method, you should give a projected
number of participants and briefly describe
the general method of recruitment, as well
as any criteria to be used to select them
(right-handed, female, etc.) n= 20 11
Method

12. Method
• The main purpose of the Method is to describe the
participants, procedure and materials in such detail that
an investigator working elsewhere could do the study in
basically the same way. It should be written with a sense
of what is and is not important to this aim. For example,
the order of questions on a questionnaire, or the number
of points on a Likert scale, are important because they
can influence responses, but the fact that the
questionnaire is typed up in Microsoft Word and printed
on A4 paper is not (presumably documents prepared in
WordPerfect and presented on A5 would give the same
results).
12

13. 13
References
• every source cited in text should be listed
• only sources cited in text should be listed
• APA format
– APA Manual Chapter 4
– covered in week 2,3 and RM1

14. 14
Internet References
http://www.apastyle.org/elecref.html
– if you retrieve an article electronically, you
should add [Electronic version] to the
reference – see APA Manual, p. 271
• sufficient if looking at PDF of actual printed pages
– but if the format of the article differs from its
printed version (e.g., ProQuest sometimes
translates articles into HTML), include the
date of retrieval and URL – see APA Manual,
p. 272

15. 15
Citations in Text
• refer to studies by the authors’ last names and
the date of publication
“Chase-Lansdale, Cherlin, and Kiernan (1995) found
that roses are red.”
“Roses are red (Chase-Lansdale, Cherlin, & Kiernan,
1995).”
“Chase-Lansdale et al.” in subsequent references
• Not first names, institutions, or titles (of authors
or studies)
– “In a study titled “The long-term effects of parental
divorce on children: A developmental perspective,”
Dr. Lindsay Chase-Lansdale of the University of
Chicago, Dr. Andrew Cherlin of Johns Hopkins
University, and Dr. Kathleen Kiernan of the London
School of Economics found that roses are red.”

16. 16
Citation of a work discussed in a
secondary source
• If you’re reading an article (the secondary
source) and you see a reference to
another article (the primary source) that
you would like to cite
• You should go and get the primary source,
read it, cite it, and include it in your
references list in the normal way

17. 17
Citation of a work discussed in a
secondary source
• But if you really can’t get the primary
source, you can still cite it this way:
– “Smith (1999, as cited in Jones, 2001)”
– the secondary source (Jones – the one you
actually read) goes in your references list; the
primary source (Smith) does not
– see APA Manual p. 247
– real psychology articles almost never do this
• maybe for an unpublished conference presentation

18. 18
Citation of a work discussed in a
secondary source
• You should not cite works discussed in
secondary sources in your research paper
– exception: you can use this format to cite a
commercially available standardized
measurement instrument that would be
expensive for you to obtain, as long as you
really understand what the instrument
measures
– talk to me if you want to cite a secondary
source and aren’t sure whether it’s OK

19. 19
Some General Writing Tips
• Outline before writing
• Tell a story
• Avoid flowery prose
• Be concise
• Don’t overstate your conclusions
• Try reading your paper out loud
• Spell-check!
• Rewrite!

20. 20
Some Specific Writing Tips
• “affect” (as it’s usually used) is a verb
meaning “to influence”
• “effect” (as it’s usually used) is a noun
meaning “causal consequence”
– “if X affects Y, then X has an effect on Y”
– “the effects of X on Y”
• Some people find this mnemonic helpful:
affect  alter
effect  end result

21. 21
Some Specific Writing Tips
• “data” are plural (singular: “datum”)
– “these data show…”
• “a, b, and c” – comma after “b”
– also “a, b, or c”

22. 22
Some Specific Writing Tips
• one-inch margins (1.25 inches left & right
is OK)
• align text left – don’t justify right margin
(leave ragged)
• 12 point font
• double-space everything
• number your pages!
– see APA Manual, p. 288

23. 23
Problem 1.
Difficulty getting started.
• Solutions:
– If you think getting started is scary work out
how much time you have and how much you
still have to do – that is scarier….
– Don’t allow yourself to become paralysed –
doing ANYTHING is better than doing nothing.
– Allow your first attempt to be pretty ropey!

24. 24
Problem 2.
Feelings of being swamped.
• Solutions
– Separate the project into smaller chunks
– Do one bit at a time
– Provide milestones and rewards
– Work out what you have still to do.
– Make a realistic plan of how long it will take to
achieve it.
– Try to set aside whole days to work on Paper
rather than an hour here or there.

25. 25
Problem 3.
Not providing sufficiently clear argument in your
Paper
• Solutions
– Use your ‘theory of mind’
• Other people do not know your paper already
• You need to be explicit about your arguments
– Take your time to write the key parts of
your Paper.
– Ask peers to read it and comment
• If they don’t understand it you are not being
clear enough.
– Keep checking your abstract/story.

26. 26
Problem 4.
Fear of having your work criticised
• Solutions
– Being criticised is a key feature of academic
life
• Essential to improve your writing skills and inform
your research ideas
– Develop a thick skin now!
– Find a way to fight perfectionism.
• Psychology is messy.
– Think about criticisms objectively and find
ways to fight them or incorporate them into
your report.

27. 27
Problem 5.
I don’t have any data yet!
• Solutions
– Introduction and method should be the same
anyway
– Describe your analysis strategy and how you
intend to interpret the results

28. 28
Example Manuscripts
• See examples in:
– APA Manual, pp. 306-320
– Heiman pg. 403
– Handouts from week 2 Tuesday