Research Paper:
The psychology department requires that each student in Psychology 1 complete a paper.
Please follow these instructions carefully when writing your research paper. Points are deducted if you do not follow directions. It goes without saying that you may NOT use a paper you turned in for another class.

You may choose any topic covered in the textbook to write about.  It will be at least 5 complete, typed, double-spaced pages with 1.0” margins (left indented only, not block formatted) in Times New Roman font, 12-point size. Do not skip spaces between paragraphs. The paper can be longer than 5 pages of research. If you choose not to include a cover sheet, then on the first page, I only want your name and the paper title – nothing else should be there – no date, no class name, not my name.

You will write the first page (only) as an autobiographical or biographical statement of why you are specifically interested in your topic. For example, let’s say your father is an alcoholic and you chose alcohol as your research topic. You will write the first page about your experiences with your father as an alcoholic, etc. The next four pages must be a synopsis of the research you read. If you write a conclusion that does not include new research, then this does not count as part of the required four pages of research information. The 6th page will be your reference sheet (bibliography).

This is a research paper so you write it in essay format, without bullet points, lists, or subtitles.  You will not write an abstract either. You need a minimum of 3 references for this paper, which includes books or journal articles and only approved websites. Please do not use your textbook as a reference. Please make sure your references are not older than 1990.

You are not allowed to use websites for the paper unless I approve the site beforehand. A few exceptions to this include: apa.org, NIMH.gov, NIDA.gov, and any website I directed you to in the modules. You can’t use any “.com” because there is no one to govern the truth of many of these sites. This means you can’t even use wikipedia.com or any other “wiki” site! You should include a 6th page that will be a list of all of your references (a bibliography) websites.

When you are using someone else’s work to write your paper, you must give them credit. You must cite your references in every paragraph of your paper; this should be done in either APA format (see www.apastyle.org and the way your textbook is written) or in MLA format.  APA format means you include the author’s last name and the year of publication ONLY of the book or article inside parentheses when you are referencing work they presented. The following is an example of a sentence from a paper on depression:  Many times depression is linked to anxiety (Myers, 2007).