opinion papers are designed to allow you to coherently present an
informed opinion, argument, critique, or perspective about some personality-related topic. Your
paper should be in the 800-1000 word range.
So, what does an informed opinion/argument/perspective mean here? Basically, it just means
that it should be grounded within reality in some way or another. So to that end, Id like you to
research and cite at least one scientific source in your paper. Academic journals and edited
academic volumes are usually your best bet, and well spend some class time on research
strategies. Youre free to cite the textbook, but it wont count as your one scientific source.
Dont cite Wikipedia, popular press books, or other popular media as your primary scientific
source.
These papers wont be graded like essays. A coherent paper that makes a clear, informed
argument or observation about a class-relevant issue will likely get full marks. We wont be
evaluating the papers based upon how correct your argument is likely to be. Common issues
that will cause papers to lose points include (but are not limited to) the following:
– failure to communicate what the opinion/argument actually is (i.e. what the point of the
paper actually is)
– lack of clarity/coherence of opinion
– excessive typos
– confusing grammar/style/structure
– paper being too short
– simply reviewing a topic or paper (as opposed to giving your thoughts on a topic).
Ill emphasize that last point again: do NOT simply review an existing paper or an existing area
of researchto do so misses the point of the assignment. Its fine to provide a quick overview of
the material youll be opining about at the outset of the paper in order to make sure your readers
are on the same page as you. But you dont have a whole lot of words to work with, so get the
intro stuff out of the way quickly and get down to work providing your contribution.
Make sure that you cite your references both in-text and in a references section at the end of the
paper (this doesnt count against the word count). It will be easiest for both you and me if you
use APA formatting, but we wont be grading your formatting per se