Experiences We Have Planned to Help You Choose Your Proposal Topic

1. Choose your initial broad topic area from a topic discussed in a textbook that interests you, preferably from a class you have alread.

 
2. Use the the library's electronic indexes to ferret out a list of several journal articles (references) that relate to your topic area(s). Through this process, continue to narrow down your topic area and get down to a manageable number of references (i.e. between 15 and 20). You'll need them to complete #3 below. Note: at this point, don't worry about whether or not these journals are in the library.

 
3. Create a reference list (in APA style--use your APA manual!!) of 15 articles.  Most (maybe all) of these will be found in your library searches.  They can be drawn from any library/electronic search that you've done for the course, whatever the topic. It is likely that your list will include articles in journals that our library does not have -- that's O.K.  We aren't asking you to read, or even think much about, these articles; they're simply being used as a typing assignment to help you master APA style.

 
4. Look at your list of references that DO relate to your current topic and note what journals the articles appear in. Make a list of the journal titles and tally how many of your references appear in each journal. You must list all the journals regardless of whether or not they are available in the library. You should, however, indicate whether or not each journal is available in the library by placing a (y)es or (n)o after each journal title on your journal tally. (There is an example of how a tally should look on the Web http://academic.uofs.edu/department/psych/methods/tallyect.htm).

 
5. From step #5, the journal with the highest number of your references in it, hopefully, becomes your target journal, but now you need to be concerned with whether or not the library has it. If our library does not have your target journal, check to see which journals on your tally we do have, and choose the one that has the most of your references in it.

 
6. In the library (or on-line), page through the past one year's worth of issues, not the last calendar year but the last year of that journal which the library owns, of your target journal, and look at the titles of 20 articles. Using the title of each article, make a list of your guesses regarding the topic of that study. These topics do not have to be related to your current proposal topic, the point is to introduce you to other potential topics that you might be interested in. You don't have to record any bibliographic information or give me the title. We just want a list of topics. You can have repeating topics. This list of topics will be linked off of your Research Methods web page.

 
7. Use all of the above information to narrow down your research proposal topic. It would be a good idea to find at least three of the articles from your reference list (Step #3) and read them. Based on what these articles say and everything else you have done in this process you should be able to start thinking about a new and innovative proposal that is a natural extension of the work that professionals in the field have already done.

 
8. Annotated Citation/Reactions: During the first third of the semester each week you will submit an annotated citation to your homepages on the WWW. This is simply a full APA reference followed by a short paragraph over viewing the contents of the article (please submit a copy of the first page of each article to the envelopes on the bulletin board). These will be assessed on a pass/fail basis. No one should fail; this is an easy assignment. We reserve the right, however, to ask you to re-submit an offering if it isn't up to snuff.

 
9. Running Reference Lists should be posted on your Research Methods Page (the date that this list should first appear will be announced in lab).  See the Running Reference List example on the Res Meth Lab Page.  References should be cited in APA style.  These should apply to your current research proposal topic.  Be sure to links to the annotations for any you have posted.