Reference no: EM132477075

PSY4910: Introduction to the Capstone Project

Select a topic of your choice

A significant part of the Senior Seminar course is the Capstone Project. The Capstone Project involves writing a proposal. Your final proposal draft is worth 270 of 1000 points in the course, or about ¼ of your total grade. Refer to the Module 7 Final Capstone Grading Rubric at the end of the document for details. Each week in Modules 1-6, you will complete a Capstone Milestone to prepare for final submission in Module 7. In Module 8, you will create a PowerPoint presentation to summarize your proposal.

The Capstone Project will assess your understanding, synthesis, and mastery of the course and overall outcomes of the Baker College Psychology Program. For your Capstone Project, you will develop and create a proposal. You will choose between two roles in psychology: researcher or consultant. You will not do both projects or blend the two projects in any way. This project is a proposalonly. Under no circumstances are students to actually conduct research or any type of pilot study.

In Module 1, you will write an essay comparing and contrasting the Researcher Role to the Consultant Role in psychology. You will then be ready to make an informed decision as to which type of proposal you plan to work on for the remainder of Senior Seminar.

Option 1: Researcher Proposal

As studied in Research Methods I and II, you may opt to assume the role of a research psychologist. In the researcher role, you will propose a research study to address an area of interest to you in psychology. You are not provided with a predetermined list of topics. In Senior Seminar, you are ready to select your own topic to explore. Select a topic that needs further study for increased understanding, presents research that could solve a problem, or follows up on published results addressing questions raised in a peer-reviewed journal article. It is common for researchers to include recommendations for further research at the end of their research articles. Looking at published research in your areas of interest will likely give you good ideas for your topic and research question.

OR
Option 2: Consultant Proposal

The other option for your Capstone Project is to assume the role of a consulting psychologist. In the consultant role, your proposal will generatea specific application of psychology in a particular setting. You are not provided with a predetermined list of topics. In Senior Seminar, you are ready to select your own topic to explore. For example, you may propose a program, a training series, a clinical intervention, or a community-based service. In this case, your problem is actually called a ‘Need.' Where the research proposal is a road map for research to be conducted, the consultant proposal specifies a need and then proposes a solution that is supported by empirical evidence in psychology.

PSY4910: Researcher Capstone Project Module

How does a researcher select a topic? How does a researcher refine and focus the topic? Students often have a general idea for a topic because it is driven by their interests in an area of specialization. Often,students select a topic that is quite broad and needs to be refined and focused. Rarely, the topic is too narrow in scope and must be broadened. Unlike your previous Research Methods courses, you are not provided with a pre-approved list of topics (although they may serve as a source of inspiration). You are required in Senior Seminar to generate your own topic, which reflects your growth as an independent researcher.

Your PSY4910 instructor will work with you to ensure that your topic is sufficiently narrow and appropriate for psychological investigation. The more clarity and focus you have with your topic, the easier it will be to write a clear research questionto focus your literature review.

There are various methods for identifying an appropriate topic including mind mapping and reviewing the scholarly literature. Mind-mapping is a great way to help with both topic selection and then to help you in focusing the topic. Mind-mapping is a way to get your ideas flowing and to provide you with graphic prompts so that you can see the connections and relationships among your ideas. It is brainstorming for individuals.Here is a very good site with much information on mind mapping, including the background and theory behind it

Keep in mind that you do not have to generate a research topic from scratch. You should, at this initial stage of your proposal, be somewhat familiar with scholarly articles in your topic of interest. You may have a favorite research article or two that inspires your own proposal. If not, spending some time generally perusing scholarly articles in your topic area can spark ideas on a research topic.

To complete Milestone 1:
1) State that you have opted for the Researcher Role.
2) In 150-250 words, identify your research topic and reflect on why you selected it (e.g., personal curiosity or experience, alignment with projected career goals).For example, what sparked your interest? At this initial stage, what do you want to learn about your research topic? Is it general curiosity or somehow related to your career path? Are there any specific scholarly articles or other sources that inspired the selection of your topic? This is an important short essay, because if you find the right topic now, it will propel you through the remaining Milestones.
3) After identifying your research topic and discussing why you selected it, articulate a possible research question related to your topic. This research question may be refined later after you have worked on your problem statement and literature review.
4) Include at least two references to support your essay. Follow conventional APA format rules.

Researcher Capstone Project Module TWO

After you select a topic and have articulated your tentative research question (per instructor feedback), you are ready to starting working on your proposal. Research proposals usually begin with an Introduction that includes a Problem Statement, Research Question and Hypothesis, and Literature Review. Milestone 2 is designed to help you write these sections.

For expert researchers, the traditional procedure in generating a research proposal involves generating an idea, asking a research question, articulating a research hypothesis, and then writing a literature review. This procedure works well for seasoned researchers who are experts in their area of research. However, for novice researchers, how can they write a research question and hypothesis until they are somewhat familiar with the literature? What is the "problem" exactly? What is already known? What is a "gap" in the literature that can be addressed in the proposal? For novice researchers, it is best to first review the literature on a given topic to see what is already out there. Reading these articles sparks ideas that the novice researcher can use to generate his or her own Problem Statement and Literature Review.

Writing a good literature review for a research proposal takes a lot of time, and it is best to prepare in advance. One way to begin writing a literature review is to first conduct background research and create an annotated bibliography. This annotated bibliography helps you understand the main points of an article to include in a literature review. Think of your annotations as "building blocks" for the Problem Statement and Literature review.

Now that you have selected your Topic, you are ready to dive into the literature, find relevant articles, and analyze them. You will use the "PSY4910 Milestone 2 Annotated Bibliography Worksheet" to complete your work.

The second element is the summary. Typically, you will be focusing on the Introduction and Discussion/Conclusion of your selected articles, although you can also glean information from the Method and Results sections of articles as well. In this assignment, for each article, you will analyze:
• What is the purpose of the article? (Read the first few sentences of the abstract and Introduction)
• How did the authors conduct the study? (Provide a few details on how the study was conducted)
• What did the authors find? (Read the Discussion/Conclusion section)
• What are study limitations and recommendations for future research? (Read the Discussion/Conclusion section)

Attachment:- Introduction to the Capstone Project.rar