Investigating Changes in Social Psychology Research: Final Project

Course Outcomes

For the Final Project in this course, you will examine research presented in the course for how social psychology has changed, and investigate a potential gap in the research that has not been addressed. This project will allow you to foster and improve your skills at reading, interpreting, and writing psychological works. It will also help you to learn your place within the field, and how to combine both your personal perspective and opinions with established, empirical research to make original claims.

The Final Project is supported by two milestones, which will be submitted at various points throughout the course to scaffold learning and ensure quality final submissions. These milestones will take place in Modules Three and Five. The final research investigation is due in Module Seven.

This assessment addresses the following course outcomes:

1. Describe foundational research regarding social context factors and social motives by examining the historical evolution of the field of social psychology

2. Determine appropriate research designs used in social psychology for application in the study of aspects of social context factors and social motives

3. Examine issues of ethics in foundational research in social psychology for informing appropriate conclusions

4. Interpret claims made by foundational research in social psychology for conveying appropriate conclusions that are supported by peer-reviewed evidence

5. Develop basic research questions supported by peer-reviewed evidence by identifying gaps in the research of social psychology

For the Final Project, you will conduct an investigation of the foundational research in social psychology. You will need to conduct a literature review of the research presented in the course. This research will include both classic and current foundational research from the field. You will analyze the research presented in the course for how what we know about social context factors and social motives has changed over time, as well as how researchers have approached the study of social psychology. You will also consider the issues of ethics that are or are not addressed in the research. Following your review of the research, you will identify a gap (or unexplored topic within the research) and develop a research question designed to further explore your gap. This will include how the research supports your research question and how you would approach addressing your research question.

Specifically, the following critical elements must be addressed:

I. Literature Review: In this part of the project, you will analyze foundational research presented in the course for how the field of social psychology has changed over time, how researchers have designed research to study social psychology, and how issues of ethics have been addressed historically in the field.

Prompt

A. Summarize the claims made by the authors of the foundational research presented in the course regarding how social context factors influence human behavior. In other words, what claims are made by the research about social context factors and human behavior?

B. Summarize the claims made by the authors of the foundational research presented in the course regarding how social motives influence human behavior. In other words, what claims are made by classic and current research about social motives and human behavior?

C. Explain how the view of social context factors and social motives has evolved over the history of social psychology. Be sure to support your analysis with examples from research to support your claim.

D. Explain the conclusions you can reach about research in social psychology. In other words, explain what we know about social context factors and social motives, based on your review of the research presented in the course. Be sure to support your analysis with examples from research to support your claim.

E. Describe the specific research designs used in the foundational research presented in the course used to address research questions. For example, what were the specific methods used to address their research question? What type of research design was used?

F. Explain how research designs were used by authors to conduct research in social psychology. In other words, how did the research designs used by researchers help in conducting research regarding social psychology?

G. Discuss how issues of ethics have been addressed in the foundational research presented in the course. For example, how did the authors inform the participants of what the experiment would entail? How did the authors account for any potential risks to participants associated with the study?

H. Discuss how issues of ethics in social psychology have been viewed historically. In other words, how have issues of ethics in the field been viewed over time? Has this view changed as the field has progressed? Be sure to support your response with examples from research to support your claims.

II. Research Design: In this part of the project, use your previous analysis of the research presented in the course to develop your research design. You will identify a gap in the research you have reviewed, explain how the research supports further exploration of that aspect of social psychology, and develop a research question addressing the gap. You will then determine an appropriate research design and explain how it could be implemented and how you will account for issues of ethics in your proposed research question.

A. Identify a gap in social psychology research presented in the course that is unexplored or underdeveloped. For example, is there an unexplored aspect of social psychology you believe could be further explored?

B. Develop a basic research question addressing the identified gap. In other words, create a question that you could answer if potential research further investigated your identified gap. Be sure to support your developed research question  with examples from research to support your claims.

C. Determine an appropriate research design that addresses your research question regarding social psychology and explain why it was chosen. Be sure to support your response with examples from the research presented in the course that supports the determined research design.

D. Explain how you will account for issues of ethics associated with your proposed research. In other words, how will you ensure that issues of ethics associated with your proposed research have been managed appropriately? Be sure to support your analysis with examples from research to support your claims.

E. Explain how your approach to accounting for issues of ethics was informed by your review of the research presented in the course. In other words, what did you learn from the research presented in the course in terms of how to address issues of ethics that you were able to incorporate in your own design?