Social psychology is an important course for all students because it provides insight into everyday behavior. Students are able to see themselves, their families, and their friends in the concepts covered in social psychology, and are able to adjust their behavior and attitudes based on what they have learned. Although social psychology is a research field, social psychologists are often interested in understanding current social problems, and their work is often applied to improve individual, community, and societal relationships. The final project is meant for you to propose a hypothetical study. You are not and should not be conducting human subjects research for this project. It is not necessary for the purposes of this assignment. All human subjects research requires written approval from the SNHU COCE Institutional Review Board in order to protect the welfare and ensure ethical treatment of the subjects. 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: Describe foundational research regarding social context factors and social motives by examining the historical evolution of the field of social psychology Determine appropriate research designs used in social psychology for application in the study of aspects of social context factors and social motives Examine issues of ethics in foundational research in social psychology for informing appropriate conclusions Interpret claims made by foundational research in social psychology for conveying appropriate conclusions that are supported by peer-reviewed evidence Develop basic research questions supported by peer-reviewed evidence by identifying gaps in the research of social psychology Prompt 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. 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? Milestones Final Project Milestone One: Literature Review Draft In Module Three, you will submit a draft of the literature review due as part of your final research investigation using the three articles that were provided for your track and topic in Module Two and two additional articles that you locate on your own. Rather than following the format of a typical lengthier APA literature review, you will instead prepare five shorter, adapted, individual literature reviews (one for each article). Each literature review should be one page in length. (These literature reviews will lead up to the final literature review submission.) The final version of the literature review will be submitted in Module Seven as part of the Final Project. This milestone is graded with the Final Project Milestone One Rubric. Final Project Milestone Two: Research Design In Module Five, you will participate in a discussion in which you develop a research study design in preparation for your final research investigation and also assist your classmates in refining their own proposed study. This milestone is graded with the Final Project Milestone Two Rubric. Final Project Submission: Research Investigation In Module Seven, you will submit a document containing a polished literature review and research design. The full adapted literature review will include a review of five articles. Combined with the research design, the final document should be 4 to 6 pages in length. Both the literature review component and the research design component should incorporate the feedback received in the milestones and should reflect all the critical elements in the Final ProjectRubric. This document should be formatted in APA style. This final submission will be graded using the Final Project Rubric. Final Project Rubric Guidelines for Submission: Your research investigation should be 4–6 pages, typed in Times New Roman 12-point font, double-spaced, while following appropriate APA format.
