Behavioral Endocrinology Research Paper (Outline Due Thursday April 6; Paper Due Tuesday May 2):

For the research paper I want you to pick an interesting question/issue that is directly related to the topic of hormone/behavior interactions (see syllabus for some recommended topics). In your research paper I want you to discuss in detail 3 research reports that you have read related to your topic. These research reports need to be primary reports of scientific empirical studies (reports that include the Methods and Data/Results of a research project) that are published in scientific journals, i.e. you need to read the original reports, not just review papers that discuss the original reports. You should, however, supplement your paper with additional information that you obtain from books and review papers related to your topic (see Bibliography and Citations below). Your paper should be 7-12 pages double spaced.

I'd like you to divide your paper into 3 sections.

(20 points) Section 1: Introduction and Background (2-3 pages). Introduce the topic of your paper. Describe the question/issue that you have chosen to research. Why is this question/issue important to study? Does it have theoretical importance? Does it have practical or applied importance? How does this question/issue pertain to our course in which we are studying hormone/behavior interactions? What in general is already known about your topic (i.e. what are the results of research besides the 3 studies that you are reviewing?). Give the reader any additional background information/education that they will need to be able to fully appreciate your paper. Assume that your audience is a fellow classmate in our Hormones and Behavior class. Define any key terms or concepts that we have not covered in class.

(45 points) Section 2: Review of Related Research Reports (3+ pages). In this section review each of the 3 empirical studies that you have read. Importantly, please attach a photocopy of the first page of each article to the back of your paper if they are different from the ones that you attached with your outline (see below). For each study:

1) describe the purpose/aim of the study. i.e. what was the research question, or what was the study trying to find out?

2) what was the researcher's hypothesis? i.e. what did the authors predict or suggest would be the outcome of their study? Note, some studies may be more "descriptive" in nature, and consequently the authors may not offer a hypothesis. Instead the authors may merely state that they wanted to find out what will happen if they do such and such. If this is the case, state it.

3) what was the rationale for the hypothesis? What reason do the authors give for making the hypothesis that they make? Or, if there is not a hypothesis, what reason do the authors give for why they did what they did?

4) give a brief description of the experimental design/procedure. Important details are who/what were the subjects. How were subjects selected. What was the experimental procedure. What were the independent variables and what were the dependent variables (I will deduct points if you don’t include this, or don’t state it correctly). Anything else that you think is important for understanding the particular study.

5) what were the basic results. This doesn't need to be much more detailed than the description of the results that the authors included in the abstract (but use your own words!). So, no need to report numbers, etc. Instead describe the basic effects, e.g. "there was a large increase in the number of words that were recalled by individuals treated with snake oil".

6) what conclusions did the authors make from their data?

7) do the data support the conclusions? Can you think of flaws in the experimental design that may lead to confounding effects. Can you think of alternative hypotheses or explanations that fit the data as well as the author's conclusions/interpretations?

(20 points) Section 3: Conclusion (2-4 pages). In this section make an attempt to be especially sophisticated and insightful! Essentially all you have to do to accomplish this is to thoughtfully discuss the impact that the 3 studies you have chosen have made on the research question/issue that is the focus of your paper. Have these studies led to new information? Have these studies led to a better model for thinking about the question/issue? Are the studies consistent with each other? Perhaps by integrating/synthesizing the results of these studies you can propose a new model not discussed in any of the papers that you have read on the topic.

Finally, what do you recommend that future studies on this topic should examine? What remains unresolved?

(10 points) Bibliography and Citations: Use APA publication format for your bibliography and citations. Your bibliography (reference list) should include the 3 articles that you have reviewed as well as any other articles/books that you have read and refer to within your paper. Within the text cite only articles/books that you have read (or at least skimmed). So, every article/book in your bibliography should be cited somewhere in the text, and conversely, every cited article/book in your text should also appear in your bibliography. I expect that you will need to use 8-15 sources for your paper.

(5 points) Overall mechanics of the paper: Make sure that your paper is well formatted, that all words are properly spelled, and that you have used good grammar. Take pride in your work!

Finally, don't use quotations. Nothing that a scientist writes is so eloquent that it deserves to be directly quoted (don't quote me on this). You should always be able to adequately paraphrase what someone else writes.

(25 points) Outline Assignment (Due Thursday April 4)

The most important objective of the outline assignment is that you share with me your overall research paper topic and that you have identified the 3 research reports that you intend to describe in detail. This will give me an opportunity to give you some feedback in terms of the appropriateness and feasability of your topic and supporting articles. I would like your outline to be structured using the same headings as your final paper. So, your outline should have the following elements:

Title: provide a tentative title for your research paper

Introduction and Background: describe briefly the question/issue that you have chosen to research

Review of Related Research Reports: at this stage, all I would like is for you to give me a photocopy of the first page of each of the articles that you intend to review in detail and for at least one of them, list for me the independent and dependent variables that was used in that study. This will allow me to assess whether you need some help in identifying independent and dependent variables.

Conclusion: any (or no) information that you want to include at the outline stage is acceptable. I realize that you may not be ready to formulate any conclusions until you do more reading.

Bibliography: please list the additional supportive papers that you have found so far that are related to your research paper topic.