Posted: March 18th, 2024

RES7002 Research Methods Empirical Research Project

RES7002
Research Methods
Empirical Research Project
Date for Submission: Please refer to the timetable on ilearn
(The submission portal on ilearn will close at 14:00 UK time
on the date of submission)
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Arden University © reserves all rights of copyright and all other intellectual property rights in the learning materials and this publication. No part of any of the learning
materials or this publication may be reproduced, shared (including in private social media groups), stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or means,
including without limitation electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written consent of Arden University. To find out more about
the use and distribution of programme materials please see the Arden Student Terms and Conditions.
Template: V5
Assignment Brief
As part of the formal assessment for the programme you are required to submit a
Research Methods assignment. Please refer to your Student Handbook for full
details of the programme assessment scheme and general information on preparing
and submitting assignments.
Learning Outcomes:
After completing the module, you should be able to:

Identify, research, critically summarise and apply key concepts in psychology
to a range of psychological issues
Critically evaluate and apply different methodological approaches to the study
of psychological concepts
Report a mini research project at a postgraduate level with a reflective
understanding of ethical issues in human participation in research
Critically distinguish between different research approaches in psychology
and their application, based on relevant theoretical, philosophical, practical,
statistical, and methodological reasoning
Demonstrate an understanding of how to plan and execute research to a
professional and ethical standard, act autonomously, and demonstrate
originality
Undertake effective communication and presentation skills to support or
strengthen arguments and analysis
Professional Skills: Utilising the skills to perform effectively within the
professional environment such as showing competence in data analysis and
reporting of results.
All learning outcomes must be met to pass the module.
This assignment has been designed to help you enhance a range of professional
development skills through its completion. These skills include: conducting effective &
comprehensive literature reviews; summarising, analysing & evaluating research to form a
reasoned, coherent argument; understanding research methods used to investigate &
establish knowledge in a studied field/discipline, whilst being aware of their limitations;
identifying & applying appropriate research methods; competency with specialist software
(i.e., statistical software – SPSS); performing appropriate data analysis accurately &
effectively; interpreting data and statistical analyses; using data & statistics to inform
evidenced conclusions; practically applying current knowledge and key concepts;
awareness of ethical considerations & standards as well as consequences of different
approaches; critical analysis of ideas & arguments; writing concisely and presenting work
in accordance with APA standards and academic conventions; managing your learning and
performance; preparation and prioritisation; and time management.
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Arden University © reserves all rights of copyright and all other intellectual property rights in the learning materials and this publication. No part of any of the learning
materials or this publication may be reproduced, shared (including in private social media groups), stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or means,
including without limitation electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written consent of Arden University. To find out more about
the use and distribution of programme materials please see the Arden Student Terms and Conditions.
Template: V5
Guidance
Your assignment should include: a title page containing your student number, the
module name, the submission deadline and the exact word count of your submitted
document; the appendices if relevant; and a reference list in APA 7 Format. You should
address all the elements of the assignment task listed below. Please note that tutors
will use the assessment criteria set out below in assessing your work.
You must not include your name in your submission because Arden University
operates anonymous marking, which means that markers should not be aware of the
identity of the student. However, please do not forget to include your STU number.
Maximum word count: 3500 words
Please refer to the full word count policy which can be found in the Student Policies section
here: Arden University | Regulatory Framework
Please note the following:
Students are required to indicate the exact word count on the title page of the
assessment.
The word count includes everything in the main body of the assessment (including in
text citations and references). The word count excludes numerical data in tables,
figures, diagrams, footnotes, reference list and appendices. ALL other printed
words ARE included in the word count.
Please note that exceeding the word count by over 10% will result in a 10-percentage point
deduction.
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Arden University © reserves all rights of copyright and all other intellectual property rights in the learning materials and this publication. No part of any of the learning
materials or this publication may be reproduced, shared (including in private social media groups), stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or means,
including without limitation electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written consent of Arden University. To find out more about
the use and distribution of programme materials please see the Arden Student Terms and Conditions.
Template: V5
Assignment Task
For this assignment, you are required to write a research report about priming guilt
in court trials (see background below). You will receive a complete data set to
analyse, and you will answer the research questions below. You should analyse the
data using appropriate statistical technique in SPSS and write a 3500-word report
using the report writing conventions of the APA.
Background
We are all subjected to a vast amount of information as we go about our daily lives
through various forms of media. Our exposure to media narratives can covertly
influence our responses to events occurring in society, which can be attributed to
psychological priming. This phenomenon has been overlooked within the area of court
trials. Often, casual observers of, for example, murder trials, are prone to media
outlets, priming them to think in certain ways about the defendant. The media
portrayal has been shown to have an impact on the preconceptions of interested
individuals in relation to the accused.
Specifically, even when faced with factual evidence which suggests the defendant is
innocent and the outcome of the trial supports this, people react with incredulity. The
belief that the outcome of the trial is wrong, can be attributed to the media priming
them against this conclusion
To this end, you will answer the following research questions: “Are participants more
likely to judge a defendant guilty when they are primed as such” and “Is there an
interaction between being primed and the evidence presented, that affects how likely
a participant is to judge a defendant guilty?”
The following references are provided to you as a starting point: Stawiski et al., (2012)
and Ling et al., (2021). Both articles are available on iLearn.
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Arden University © reserves all rights of copyright and all other intellectual property rights in the learning materials and this publication. No part of any of the learning
materials or this publication may be reproduced, shared (including in private social media groups), stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or means,
including without limitation electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written consent of Arden University. To find out more about
the use and distribution of programme materials please see the Arden Student Terms and Conditions.
Template: V5
Please follow these steps:

Read the articles provided to you and conduct a small literature search to
identify any further articles on the effect of priming on mock jury decision
making and guilt in court trials. The aim of this is to develop your hypotheses
for the research based on what you have read. This means when we release
the data to you, you can analyse the data in order to test your hypotheses. We
delay the release of the data to stop you being tempted to develop hypotheses
after you have already analysed the data.
At approximately week five of the module, we will release the data to you. This
will be data from a study using real participants. We will also provide you with
some basic demographic information and the materials used to conduct the
study so you can fully report the methods.
You are required to analyse the data in SPSS and to include the SPSS output
in an appendix. If you experience any issues with installing or using SPSS,
please email your lecturer for advice.
We will outline the variables used in the experiment when we release the data
and materials. It is your job to choose the appropriate statistical test, perform
any data screening to justify the choice of test (parametric or non-parametric),
and report the descriptive and inferential statistics. You can include tables and
figures where relevant, but you must format them in line with APA style.
Although you are not directly collecting data, it is important you understand the
ethical processes involved when testing human participants. Each participant
must be presented with a participant information sheet, informed consent
form, and debrief form. You can find templates for these documents on the
virtual psychology lab. We would like you to add these documents in the
appendix of your report, adapted to the details of the study you are reporting.
These will not be marked, but their appropriateness will be commented on for
when you are designing your own study in future.
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Arden University © reserves all rights of copyright and all other intellectual property rights in the learning materials and this publication. No part of any of the learning
materials or this publication may be reproduced, shared (including in private social media groups), stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or means,
including without limitation electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written consent of Arden University. To find out more about
the use and distribution of programme materials please see the Arden Student Terms and Conditions.
Template: V5
The suggested word allocation of the report is (with mark weighting):
a. Abstract 200 words (10 Marks)
b. Introduction 1250 words (20 Marks)
c. Method 400 words (20 Marks)
d. Results 400 words (20 Marks)
e. Discussion 1250 words (20 Marks)
f. Presentation and Referencing (10 Marks)
This is only a guideline and does not need to be strictly adhered to, but your
report should not exceed 3500 words in total (excluding reference list and
appendices).
See further guidance on iLearn.
(3500 words)
(100 marks)
(LOs: 1-6)
This module is marked using the Arden University Categorical Marking
Criteria
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Arden University © reserves all rights of copyright and all other intellectual property rights in the learning materials and this publication. No part of any of the learning
materials or this publication may be reproduced, shared (including in private social media groups), stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or means,
including without limitation electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written consent of Arden University. To find out more about
the use and distribution of programme materials please see the Arden Student Terms and Conditions.
Template: V5
Formative Feedback
You have the opportunity to submit a draft of your report to receive formative
feedback. This can be up to a 500-word plan for your Introduction and Discussion
sections combined, and 1000 words for your Methods and Results section combined.
In total, the maximum you can submit as a draft for review is 1500 words.
The feedback is designed to help you develop areas of your work and it helps you
develop your skills as an independent learner. 
  
If you are a distance learning student, you should submit your work via Turnitin. Please
check your iLearn module pages/forum for the formative feedback deadline and submission
link.
If you are a blended learning student, your tutor will give you a deadline for formative
feedback and further details.  If you have a confirmed extension to your summative (final
submission) deadline, please contact your lecturer for information on extensions to the
formative feedback deadline.
Formative feedback will not be given to work submitted after the published date or the
date specified by your tutor (if a blended learning student).
Referencing Guidance
You MUST underpin your analysis and evaluation of the key issues with appropriate
and wide ranging academic research and ensure this is referenced using the APA7
Format.
Follow this link to find the referencing guides for your subject: Arden Library
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Arden University © reserves all rights of copyright and all other intellectual property rights in the learning materials and this publication. No part of any of the learning
materials or this publication may be reproduced, shared (including in private social media groups), stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or means,
including without limitation electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written consent of Arden University. To find out more about
the use and distribution of programme materials please see the Arden Student Terms and Conditions.
Template: V5
Submission Guidance
Assignments submitted late will not be accepted and will be marked as a 0% fail.
Your assessment can be submitted as a single Word (MS Word) or PDF file, or, as multiple
files.
If you chose to submit multiple files, you must name each document as the question/part
you are answering along with your student number ie Q1 Section A STUXXXX. If you wish
to overwrite your submission or one of your submissions, you must ensure that your
new submission is named exactly the same as the previous in order for the system
to overwrite it.
You must ensure that the submitted assignment is all your own work and that all
sources used are correctly attributed. Penalties apply to assignments which show
evidence of academic unfair practice. (See the Student Handbook which is available
on the A-Z key information on iLearn.)
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