Checklist – Paper IV: Study Two Methods, Results, and Discussion
Use the check sheet below to make sure your paper is the best it can be! Make sure you answer “Yes” to all questions before submitting your paper or you will lose points! The first two sections duplicate the checklist from Papers I, II, and III, but the rest is unique to Paper IV.
| General Paper Format (This section is identical to the Papers I, II, and III Checklist) | ||
| Yes | No | |
| 1. Is everything in your paper (including headers, the main body of your mini-literature review, and your references) in 12 point Times New Roman font? | ||
| 2. Is everything in your paper double spaced, including references (here I mean the spacing above and below each line, not the spaces following a period)? | ||
| 3. Do you have one inch margins on all sides of the paper (one inch from the top of the page, one inch from the bottom, and one inch from each side) | ||
| 4. Are the first lines of all paragraphs indented another ½ inch (or 1 ½ inches from the page edge)? | ||
| 5. Are your paragraphs aligned left? (That is, text should be flush left, with lines lining up on the left of the page, but text should NOT line up on the right side of the page – it should look ragged) | ||
| 6. Do you need help figuring out how to configure a word document in APA format (inserting headers, page numbers, proper indents, etc.)? If YES or NO, I highly recommend watching this video which walks you through setting up an APA formatted paper! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9pbUoNa5tyY | ||
| Title page (This section is identical to the Papers I, II, and III Checklist) | ||
| Yes | No | Header |
| 1. Do you have the phrase “Running head” in your header (with a lower case h)? | ||
| 2. Is the rest of your Running head title in ALL CAPS? | ||
| 3. Is your Running head in 12 point Times New Roman font? | ||
| 4. Do you have a page number that is flush right (also in 12 point Times New Roman font)? | ||
| 5. Is your header 50 characters or less (including spaces and punctuation)? | ||
| Title / Name / Institution | ||
| 1. Is your title 12 words or less (as recommended by the APA)? | ||
| 2. Does your title describe your general paper theme (while avoiding something blank like “Paper Four: Methods Results, and Discussion”)? Note that your header and title can differ! | ||
| 3. Do all title words with four letters or more start with a capital letter? | ||
| 4. Are your name and institution correct? | ||
| 5. Are your title, name, and institution elements centered and in 12 point Times New Roman font? | ||
| Methods Section (This is similar to Paper II, but new elements are in bold purple text) | ||
| Yes | No | Header |
| 1. Is your header title present and identical to your header title on the title page? | ||
| 2. Is your header title in ALL CAPS and 12 point Times New Roman font? | ||
| 3. Does your header on this second page omit the phrase “Running head” | ||
| 4. Do you have a page number starting on page 2 | ||
| Title for the methods section | ||
| 1. Is the word “Methods” centered and in bold at the top of your methods page? | ||
| Methods Section Continued | ||
| Yes | No | Participants |
| 1. Do you have the word “Participants” flush left and in bold, right below the word “Methods”? | ||
| 2. Did you list out your demographic characteristics, including gender, age, and ethnicity / race? | ||
| 3. Did you provide the descriptive statistics for (means and standard deviations) for age and italicize the letters M and SD? | ||
| 4. Did you provide frequencies for gender and ethnicity/race and italicize the N? | ||
| 5. Did you use the brand new participant set from study two and NOT the set from study one? | ||
| 6. Did you refer to your appendix? | ||
| Materials and Procedure | ||
| 1. Did you mention informed consent? | ||
| 2. Did you discuss any instructions the participant may have read? | ||
| 3. Did you thoroughly describe any stimulus material that might have occurred before your actual independent variables (and photos, descriptions, profiles, questions, puzzles, etc.) that are a part of your study? | ||
| 4. Did you thoroughly describe your two independent variable in enough depth and detail that another researcher could duplicate your materials (though you can refer back to study one if the variable is identical)? | ||
| 5. Did you give your IVs names that matches up with the names you refer to in the results section? | ||
| 6. Did you describe all of your most relevant dependent variables, noting the scales you used (e.g. “Yes / No”, “A scale ranging from 1 (not at all likely) to 9 (very likely))” for EACH of your DVs? | ||
| 7. Did you fully describe what participants went through in the study, noting the order in which they received study materials (e.g. first informed consent, then IVs, DVs, and debriefing)? | ||
| 8. Did you fully describe your attention check (manipulation check) with enough detail that a reader unfamiliar with your study could recreate it, and did you include the scale for that attention check question? | ||
| 9. Did you use the past tense when describing your methods (seeing how you already collected the data, and therefore do not discuss what participants will do)? | ||
| Results Section (This is similar to Paper II, but new elements are in bold purple text) | ||
| Yes | No | |
| 1. Do you have the word “Results” centered and in bold, immediately following the methods section? | ||
| 2. Was the first dependent variable you looked at your manipulation check question, and did you make sure you analyzed the correct DV? | ||
| 3. Did you analyze at least two different dependent variables with ANOVAs? a. Note: You won’t use t-Tests for this study, as you have two different IVs. | ||
| 4. Did you mention all of the IVs and the DV by name when talking about your analysis? | ||
| 5. Did you include means and standard deviations within parentheses for each level of your independent variables? | ||
| 6. If your factorial ANOVA was significant, did you include follow up simple effects tests? (That is, do you have seven total F tests)? | ||
| 7. Did you italicize the letters F, t, p, M, SD, and X2 (where appropriate)? | ||
| 8. Did you round ALL numbers to two decimal places (with the exception of the p value, which can go as low as p < .001 or p = .001). | ||
| Discussion Section (New Information in this section) | ||
| Yes | No | |
| 1. Do you have the word “Discussion” centered and in bold, immediately following the results section? | ||
| 2. Did you remind your reader of your study two hypothesis? | ||
| 3. Did you mention whether you supported or did not support your study two hypothesis? | ||
| Appendix (New Information in this section) | ||
| Yes | No | Title for the appendix page |
| 1. Do your appendices come at the end of the paper? | ||
| 2. Does each of your four appendices (E, F, G, and H) start on their own page? | ||
| 3. Is the word “Appendix” for EACH analysis centered on each page followed by a short (and descriptive) description of the appendix? | ||
| Appendix Information | ||
| 1. Appendix E: Did you include a table for each of the following demographic variables: Gender, age, and ethnicity? | ||
| 2. Appendix F: For your manipulation check, did you include your chi square or t-Test info? (If a chi square, did you include your crosstabulation and chi square table? If a t-Test, did you include your descriptives and t-Test table?) | ||
| 3. Appendix G: For your first 2 X 2 ANOVA, did you include the descriptives tables and your F table? | ||
| 4. Appendix H: For your second 2 X 2 ANOVA, did you include the descriptives tables and your F table? | ||
| Writing Quality | ||
| Yes | No | 1. Did you proofread your paper, go to the writing center, go to the research methods help center, or use the Pearson writer to make sure your paper flows well? |
| 2. Did you use the past tense (which is recommended, since your papers in this class will reflect work you already did rather than work you will do)? | ||
| 3. Did you use a scientific / objective terms like “people”, “participants”. “users”, “readers”, etc. (as opposed to subjective words like “you”, “we”, “me”, “I”, or “us”, etc.)? | ||