The next milestone to reach as you work on your research proposal is to hone in on a specific, testable research question. Remember, you are designing one study to attempt to answer one question that builds upon previous research and fills a gap in the literature. Your research question should be specific and testable. When considering your research question, think about “how will we answer this question? What observations need to be made?” Your job is to demonstrate that you can design a scientifically sound and valid method for answering your research question. A complicated study is not necessarily better, and it might actually be worse if it leaves us with alternative explanations that cannot be ruled out. But there is also no such thing as a perfect study; every study will have some limitations so focus on progress, not perfection.
Once you have decided on your research question, begin describing the methods you’ll use to answer your research question and test your hypothesis.
For this milestone, you should attempt to summarize 3 references that you’ll include in your introduction / literature review section of the research paper. These references should be directly relevant to your research question. You should also begin describing the participants, materials, and procedures that you would need to use to carry out your research. It is okay to submit a rough draft that still needs editing, but you’ll need to show me progress to earn credit for this milestone.
Requirements for full credit:
1. Identify your research question
2. Summarize at least 3 references that provide some clues to the answer to your research question (about a paragraph per reference)
3. Describe the materials and procedures you propose to use to answer your research question (at this stage you can provide a rough overview, but eventually the methods section will need to provide the exact description of materials and procedures for gathering the observations) Everything must be written in APA 7Th edition formatting.