Write a report which communicates the main points of your literature review to a specified audience (the jurors and judges in this case as a guide to further practice). – PLEASE also see the structure in which this report will need to be written in at the end of the page.
This is the second part of the attached dissertation project and requires you to make the concepts, theories, research findings and arguments from your literature review (EMA 01) available to a specific stakeholder audience (as above) . This report requires the application of the psychological literature and research to a practical problem and report your discussion and findings (or recommendations) back to that audience in a way they could understand and benefit from. TMAs 03, 04 and 06 are examples of the kind of audiences you could write your report for and the kind of language you would use to explain findings. You do not need to write for the same audience in EMA 02 as you did in your TMAs. You should review your feedback from those TMAs when preparing EMA 02. In writing EMA 02 you are directly addressing the audience (stakeholders/ professionals/ those concerned) while structuring and formulating your report in way they can understand, so they can benefit from your insights.
It is important to be able to communicate findings to an interested audience in a style, and at a level, appropriate to their experience with the topic, and it is this skill you are expected to showcase in your EMA 02. Your task is to communicate your arguments and conclusion (or some essential aspect(s) of them) from your EMA 01 to a specific stakeholder, directly addressing an issue you have identified. Uniquely, you are in the fortunate position that you can choose your stakeholder: it may be a funding body, a non-governmental organisation, a think tank, a policing organisation, and so on. However, the focus may vary depending on what you chose as the topic for your critical literature review.
Please include reducing description and increasing critique. Critique is evident in both structure and content so we can have a chat about how to draw this element more to the fore.
You will already have decided which audience you are writing for as part of your TMA 05. Think about why you have chosen this specific stakeholder (e.g. how does the topic/issue you are discussing concern them and what is their agenda?) and what message or insights do you want to get across (in a sense this is your own agenda). Do use these two questions as your starting point and guide throughout, as focusing on them will help you structure your EMA coherently around your key issues. You should ensure that you are always aware of who you are writing for, so you can tailor the content and style of your report to them and be as clear, precise and specific as you need to be.
When developing your report, think about what information is the most essential to communicate. The stakeholder will not need to know every detail you identified in your critical literature review (EMA 01). But equally, merely deleting detail from your EMA 01 to edit it down will make for a poor EMA 02. The structure and purpose of your EMA 02 is very different from EMA 01 so thinking about the crucial elements for this person or group is a vital early part of your process for writing EMA 02. For example:
- If the purpose of your report is to inform training for law enforcement personnel, which parts of the research would be most relevant to them? What key issues are they facing in their practice that the research can offer insights into? How could these insights help inform such a training package?
- If you are trying to inform policy, what are the key issues they face and how does your material guide policymakers to making a decision based on the science?
In each case you would have to ask yourself how you can convey relevant scientific findings in a way a non-psychologist can understand. Further, you need to consider how best to address the specific audience (e.g. higher ranking police officers or those who may be engaged in interviewing/interrogation, etc.).
Focusing on the agenda, perspective and audience for your report should help you in your writing.
In order to write a report which addresses these issues and focuses on the stakeholder’s needs, you should:
- choose to report findings from a part of your literature review that is relevant to the specific audience you are reporting to (you may find yourself omitting a lot of what went into EMA 01 and expanding on some key points that fit your aim for EMA 02),
- not report technical detail of the research if irrelevant to the stakeholder
- be clear and concise – the audience may not be interested in (or even be able to follow) much technical jargon
- structure your report well – your audience should see immediately how your report is relevant to them, and they will benefit from headings that allow them to quickly find information they may be looking for
- provoke thinking – you want your readers’ world to be somewhat changed as a result of reading your report.
Most importantly, EMA 02 is not a re-packaging of the EMA 01 materials. It is a stakeholder report that should use the EMA 01 material but is structured and re-written for a specific applied purpose and addressing an applied audience.
You need to ensure that the focus of your EMA 02 sits comfortably within the discipline of psychology and is relevant for the stakeholder. While it is likely that some aspects/research of your EMA 02 relate to or inform other disciplines, the focus of your EMA 02 should not originate or fit exclusively within another discipline (e.g. criminology or neuroscience). If you think that your chosen stakeholder is interested in a topic that originates or fits exclusively within another discipline, you need to reconsider your stakeholder and/or the issue/topic you are focusing on. If in any doubt, please consult your supervisor.
You will also need to think about how broad or narrow the focus of your EMA 02 needs to be. You will not, and should not, include all of your EMA 01 materials in EMA 02, but you will need to think about what parts are relevant for your audience, agenda and perspective. As indicated above, you may find yourself excluding large parts of what went into EMA 01 while expanding on certain other aspects. While EMA 01 informs EMA 02 it is important to treat them as separate pieces of work. Establishing how the research literature you reviewed for EMA 01 is relevant for EMA 02, and how you should use it, is an important part of your supervision process. Make sure you are in close contact with your supervisor when planning EMA 02.
You are nearing the end of DD802, but it is important to note that you still have access to, and should seek guidance from, your supervisor. In addition to meetings and written communication, you can send your supervisor a draft of up to 500 words. You can choose what you want to submit, it could be part of your EMA 02, it might be an extensive outline of your stakeholder report plan, or bullet points of the topics and literature you are writing about. What is included in your draft is entirely up to you and this is an opportunity to receive direct feedback on your work prior to EMA 02 submission.
Relevant material for EMA 02
You will have gathered many of the materials relevant to this assignment when completing your EMA 01. In tailoring your report to your chosen audience, you may need to draw on additional materials relevant to that audience; for example, if you are aiming your report at a policymaking audience, you may need to establish what current policy is, and what issues there are around it, prior to highlighting the research findings you identified that may address such an issue. Remember that your style of writing should be appropriate for your intended audience. Therefore, while you should not assume that your stakeholder is aware of psychological research in a given area, you can assume that they have some knowledge of their current position on a selected topic (e.g. policymakers should be aware of current policy, legal professionals should be aware of current law etc.).
External sources of information
As with EMA 01, this assignment requires you to draw on a range of empirical and theoretical research and evidence. Depending on your choice of stakeholder, you may also need to find information on current policies or practices which might be relevant to your research focus and audience.
this report is for a specific (Jurors and judges) audience about how your findings from your EMA 01 can be applied. You should have already chosen the audience (e.g. practitioner, politician etc.). Remember you are not choosing how to deliver this material: it must be as a written report.
Impact is important because it sets the broader stage for how research may influence a way of thinking about or understanding something. This does not always fit well with a particular piece of research, but in this module, which is very applied, most (if not all) the research that you cover will have impact and relevance for at least one stakeholder.
Structure of EMA 02
The exact structure of your EMA 02 depends on the kind of report you are writing and the type of audience you are addressing. Still, a good EMA 02 is likely to be structured using headings and sub-headings that guide the reader to the information and/or argument provided within; it will include a title page that gives information on the title/header of the report (i.e. its purpose and topic), as well as formally identifying the author and the audience/stakeholder it is addressed to. Crucially, it needs to be written to directly address that audience (i.e. speaking to them, rather than about them).