Spring, 2005 (Roos, Soc. 502)
Assignment 4: Proposal (due Wednesday, March 9th; electronic copies due 8 a.m. Tuesday March 8th)
The assignment this week is to write a 3- to 4-page proposal for your final project. Distribute online copies to everyone in the class no later than Tuesday 8 a.m. Please read each other's proposals by class on Wednesday.
The proposal should consist of two parts. First, describe your project. Be specific, what is your research about? What are some of the important articles or books in the field, and how will your research "move the field forward?" Start your literature review (Ass. 5 will be a fuller literature review). You might find it useful to summarize your argument in a heuristic model with arrows indicating flows of causality, but this is not required. Summarize a few of your expectations (to my mind, well-written prose is preferable to more formal hypotheses, but if you want to write hypotheses feel free).
Second, describe the variables you plan to use and how you plan to measure them (i.e., what are the theoretical constructs and the indicators you will use to measure them). The whole point of this section is to describe how you plan to go about testing the expectations outlined in the previous section. What kind of descriptive analyses do you plan? What kind of statistical analyses will you use to test your hypotheses (at least to the extent you know them at this point)?
This is also the point to double-check that you have completed all IRB requirements. If you have any questions, talk with me. The relevant forms are available through ORSP:
In preparation for our discussion, please read the other proposals carefully and come to class prepared with suggestions, analytic critiques, and so forth. How would you advise your classmates to revise their projected work? What further references would you suggest they pursue?
We will spend 10 to 12 mins. on each of your projects.