sensation and perception research paper

1. A research paper (12-15 pages) covering any current topic that pertains to sensation and perception will be worth 150 points. At least 5 primary academic resources must be cited in this paper. I have purposefully kept this assignment very broad this semester as we seem to have a diverse cross section of students from various disciplines. While the topic does need to pertain to sensation and/or perception, it can be written from your own interests and focus.
   1. 1. Academic writing is your means of joining an on-going intellectual dialogue and contributing your knowledge to the conversation. Take it seriously! Except when otherwise noted, all assignments are to be typed, double-spaced, 12 point font, with one-inch margins and page numbers. All references to other work must be cited and referenced utilizing APA style. I suggest you get a copy of the APA publication manual.
      2. NOTE: When citing electronic sources, you must consider the academic validity of your source. Wikipedia, while a wonderful tool, is NOT an academic source – citing such sources in an academic paper is not appropriate. All periodicals are not academic sources (i.e. Psychology Today, Better Homes and Gardens, Mad Magazine)
      3. Every paper will be evaluated by a plagiarism checker.

My goal for this assignment is to give students the opportunity to investigate further into some topic of perception that they found intriguing. I left the overall topic open to accommodate the various interests of the students in the class. I have had some students that have taken the more biological route and completed papers on “Oculus Ex Machina”, facial perception, and stereo blindness in children with amblyopia and strabismus. I have also had students that went a more abnormal or social psychology route such as Alice in Wonderland Syndrome, mirror neurons and autism, and “Affecting Change in Perception using Positive Psychology”. The trick with the last group of topics was to make sure that the overall focus of the paper was the underlying perceptual processes that resulted in the disorder or symptoms. This is, after all, a Perception paper and not an Abnormal or Developmental Psychology paper.

As far as organization of the paper goes, I would begin with an intro where you discuss everything that will be covered in the paper. You could then identify and define the subject that you have chosen (what is generally known about the topic). This could be followed with a review of the current literature, an analysis of the real world consequences or application, discussion of treatments (if applicable) and finally a conclusion that ties it all together. This basic structure should work for most papers, however, you are certainly not obliged to follow it.

The citations for the paper should be fairly recent and from primary sources (not texts or encyclopedias) and need to be presented in APA format. If you need help with the APA style, I have posted some resources.

Think of the page limit of a guideline. I chose the page number because an in-depth analysis generally runs about that length. In other words, that is my best guess at how long a paper would have to be to fully cover the topic. That being said, I do not grade by the page. A shorter paper that is well organized and written will generally do better than a longer paper that is poorly organized or full of fluff. Think quality over quantity.