Undergraduate Thesis

PsychChick

Hi,

I am about to go into my final year of an Undergraduate Psychology and I am currently trying to get started on my final year research project.

I am hoping to do something in the along the lines of sexual attitudes/behaviour among young people.

Could anyone offer me some advice on how to get started and what I should be dong at ths stage?

Thank you!:)

The Black Oil

I guess you may not have a supervisor yet or are thinking of approach someone or a few people? Read around the area you're interested in to see what's been done before. Put together a page or two perhaps in bullet points centred around some specific ideas you come up with. Check your dept's ethics webpage and requirements. Put together a draft research proposal including design, research question(s), method, analysis, etc etc. Come up with a plan as to how you're going to go bring the project from the start to completion. Don't forget to do a pilot study once you have ethical approval, etc.

alanjfinn

Depending on where you are doing your degree, for mine I had to base my hypothesis on an existing study i.e. I had to go into Psychinfo or one of the other databases and find a study related to,similar to my area of intrest and build on that,then as said you have to get ethical approval,a colleague of mine wanted to study whether incompetent teachers affected the kids they taught,no way was that allowed, a bit too controversial,(if in fact her hypothesis was proven to be true),so nail down your area of intrest,Black Oil advice is all good as well,the vey best of luck,any help you need do not be afraid to ask,anything at all:)

Valmont

PsychChick wrote: »

I am hoping to do something in the along the lines of sexual attitudes/behaviour among young people.

That could be construed as ethically dubious. Presumably you will be giving minors some sort of a questionnaire or attitude scale and if they're under 18 you will require permission from schools or parents. That might be more trouble than you need for your final year project.

TheNibbler

I would second the above comments about the problems inherent in doing research involving under 18 year olds. Did a group project during my Psych degree involving under 18 year olds and encountered many problems. This was even though our project dealt with a fairly innocuous topic, unlike sexual attitudes.

If you're not too far along with the process of deciding what to study I would suggest something that will cause you less grief later on. It may seem interesting now but when you're struggling to get your thesis in on time you won't care what the topic is!

The Black Oil

Aye, you could be in hot water if your idea centres on minors..the ethics requirements will probably involve having a solicitor's letter, garda vetting clearance, etc.

PsychChick

Yeah, hoping to do something in the area of sexual attitudes among college students.. Perhaps through the use of a questionnaire.. Would I still have problems??

alanjfinn

PsychChick wrote: »

Yeah, hoping to do something in the area of sexual attitudes among college students.. Perhaps through the use of a questionnaire.. Would I still have problems??

You should be fine with that,you will need to emphasis that it is anonymous so you may need to come up with a way for people to fill in your questionnaires and leave them back without being recognised,i.e.they may not like the idea of filling them in and handing them back to you, you could obviously then can read them,not that you would of course:D,,,,By the way,one questionnaire will not suffice,3 or 4 might do it.

Valmont

PsychChick wrote: »

Yeah, hoping to do something in the area of sexual attitudes among college students.. Perhaps through the use of a questionnaire.. Would I still have problems??

An attitude scale might be a good idea. You can take some time to construct it using some basic construct validation techniques such as split-half reliabilities, that sort of thing.

PsychChick

Thanks!
Could you recommend any texts that may help when it comes to constructing a questionnaire?

Valmont

PsychChick wrote: »

Thanks!
Could you recommend any texts that may help when it comes to constructing a questionnaire?

Any standard psychometric textbook would be a great help, especially the sections on reliability and validity. Kaplan and Sacuzzo have a great book that covers the basic reliability tests among other things. You could probably pick it up in Hodges Figgis although it is about 45 euro. Alternatively you could find the various pieces of info on the net by googling around for a while. Either way, constructing a questionnaire or attitude scale for your fourth year thesis and not performing any reliability tests would be a bad idea.

alanjfinn

PsychChick wrote: »

Thanks!
Could you recommend any texts that may help when it comes to constructing a questionnaire?

Your college should have a book with a list of all the major questionnaires,if memory serves about 80/90,compiling your own could take years to do,its not a runner.

Valmont

alanjfinn wrote: »

Your college should have a book with a list of all the major questionnaires,if memory serves about 80/90,compiling your own could take years to do,its not a runner.

A proper psychometric test yes, but a simple attitude scale is not a big deal. I had to construct one when I took a psychometrics class and it didn't take too long.

At the undergraduate level it wouldn't be a problem to perhaps use some sort of established "attitudes to sex" test as I'm sure there is at least a half decent one out there already. Check the mental measurements yearbook which should be available from your college library.

alanjfinn

A thesis is a serious piece of work and does not get done using self constructed simple attitude scales,most of the Qs used take years to develope

"constructing a Q that will yield reliable and valid measurements is a challenging task" Shaughnessy JJ & Zechmeister JS. Research Methods in Psychology,P 176

Valmont

alanjfinn wrote: »

most of the Qs used take years to develope

Exactly. An undergraduate usually has 5 or 6 months to complete their thesis project thus rendering the construction of a professional-standard and psychometrically sound attitude scale both untenable and uneccessary.

alanjfinn wrote: »

A thesis is a serious piece of work and does not get done using self constructed simple attitude scales

Perhaps if you perused the abstracts of the annual PSI undergraduate research conference you would have seen otherwise.

I'll give you an example. A fellow student of mine last year constructed an attitude scale, performed some basic reliability measures such as test-retest reliability and a split half correlation. There was a pre-test and post-test element to this project with some intervention between them.

This study provided some insightful information and demonstrated, most importantly (for undergradautes) that they had understood the fundamental elements of the scientific method and used them to construct a simple and interesting psychological study that tackles a real issue.

Fair enough, reliability of a measurement instrument does not imply validity but it's not like many undergraduate research papers are published in the Psychological Review or are actually expected to be ready for immediate clinical application.

alanjfinn wrote: »

"constructing a Q that will yield reliable and valid measurements is a challenging task" Shaughnessy JJ & Zechmeister JS. Research Methods in Psychology,P 176

So you read the introductory paragraph on test construction, well done. A psychometric platitude doesn't change the issue here which is that the standards and academic context of a postgraduate research thesis are not the same as those for an undergraduate one.

hoolio

I've always though calling what we were expected to produce at the end of our degrees a "thesis" very very optimistic. it doesn't require anything approaching the level of knowledge, work, length or quality of a thesis, and any one that did is overkill to the extreme. I think they downgraded it to "project" eventually. Basically, i didn't take it any more seriously then it needed to be taken (it needed to be taken as seriously as 3 subjects put together).

Anyway i'd avoid creating the major questionnaire myself. Naturally you are going to have to produce and get ethical approval for a basic one at least - demographics of your participants for example. However i'd try to find an "off the shelf" questionnaire for the meat of the data. It doesn't need to be particularily well known or famous (indeed you probably dont want to pay for your questionnaire). It'll save you needing to delve in validating your measure and allow you to actually focus more on what you're interested in.

Other general pointers:

-if you're going the questionnaire route do yourself a big favour and do it online. not only is it easier to make it anonymous, you'll also find it easier to get participants, especially if it's a short test, and especially if theres an incentive to click the link (a chance to win a hmv voucher was the one often being used when i did mine - i was too cheap to do that though)

-don't overcomplicate yourself. as has been said it's an undergrad assignment and most definitely not in the same league as something you'd earn an MA/PHD for. it's important, very important, but it's not your entire degree, so don't drive yourself mental. you don't get any more marks for doing 2 hour long attention tests then you do for a 15 min questionnaire (within reason of course

-find a supervisor you actually get on with, who actually will be helpful, and you might just mark easy

good luck

alanjfinn

Hi Valmont,once your sure thats all that matters,
maith an fear.