WEEK 5 Final Research
Project
Final Research Project
The topic of your
project needs to be a contemporary societal problem, such as healthcare reform,
immigration reform, privacy rights, euthanasia, First Amendment Rights, stem
cell research, capital punishment, corporate prisons, legalizing drugs, ageism,
animal rights, cloning, prayer in schools, racial profiling,
recycling/conservation, sexism, outsourcing jobs, workplace bullying, etc. The
topic must focus on a single aspect, as in “How far do corporations intrude
into the private lives of their employers?” or “The social costs of financing
the distribution of custom-designed drugs.” You may suggest another topic to
use, but the instructor must approve the topic during the Week Two Discussion.
The Final Research
Project will present research relating the responsibilities of a critical
thinker to contemporary society. In this assignment, you will do the following:
•Research one aspect of a contemporary social problem. •Define the problem.
•Propose a possible solution for the problem. •Create an argument that supports
your thesis position. You should take on the perspective of a critically
thinking researcher. The argument must present a thesis statement and evidence
to support the thesis statement. •Evaluate the ethical outcomes that result
from the position you take on the issue and explain how those outcomes would
influence society and culture. •Interpret statistical data from at least two
peer-reviewed scholarly sources. •Evaluate evidence using the following
standards: validity, reliability, and bias related to the chosen topic and
accurately identify strengths and weaknesses.
Research and Define the
Problem You must take on the perspective of your major field of study and
explain in your paper what that perspective is and how it informs your view of
the topic. The topics listed above are far too broad to write about in 10–12
pages (3,300–3,900 words). Instead, you must choose a narrowly defined thesis
and approach it from the perspective of your field.
Example: If you are an
economics major, and you are interested in immigration reform, you should
approach a very specific aspect of immigration reform through the lens of
economic theory and practice. A specific thesis question would not be, “How
does illegal immigration influence the U.S. economy?” One could write thousands
of pages on such a topic. Instead, a better question would be, “How do illegal
immigrant hotel workers in Chicago impact the economy of Northern Illinois?”
You would then want to do the research and determine the positive and negative
impacts they have, ultimately trying to conclude how illegal immigration in
this area should be approached ethically.
How to Hone Your
Thesis: It is important that you start your research early in this course. Try
to find the most important contemporary questions and theories in your field of
study and then align the most important questions with a very specific aspect
of the general topics above. For example, if you are a psychology major, you
might want to start thinking within the realm of healthcare reform or aspects
of mental health and criminality in the prison system.
Your Argument You must
present a complete argument, including a major claim with at least five points
of evidence, information, or data that will prove the claim. •The thesis
statement must be ◦A clear, simple declarative sentence as the first or last
sentence in the opening paragraph of the essay. ◦Of such a nature that it can
be substantiated, corroborated, verified, and proved through appeal to primary
or secondary academic research source materials.
•The introductory
paragraph must ◦Present the thesis statement, an explanation for the importance
of the topic, and its relation to the student’s field of study.
•Beliefs, opinions, and
personal opinions must not be introduced at any point in the essay. •All
beliefs and opinions should be supported with academic evidence. Sweeping
generalizations with no supporting academic evidence do not reflect adequate
critical thinking skills. •Do not include rhetorical questions in your essays.
All the questions that are pertinent to your project need to be answered in
your essay and your answers again need to be supported with evidence from
peer-reviewed journal articles and academically published books.
Attributes of Good
Critical Thinking in Papers •Your paper should include academic sources that
explain multiple sides of the issue. •The evidence that you use should come
from high-level researchers engaged in your field of study. •Your interpretations
of the evidence should be objective and state the conclusions and theses
presented in the evidence clearly and fairly. •Your paper should place the
various forms of evidence in relation to one another and demonstrate why one
form or perspective is stronger than the other positions that one could take on
the issue. •Your paper should point out the limitations of current evidence and
attempt to indicate areas for future research.
Ethical Outcomes of the
Position You Take After you have defined the problem and created an argument
about how one ought to respond to the issue, you need to explain the ethical
outcomes of the position you have taken. This should again be in relation to
the field of study in which you are working. There might be different ethical outcomes
that result from your analysis. For example, going back to the example issue
above, from an economic standpoint, illegal immigrants might contribute
positively to the economy of Northern Illinois in a specific number of ways.
Thus, an economist who believes that positive impact to the economy is the
greatest good would say that one should promote the use of illegal immigrants.
However, because these workers are often paid less than others and eliminate
jobs that could be done by residents of Chicago, there could be other negative
ethical outcomes that would outweigh the positive impacts to the economy. It is
your goal to draw out the ethical implications of your thesis and explain the
underlying rationale that is the foundation for your claim that one action is
better than another. •Critical thinkers are those who can outline the positive
and negative ethical impacts of their positions. In addition, they are able to
provide a rationale for why they believe a specific position is the right
position, even when it leads to negative outcomes. •Critical thinkers are also
able to be honest and objective about the limitations and gray areas that
pertain to their theses.
Final Research Project
Requirements The Final Research Project may be presented as a formal research
paper (essay format), a PowerPoint presentation, a video, or a podcast
equivalent to a minimum of 10 – 12 pages in APA format (approximately 3,300 –
3,900 typewritten words, excluding title page and reference pages). Written
essays must adhere to all APA formatting standards and requirements, as
outlined in the Ashford Writing Center.
PowerPoint
presentations must include the full text (at least 3,300 words) in the speaker
notes portion of the slides, with appropriate citations, and full reference
pages. PowerPoint presentations must adhere to the basic principles of
PowerPoint presentation design and must include citations and references
according to APA standards and requirements.
Videos and podcasts
must include a full transcript, in APA format, including appropriate in-text
citations and a references page.
Quotations: There must
be no more than 15% quoted content in the body of your essay. All quoted
material must bear quotation marks and a full quotation citation.
Source Documents:
•There must be 10 or more source documents used, cited, and referenced.
•Multimedia sources (such as videos) may be used, but no more than two such
sources may be used. If multimedia sources are used, then they must be authored
and distributed by credible sources, such as universities, law schools, medical
schools, or professors, or found in the Ashford University Library. •Where
print documents are used for source materials, those must be peer-reviewed,
scholarly journal articles, and academically published books. Popular media
sources (e.g., newspapers, magazines, television and radio shows, etc.) may not
be used. Materials from advocacy groups (e.g., Greenpeace, Human Rights
Campaign, National Organization for Women, etc.) may not be used. •Two of the
peer-reviewed scholarly sources used must include statistical evidence, which
must be accurately interpreted. •Sites such as ProCon.org and Wikipedia should
not be used. •Religious texts are neither peer-reviewed nor scholarly and so
may not be used in any way.
Summary Conclusion: You
must have a summary conclusion as the last paragraph(s) of the project,
presenting the major point of the essay and the evidence supporting that point.
Word Count: The content
body of the project must be 3,300 words or more. The word count does not
include anything in the title page, running header, or reference list. It is
expected that you meet all logistical requirements of this paper.
Reference List: •The
list of references must include only those source documents that are cited
within the body of the project. •The project must fully comply with APA
formatting standards and requirements as outlined in the Ashford Writing
Center: title page, running header with page numbers, font face and size, line
spacing, citations, and reference page(s).
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