Poster Session

The Research Methods II class had their first ever poster session today. Students presented their research projects for about an hour in their classroom. Students from other classes and faculty viewed the posters and interacted with the authors.

In chapter 12, we describe some of the dynamics of poster presentation:

• "Poster sessions usually take place in large rooms equipped with easels and large blank poster boards. Presenters are assigned a poster board, and they use it to post materials describing their research. After they post their materials, presenters stand next to their poster and wait for viewers (their audience) to file by. Interested viewers may pause, read the posted materials, and discuss them with the presenter. Poster presenters usually have copies of a complete report to give to those who are interested."

Here are some pictures of the event:



Kudos to Dr. Brittney Schrick, the new instructor of our Research Methods II class, for putting on the poster session.

APA Publication Manual 6th Edition Out in July

In case you have not yet heard, the new Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association will be released in July.

One of the big changes from the 5th edition is coverage of issues related to computer technology:

• dealing with supplemental data
• referencing electronic sources
• a new APAstyle Web page

Table of Contents

1. Writing for the Behavioral and Social Sciences

2. Manuscript Structure and Content

3. Writing Clearly and Concisely

4. The Mechanics of Style

5. Displaying Results

6. Crediting Sources

7. Reference Examples

8. The Publication Process

Appendices

Journal Article Reporting Standards (JARS)

Meta-Analysis Reporting Standards (MARS)

Flow of Participants Through Each Stage of an Experiment or Quasi-Experiment

References

Index

The new Publication Manual includes changes in:

Ethics

Simplified Heading Styles

Updated guidelines for reducing bias in language

New ways to report inferential statistics and revised table of statistical abbreviations

Ways to handle data sets and media

Displaying electronic data

Emphasis on DOI (Digital Object Identifier)

The Publication Process

Pre-order the Publication Manual HERE

Common APA Style Errors

Every semester I see students make the same APA style errors over and over. Of course, I expect these errors but I also expect students to learn from my corrections; trial-and-success learning works.

In my classes (and as we note in chapter 11), I have students first write the Method section. I also have them include the Title Page. Here are some suggestions inspired by this semester's first drafts:

• It's a plan; it should be written in the future tense.
• The Title Page should follow the example in the APA Style Manual (p. 306)
• Citations in text should follow examples in the APA Style Manual (p. 84)
• All pages should be numbered and a short title included on the upper right header
• The page numbers and short title should be added using the word processor's header function
• Double space entire document
• Use the spell checker
  
• Use No Bold
• Use No underline
• Don't cross subsections
• Participants subsection should only describe participants
• Apparatus subsection should only describe equipment that will be used
• Procedure section should only describe how data will be collected

Finally, will someone who is not familiar (e.g., friend, roommate, parent, etc.) with your proposed research understand what you wish to do?

Posters

In chapter 12 we write about posters and how they have become the dominant method for conveying research results at psychology meetings. Today I put together a poster for the upcoming meeting of the Southwestern Psychological Association (SWPA) to be held in San Antonio, TX next week.

I had a conversation a few months ago with a colleague from the English Department. She's in charge of our school's first faculty research day to be held next Fall. The idea is to provide a hometown setting in which faculty who have published or presented research elsewhere to do it again on campus. She asked me about posters, apparently because they are rare at meeting of English faculty. So, I volunteered to handle the poster session for her (after sending her some pages from chapter 12, that is :-).

Here is the main graphic on the poster:



I compared the American Psychological Association's (APA) list of convention topics to the similar list of convention topics of the Association for Psychological Science (APS). The 39 topics in the green area above are the ones common to both lists. The 18 in the greenish-yellow area are the ones unique to the APA list and the 7 in the gray are unique to the APS list. Also on the poster are the APA and APS lists in alphabetical order as are an abstract (see below) and the topics that used before 1998 and the topics they use now.

My fingers are still sticky from the spray glue I used to assemble the poster. I'll be presenting it next week and hope to have some conversations with passersby about how these lists help us define psychology today.

Irritating Phrases

A new book, Damp Squid, lists the most irritating phrases in English. Written by Jeremy Butterfield, it documents many interesting facts about English words. Recently, the Telegraph listed Butterfield's collection of the ten most irritating phrases. Here they are in order:

1. At the end of the day (very British)
   
2. Fairly unique (It's either unique or not)
   
3. I personally (As opposed to...)
   
4. At this moment in time (Now)
   
5. With all due respect (I'm about to disrespect you)
   
6. Absolutely
7. It's a nightmare
8. Shouldn't of (Shouldn't have)
   
9. 24/7
10. It's not rocket science (Does anyone remember when it was rocket science?)
    

Avoid phrases like the above in your writing. Think of other phrases that are equally irritating or trite. One of my pet peeves is "chomping at the bit," it should be "champing at the bit."

Finding the mot juste or just the right word is one of writing's pleasures.

Care and Feeding of Editors

A recent column by Lynn Worsham in the Chronicle of Higher Education (September 8, 2008) discusses what academic journal editors look for in submissions to their journals.

She identifies several oft-made mistakes by authors:

• submitting the wrong type of article to a journal
• failing to proofread the submission for grammatical and careless errors
  
• citing sources incorrectly
• being unaware of previous similar research in the same journal and not citing it
• not following specific submission requirements (e.g., # of copies or no return envelope)
• submitting a conference presentation without rewriting it as a paper
• arguing with editor over rejected submissions

Other suggestions included knowing the appropriate style manual followed by a particular journal, following the journal's rules exactly, and realizing that rejection was a fact of academic life.

In our chapter 12, we cover some of the steps necessary to take a research project to completion. Finishing a research project can mean more than one thing. It could mean presenting your results orally in class or in public. Ultimately, it could mean publishing your research in a peer reviewed journal. If that's your goal, pay attention to Worsham's suggestions.

2009 Regional Psychology Association Meetings

In chapter 12 we discuss scientific meetings and more specifically, the meetings of the regional psychology associations.

Martha Boneau at APA just sent me the 2009 dates and locations of those meetings. Here they are:

2009 Meetings of the Regional Psychological Associations (sorted by date)

Feb 18-21, 2009
Southeastern Psychological Association (SEPA)
New Orleans, LA
http://www.sepaonline.com/

March 5-8, 2009
Eastern Psychological Association (EPA)
Pittsburgh, PA
http://www.easternpsychological.org/

April 2-4, 2009
Southwestern Psychological Association (SWPA)
San Antonio, TX
https://www.swpsych.org/

April 16-18, 2009
Rocky Mountain Psychological Association (RMPA)
Albuquerque, NM
http://www.rockymountainpsych.org/

April 23-26, 2009
Western Psychological Association (WPA)
Portland, OR
http://www.westernpsych.org/

April 30 - May 2, 2009
Midwestern Psychological Association (MPA)
Chicago, IL
http://www.midwesternpsych.org/

Oct 9-10, 2009
New England Psychological Association (NEPA)
Worcester, MA
http://www.nepa-info.org/

Taking Care of Rats and Pigeons: 1972-3

My last post reminded me of my undergraduate days and when I had the responsibility for the rat and pigeon lab at the University of Baltimore. The lab is no more, and that space is now an administrator's office, seems fair :-)

Our lab housed about a dozen albino rats and half as many pigeons. I was (and still am) allergic to rat dander, so I had to wear a filter mask. My job was to feed and water the animals and to clean up after them. For that, I earned minimum wage which was $2.40 an hour.

A couple of incidents still come to mind. One was the only day I was ever bitten by a rat. That happened on the day the experimental psychology class first came to meet their rats. In retrospect, it seems obvious what happened. The rats were all nervous, probably in response to the students' own anxiety, and one took it out on me. He got my left index finger. Fortunately, his upper teeth hit my fingernail, so only his lower teeth broke the skin. For a few seconds, I had a half pound white rat attached to my finger while blood streamed everywhere. After he let go and fell, I caught him and put him back in his cage. Then, I got some first aid.

The other incident involved a pigeon. I learned how to catch a loose pigeon. The lab was windowless by design, so I could control the amount of light in the room. So, one of the pigeons got loose one day and was flying around the room. Fortunately, I remembered my mentor's advice, "Wait for him to land, then turn out the lights, sneak up on him and grab him." So, I watched and when the pigeon landed on the lens of the overhead projector, I turned off the lights and slowly approached. Slowly, I placed my hands around where I imagined him to be and closed the distance between dexter and sinister (my right and left hands for the Latin-impaired) and grabbed him. Back to the light switch, one pigeon nabbed.

Pigeons, possessing eyes with cones only, are effectively night blind. So, once the lights go out they are very unlikely to move. Ahh, the good? old days.

The Arkansas Symposium for Psychology Students

The Arkansas Symposium for Psychology Students (ASPS) will hold its 24th annual meeting on April 18-19, 2008 at Arkansas State University and our own Chris Spatz will be the keynote speaker.

ASPS was founded in 1984 by Randy Smith and Ralph McKenna. The germ of their inspiration came while walking down Bourbon St. during the 1983 meeting of the Southwestern Psychological Association. The first meeting was held at Hendrix College in 1984 followed by a second meeting at Ouachita Baptist University the following year. See below for a list of the locations where ASPS has been held over the years.

That second meeting was where Chris and I first met. In fact, we roomed together. So, we have been working together for a long time now.

Here are the previous sites and keynote speakers of the Arkansas Symposium for Psychology Students:

1985	Hendrix College	March 29-30
1986	Ouachita Baptist University	April 11-12	Steve Davis
1987	Southern Arkansas University	April 3-4	Arthur J. Riopelle
1988	Arkansas Tech University	April 8-9	Richard Dana
1989	Arkansas State University	April 7-8	E. John Capaldi, Michael Prince
1990	Henderson State University	April 6-7	Nate Azrin
1991	University of Arkansas-Fayetteville	April 5-6	Elizabeth Loftus
1992	Hendrix College	April 3-4	Charles Brewer
1993	Ouachita Baptist University	April 2-3	Mark Ware
1994	Southern Arkansas University	April 8-9	Bill Hill
1995	University of Arkansas-Monticello	April 7-8	Richard Miller
1996	Arkansas Tech University	April 12-13	Craig Carson
1997	University of Central Arkansas	April 11-12	Mark Ware
1998	University of Arkansas-Fayetteville	April 3-4	Phillip Costanzo
1999	Harding University	April 16-17	Dave Myers
2000	Arkansas State University	April 7-8	Sarah Boysen
2001	Hendrix College	April 6-7	Charles Brewer
2002	Ouachita Baptist University	April 12-13	Ludy Benjamin
2003	Southern Arkansas University	April 4-5	Elizabeth Yost Hammer
2004	University of Arkansas-Fayetteville	April 4-5	Brett Pelham
2005	Arkansas Tech University	April 8-9	Sharon Roberts
2006	University of Central Arkansas	April 7-8	John Harsh
2007	University of Arkansas-Monticello	April 13-14	no invited speaker
2008	Arkansas State University	April 19-19	Chris Spatz

McKenna and Smith envisioned a low-stress, collegial conference where students and faculty could come together and celebrate research in psychology. At ASPS, all papers are accepted and there are no competitions, all in the service of friendly gathering and a good time.

By JoVE, I think they've got it.

JoVE is the acronym for the new Journal of Visualized Experiments. This biological Web site displays research protocols using video, a kind of scientific YouTube.

Here is a blog entry about Moshe Pritsker, the CEO of JoVE. He discusses new deals to distribute the videos and how the cost to produce them has increased. At present, JoVE has about 200 videos. Pritsker wants to become a purveyor of biological methods videos.

JoVE is yet another example of how technology, research, and teaching interact. Video is a powerful medium. Combining video with the Web (a la YouTube) makes it possible to distribute video widely.

In chapter 12 (p. 386), we discuss another use of media as a communication medium, that is e-posters. We anticipate that many more useful applications of technology will appear over the next few years. Successful teachers and successful students will adapt to and use these new methods.

Now we need a Web site for visualizing psychological methods and protocols.

Scientific Societies: History and Psychological

The Royal Society

In chapter 12 (p. 384) we discuss the forming of the Royal Society, the first scientific society, founded in 1662. We also mention the American Psychological Association, the Association for Psychological Science, and the seven regional psychological associations.

Scientific societies hold an important role in science. Many publish journals and nearly all hold annual meetings. Scientific societies also help scientists identify themselves professionally and give them a venue for meeting other scientists who are interested in similar topics.

The Royal Society has the longest history, naturally, and this page tells the story of the Society. Before the actual founding of the society, English scientists began meeting in what they called an "invisible college" to discuss the ideas of Francis Bacon. Two of those early scientists were Christopher Wren and Robert Boyle. Robert Hooke and Isaac Newton were two other early members. Their correspondence led Newton to develop his theory of universal gravitation.

In 1679, Hooke, then the secretary of the Royal Society, wrote to Newton inviting him to correspond about scientific topics of mutual interest to them. (See: Cohen, I. B., (1981). Newton's discovery of gravity, Scientific American, 244 (3), 166-179 for a comprehensive account.) A few years earlier, Hooke and Newton had disagreed over Newton's work on optics. So, intense was Hooke's criticism that Newton nearly gave up science.

Their new correspondence was amicable and related to planetary motion and the predicted paths of objects in space as they were influenced by other objects. After a visit by Edmund Halley, the discoverer of Halley's comet, Newton's ideas became firmer. Halley urged Newton to publish his ideas and Newton did, writing De Motu.

Psychological Societies

The American Psychological Association was founded in 1892 in the home of G. Stanley Hall. Fernberger's account tells much about the first 50 years of the association. The Association for Psychological Science was founded in 1988. This link provides a timeline of APS's history.

Information on the regional psychological associations can be found here. As we mention in chapter 12, the seven regionals are: the Eastern Psychological Association (EPA), the Midwestern Psychological Association (MPA), the New England Psychological Association (NEPA), the Rocky Mountain Psychological Association (RMPA), the Southeastern Psychological Association (SEPA), the Southwestern Psychological Association (SWPA), and the Western Psychological Association (WPA).

The seven regionals differ in size. The WPA and MPA are the largest. NEPA is the smallest. The EPA and SEPA are mid-sized and the SWPA and RMPA are slightly smaller. All of the regionals meet annually in cities within their regions. The MPA nearly always meets in Chicago (at the Palmer House Hotel) while the others move from city to city.

Many students, both undergraduate and graduate, attend the meetings of regional and national societies. The meetings provide many learning opportunities for them. Check the links above for a meeting near you and try to attend.

Edward Tufte

We briefly mention Edward Tufte in chapter 12. He deserves much more space because of his pioneering work in communicating information using graphs. A recent STANFORD Magazine article reviews his career.

He was unable to find a publisher for his first book, The Visual Display of Quantitative Information, so he started his own publishing company, Graphics Press. Today, he estimates that he has sold over 1.4 million copies of his books.

One of Tufte's contributions to our vocabularies is the word, chartjunk, the unnecessary elements often found in graphics.

In our classes (and in chapter 12), we emphasize the skills involved in creating effective and elegant graphs. Dr. Tufte also teaches a one-day course in presenting data and information, and it's half price for students.

Off to SWPA

Ed's off to the annual SWPA meeting. SWPA, the Southwestern Psychological Association, is one of the regional psychological associations we discuss in chapter 12 (p. 384).

SWPA's meeting features talks by several prominent researchers:

Through the Labyrinth: How Women Have Both Advantage and Disadvantage as Leaders: Alice Eagly, this year's Saul Sells' lecturer who is Professor and Chair of the Psychology Department and the James Padilla Chair of Arts and Sciences at Northwestern University. The winner of numerous awards and honors, Professor Eagly has two main speciality areas: attitudes and gender.


The Positive Psychology of Disability: Christopher B. Keys, who isProfessor and Chair of the Psychology Department at DePaul University. A former President of the Society for Community Research and Action (Division 27 of APA). Professor Keys has been conducting studies concerning the empowerment and strengths of people with disabilities and their families for 20 years. He helped edit the award-winning Encyclopedia of Disability and has been invited to present his research in Asia, Australia, Latin America and Europe.


Offensive Defensiveness: Why People Promote Zeal After Self-threats: Ian McGregor of York University, Toronto, Canada, has been referred to "as one of the truly bright stars in a new generation of research psychologists." He will speak on his cutting-edge laboratory work on the root causes of zealous ideological conviction and extremism.


Seeds of Hope: Effective Interventions for Relationship-Disturbed Children: David Cross is the director of the Developmental Research Lab, and Associate Director of the Institute of Child Development at Texas Christian University. For the past ten years he has been working with Dr. Karyn Purvis (Director, Institute of Child Development at TCU) to develop research-based interventions for at-risk adopted children and their families.


Different Strokes for Different Folks: the Genetic Basis of Individual Differences: SAMR invited speaker is Howard K. Gershenfeld, M.D., Ph.D., Associate Professor, Psychiatry, Internal Medicine - Clinical Geneticist , Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences, Southwestern Medical School.


Dr. William Buskist of Auburn University will present his 2005 Harry Kirke Wolfe lecture which he originally presented at the APA convention in New Orleans. This presentation is a part of a lecturer program for regional psychological associations sponsored by the APA.

I'm looking forward to an exciting few days in Ft. Worth.