Writeup
Your writeup should have four sections: Introduction, Methods, Results, and Discussion. Write it as though you actually did the experiment (instead of like you made up the data).
The writeup should include the following information:
1. Introduction: Well-motivated statement of research questions and hypotheses
a. Research question
i. Stated generally, in a way that makes the interest of the question clear.
ii. Stated specifically in terms of the particular outcome and predictor variables you’ll be testing.
b. Theoretical hypotheses
i. These are YOUR research hypotheses (not null and alternative statistical hypotheses.
ii. There are 3 potential hypotheses for a 2*2 design: one for each predictor variable and one for the interaction. You should expect to find a difference for at least two of these. If you do not expect to find a difference for the third, state that as well.
c. The research topic and hypotheses should be clearly motivated: Make sure you state WHY you have the hypotheses that you do. This could be based on previous research (which should be cited) and/or your own observations or intuitions.
2. Methods: Explanation of the methods with enough detail that the experiment could be replicated by someone else
a. Participants: number and inclusion criteria
b. Task: give enough detail that someone could replicate it. You may want to follow (and reference) previous academic work that has used a similar task.
c. Items/stimuli
i. What are they? (for example, if it’s a listening task, what will participants be hearing? If it’s a speaking task, what will they be saying?) You don’t need to list every stimulus in the paper but you should give a clear picture of what the stimuli generally are and a couple examples.
ii. Are there both targets and fillers? How many of each? How do they differ?
iii. What properties were considered when choosing the stimuli? (for example, if you made sure that all of the words were one syllable, say that! If you made sure that the fillers were the same frequency as the targets, say that! Etc)
d. Analysis: Any measurements that will be taken, or other data processing
3. Results: Descriptive and inferential statistics that address the research question/hypotheses
a. Descriptive statistics
i. Present graphs of your results: think about the clearest way to present
these in terms of getting your point across to the reader about the answer to your research question. Make sure figures are clear, with all necessary information clearly labeled on the axes and/or in captions. Make sure the figure text is big enough to be visible (it should be about as big as the main text!)
ii. Present the summary statistics corresponding to these graphs in tables.
iii. Relevant confidence intervals should be included, either in the graphs or in the summary tables.
iv. Summarise the results in words, describing what these graphs are showing.
b. Inferential statistics
i. Describe the appropriate regression model to test your research
questions, and how you will tell whether your hypotheses are correct.
ii. Provide the null and alternative hypotheses corresponding to each of your theoretical hypotheses.
iii. Present the statistical output for each scenario in a separate table.
iv. Describe the results of the statistical output in words. Walk the reader through interpreting the results of the model.
4. Discussion: Interpretation of the results
a. Summarize the results of each dataset.
i. What can be concluded about the research question based on this
dataset? Link the evidence from the statistical results to make it clear how these answer your research question.
ii. What are the limits on what we can conclude? To what extent can we be certain about the conclusion?
b. For any differences found across the two datasets, discuss why this difference occurs, based on the data.
References
At the end of your writeup, give full bibliographic info for any references you cited.