As I mentioned previously, I want you to write two small papers for this course. Each paper is to briefly detail an experimental question you believe needs to be addressed. What I want you to do is consider some of the material you have read or heard about in class, and from this material derive some experimental questions. There are at least two ways this could be accomplished. The first possibility would involve identifying a gap in the current story (i.e., our "current theory") or how a current theory could be extended to a novel domain. For example, you might think of a novel application of the Rescorla-Wagner model. The other obvious way you might attack this problem is by identifying an aspect of the current story which you believe is wrong. This would entail first convincing me that there are good reasons to question the theory, and then showing me how you could address this issue experimentally.
In both cases, I believe you can use the same basic format, one which roughly conforms to that used in APA journals:
In the introduction I want you to briefly tell me about the area of concern, the issue you are going to address, and why you believe this issue needs to be addressed. In the methods section, briefly sketch out how you would go about attacking this issue. This will involve telling me what sort of subjects and apparatus you would employ, briefly describing the experimental procedure (including the appropriate controls), and how you would interpret the results. Finally, I would like you to conclude by discussing the implications of your experiment. That is, why you believe it is important and why others might be interested in it.
In writing these papers, I want you to be as concise as possible. Thus, the papers should be just a couple of pages long (single spaced, 4 pages double spaced). What I would like to see in these papers is evidence that: 1) you can think clearly about a problem area; 2) you can figure out how to attack an issue experimentally; 3) some evidence of originality; and 4) some evidence of creativity. Each of the papers will be worth 10 points.