Creating the Research Methods Section for a Psychology Term Paper

The methods section in a psychology term paper describes the research process in detail. Its aim is to illustrate how you managed to carry out your research, and what steps were taken in order to come up with certain results. The methods section in a psychology term paper should be represented in such a way as to allow your reader to repeat your research. Thus, the methodology you apply for the purpose of obtaining specific results is the main assessment tool used to estimate the effectiveness of your study. Here are some recommendations to help you deal successfully with the methods section, which is an essential part of your psychology term paper.

  1. Divide the methods section into the following subsections:
    • Participants
    • Instruments
    • Procedure.
  2. Specify the participants who were involved in your study.

    3. You are not supposed to provide enough detail so that your reader could guess the identity of people who took part in your study. However, this subsection should be accurate enough to clarify the following issues:

    • The number of people who took part in your research.
    • Participants’ gender identity, age, race and ethnic background, their social status, and place of residence.
    • Particular reasons for inviting this or that group of people to participate in your study.
  3. List the instruments you worked with in order to arrive at the results of your analysis. These instruments include the measures, materials, equipment and primary sources of information used in the course of your study.

    4. In this subsection, you should point out the following items regarding the measures used in your research:

    • The title of the measure, its origin, i.e. who developed it.
    • Particular items checked out by way of applying the specific measure.
    • The detailed process of measurement.
  4. Describe the procedure of your study. In this part of the methods section, elaborate on what you did in order to collect the data. You should specify the steps you took to come up with the results of your analysis. Here you should inform your reader about the approaches you used in order to comply with your tasks, i.e. what type of research design you applied and how you accounted for the variables. In addition, in this subsection you have to point out the tasks you gave to your participants.
  5. Proofread your paper.

    6. Once you’ve produced your piece of writing, take some time to read it carefully. Make sure it was written in the past tense. Check your grammar and spelling in order to eliminate any mistakes.