Marriage and Family Research Paper Read the following information carefully and

Marriage and Family Research Paper
Read the following information carefully and thoroughly. I recommend you print these instructions to reference periodically so that you meet all the requirements and deadlines.
You will post your Research Paper in Blackboard under the Content tab under Module Eight. Your paper will be checked through the SafeAssign format.
For this research paper, scan through the chapters of the textbook that we will not be covering in class (Chapters 4, 7, or 14) and choose a topic of interest to you. Use this topic to complete your research paper.
The point of this research project is not only to learn about a topic and practice research and writing skills, but to practice relating and analyzing the topic to the concepts and theories in the field of marriage, families, and relationships as discussed in your textbook.
The majority of points given for this research paper will be based on:
1) your ability to relate the topic or issue to concepts, and theories mentioned above and from your sources/textbook, (75%) and;
2) how well the paper is written (spell- and grammar-checked, complete, well written sentences, academic writing style, etc.) (25%).
Your research paper should be about current trends and issues in marriage, families, and relationships. You may include your opinion in your Conclusion only; the bulk of the paper (95%) should have a discussion of the research and findings from academic sources on the subject (.edu, .gov, .org – NO dot com’s/NO Wikipedia information/answer.com, ask.com, etc.).
RESEARCH PAPER FORMAT
The body of the paper should be double-spaced with a maximum of 1” margins, headers and footers. A “12” Times Roman font size.
Use the standard format of MLA with the following three components:
1. Cover page – List research topic, your name, and name of the class and semester. (Pg. 1)
2. Body of the paper – four pages long. Use headings throughout your paper, such as: Introduction; sub- headings differentiating issues on the topic; Analysis or Discussion; and a Conclusion. Headings help guide your readers in the direction of your thoughts or issues.
Also, you will need to reference your sources within the body of your paper (name, year, and page number). For example:
Todd (1995) argues that…(678).
Franklin, et.al. suggest the notion of… (49).
Researchers have argued that this topic is methodologically… (Smith, 1999: 34; Bartlett, 2001: 435; Calvert, et. al. 2001: 7).
Teen pregnancy in Japan is considered… (Havlin, 1998). Women and men are treated… (90)*.
The National Institute of Health’s Report on teen pregnancy states… (2000: 4).
* – if the same source is used throughout a paragraph or multiple paragraphs without
switching to another source, you may skip repeating the year and perhaps the name of the author and simply reference the page number. The point is that the reader can use your page reference to then locate which source it came from by going to your Works Cited page.
3. Works Cited Page – needs to be uniform by author in alphabetical order. (Last Page) Examples:
(journal article)
Bartlett, Thomas. 2001. How Can This Be? Journal of Sociology, Vol. 6, No. 2: 430-450.
(book)
Calvert, Roman; Simpson, Miles; and Vernon, Sylvia. 2001. Methods of Tranquility.
University Press, New York.
(government or organizational website)
www.nih.orgindexpub445. National Institute of Health. Department of Health and Human Services. Residential Care in the 21st Century. Fall, 2000.
The point is to have enough information so that anyone can find the source you are using. That information usually includes the name(s) of the authors; the year of publication; the name of the article, book, or publication with volume numbers, publishing companies, and city of publication (if book). With articles out of journals you also include the page numbers where the article is located (Journal of Social Psychology Vol. 64, No. 4: 64-91). Organizations from internet sites should have the website location, the name of the organization, the name of the resource, and year of publication. As long as the necessary location information is included and it is in a consistent format, any uniform style for your Works Cited is ok.
A list of the minimum number and types of resources to be used is as follows:
1. Two (2) peer-reviewed psychological or sociological journal articles (see attached Journals List below). This requires using the databases through the TCC Library for peer-reviewed journals. Databases such as Proquest, Ebscohost, Infotrac, Advanced Academic Search are where you will find these types of journals. You will want to get the entire article (not just the abstract); therefore you will want to check the Full Text and Peer Reviewd boxes in these databases. You can access these databases through the remote access of the TCC Learning Center (Library) system. To get the access codes, contact the TCC Learning Center. It will take time to filter through articles to find the journal articles relevant to your topic, so start early!
2. Two (2) books. One book can and should be one of your textbook because you will want to use it to relate your topic to concepts and theories discussed in the textbook.
3. One (1) article obtained from reputable organization or governmental entity off the internet (dot gov’s, or edu’s.). You will need not only the site name spelled out for your Works Cited listing, but also the name of the article, the date you secured it, and the name of the organization.
NOTE: Magazines, newspaper articles, and other internet sites are not academic sites. Google, yahoo or other general search engines may not be used as your sources. Again, do not use Wikipedia; Ask; About; Answer.com’s, etc.. You will have to go into the TCC Library site and look up academic journal articles from data base websites like Academic Premiere Search/ Ebscohost, Infotrac, Proquest, JSTOR, etc. Your TCC Librarians can help you with this and you can access these from your home/personal computer, but you will need an access code to do so. You can get codes and directions on how to get to these sites from the TCC Library if you need them. You want full-text, peer-reviewed, scholarly journal articles (not journal article reviews) from journals such as the following:
Names of Possible Journal Resources
Journal of Marriage and Families
Journal of Social Work Practice
British Journal of Social Work
American Journal of Sociology
Social Work Research
Journal of Comparative Family Studies
Families in Society
There are many more journals on issues relevant to marriage, families, and relationships so check with your Librarian.