For your first milestone, you will choose articles from the Preselected Studies

For your first milestone, you will choose articles from the Preselected Studies folder in the Assignment Guidelines and Rubrics section of the course. Topics you will be choosing from include: employee motivation, parent influence on student achievement, and prescriiption drug abuse. Each of the three topic areas consists of three different articles. To be clear, you are to select one topic and its three associated articles; you cannot pick articles across multiple topics. This selection is simply a personal preference—finding something you enjoy reading about will make this project more interesting and engaging for you.
Once you have selected your topic and its three associated articles, read them. It is recommended that you read each of them at least twice for full understanding. If you find yourself disliking the articles at this point, you can select another set, but you need to commit pretty quickly.
Once you have read and have a good understanding of the three articles, it is time to start writing your paper. You will summarize the important information in the preselected studies that you have chosen in order to guide your analysis later in the assessment. This will include how the research was designed, as well as the results and conclusions that were reached. This should be in a narrative format that flows smoothly from one topic to another.
Be sure that your submission addresses the following critical elements:
Describe the research design of each of the preselected studies that you have chosen in relation to specific methodology.
Describe the research design of each of the preselected studies that you have chosen in relation to hypothesis.
Describe the research design of each of the preselected studies that you have chosen in relation to variables and details.
Describe the research design of each of the preselected studies that you have chosen in relation selection of participants.
Describe the results of each of the studies that you chose.
Describe how the results of the studies support or do not support the research hypothesis.
Describe the conclusions that the authors in each of the chosen studies reached based on their results.
For more detailed instructions, see the following steps:
Begin with a short (2–4 sentence) introductory paragraph. A high-level descriiption of the topic would be good for this but feel free to be creative. You want to give the reader a feel for what is coming but do not go into so much detail that you lose them.
Next, take each article one at a time. For each one, cover the eight numbered points below. You have to address each one but you do not have to necessarily do it in this order (except for the first point, which really should be toward the very beginning); whatever works best for your flow is fine.
First, in narrative form, describe the article are you reviewing. This means writing a sentence that says something like, “In such and such article…” or “Per <>…..”
What is the hypothesis statement, in your own words? Careful—there may be more than one. Do not simply copy/paste a hypothesis sentence from the article. You need to show that you understand the material by paraphrasing or somehow interacting with the material directly.
What are the independent and dependent variables? It may be implied in your hypothesis statement but for full credit you need to specifically state “the independent variable is . . . ” or something along those lines.
Participants: Who were they and how were they chosen?
What were the study methods (what did they do)? You do not have to paraphrase the entire methods section but provide enough detail that if you asked a friend or family member to read it, they could understand what happened without having to refer back to the article.
Results: What did they find? Some brief reference to the statistics would be appropriate here but you do not have to go overboard; a big-picture perspective would be fine. Make sure to state if the hypothesis was supported or rejected.
Conclusion: According to the authors, what does it all mean? You may disagree with the authors, but for now just give their point of view. You will have your opportunity to critique this later in the semester.
Once you have finished with this article, circle back to the top and do it again. Repeat for all three articles. Make sure to use transitional wording so that the reader moves smoothly from one article to the next. You are free to discuss the articles in any order so if you need to move them around to make it flow better, that is perfectly acceptable.
If you have not already done so, add a title page and running head across the document. See APA manual, p. 23–24 for formatting instructions.
Finish by adding a reference page. This should include all three of your selected articles. At this point it is unlikely that you have added any additional sources, but if you have, then you must include those as well. See APA manual, p. 37 for formatting instructions.
As a final exercise, you might consider using the rubric to mock grade yourself. Looking over the paper from an instructor’s viewpoint will help you identify strengths and weaknesses which will improve both your learning and your grade. Note that you should not just mentally give yourself “yes” or “no” answers to the criteria. Instead, think, “If my instructor scores me as anything less than this, what specific argument would I make to demonstrate I deserve the higher score?” If you cannot point to something in your paper that demonstrates that you have met that criteria, the instructor probably cannot find it either.
What to Submit
Your paper must be submitted as a Microsoft Word document with double spacing, 12-point Times New Roman font, one-inch margins, running head, title page, and at least three sources cited in APA format. This submission should be approximately 2–3 pages in length (not counting title or reference page).