RESEARCH IN POPULAR MEDIA CRITIQUE PAPER

Select a popular media summary of a scientific psychology study. Links to media summaries are attached below.  Compare the popular summary to the findings in the original study and summarize your findings in a critique. Points you may wish to consider include:

*    success at simplifying the original research questions & hypotheses for general audiences

*    how adequately the description of participants & procedures was conveyed

*    if the strengths and limitations of the study’s research design are effectively covered

*    how well the major findings of the original study are paraphrased in the popular summary

*    whether substantial limitations outlined in the original’s conclusions section were addressed in the popular summary

*    if the author of the popular summary suggests practical implications of the study, how reasonable are the suggestions?

Your critique should include awareness of the differences in goals & audiences of the two sources (i.e., news website for non-professionals, scientific journal). For example, the popular summary will be less detailed because it is much shorter than the original research. Simply stating the popular summary is flawed or inaccurate because the cut material was “important,” without persuasive arguments for why non-professional readers would require deeper explanation, will result in a loss of points. The critique should be about 1000 words, typed and double-spaced. Excessively short or long papers will be penalized; stay within 850 – 1150 words for full credit.