Social Psychology Application Paper

Social Psychology Application Paper

To write a paper that takes one or more major principles of social psychology and applies it/them to one example from your life.
Relation to course objectives:
Through writing this paper you are expected to demonstrate that you have become a better social psychologist over the course of the semester, through theory integration and application.
Learning objective:
This assignment is intended to assess the degree to which you can comprehend theories that you have learned in social psychology, synthesize their implications, and apply them to your own personal experience.
Process:
A. Think about an event in your life or a world event that brings to mind a major principle that you have learned about in this class. I would recommend picking an event from your own life so that you can apply social psychological theories to something that has not previously been analyzed from a social psychological perspective. If you do choose a world event, please do not simply repeat easily google-able analyses I would like to see original thinking here.
B. Write a paper that includes 3 major components:
1) a description of the event or life example (this could be something that happened to you or merely something that you observed; it is acceptable to choose an event from the broader world based on media coverage, but please try to choose lesser-known events and be sure to provide an original analysis!
2) a summary of the social psychological research findings or principle that can explain this event;
– you should specifically refer to at least 1 theory in this section. It is helpful if you refer to principles that we covered in class, and it is a plus if you can briefly describe a study or two that best illustrates this theory. If you do describe outside studies, please cite them in text. I do not require a reference list at the end of the paper unless you bring in outside research that was not discussed in class. If you cite any studies that we did not discuss in class, please include the full APA-formatted citations at the end of your paper.
3) the application of the principle to your own example. In what specific ways does the theory that you identified apply to the example you described? For example, you might write something like self-awareness theory is the best explanation for my behavior because or I think that this event is best understood as an example of the power of normative social influence or his reaction was an example of the fundamental attribution error. Identify the specific aspects of the situation that explain why your theory is the best fit for the situation.
C. This paper should be approximately 4-6 pages long, double-spaced. Do not use a title page.
Evaluation
This paper will be graded out of a total of 25 points. Questions that I will ask for every paper include:
Is this paper clearly written and grammatically sound?
Does the writer demonstrate a clear understanding of the psychological principles in question?
Is there a clear logical link from example to theory? At the most basic level, your theory application should be an appropriate fit with your example. At a more advanced level, you should provide multiple connections from example to theory in order to establish a sophisticated grasp on the material.

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Social Psychology Application Paper