Due: Monday, Feb. 24, by 7:00 a.m.

Best Practice: Draft it prior to Friday Discussion Section (Feb. 21th)

Submission: Upload to Canvas

Read the Media Effects Research

Directions:

Please complete a draft of this assignment before Friday's discussion but wait to submit the assignment until after you've had a chance to talk over the assignment in discussion class, which will give you the opportunity to ask questions and make sure you're doing the assignment correctly. Remember: You must attend discussion to receive full credit for the assignment.

Your task:

For this assignment, you will write a short essay in which you ask and develop a scientific question about media.

1. Come up with a question. Tap into your scientific curiosity; there are very few limits here, you could go in thousands of different directions. Think about things that you’re interested in, questions that you’re legitimately invested in trying to answer. The only requirements: it needs to be a question about media in some way, shape, or form, and it needs to be a question that science can attempt to answer. See the assigned reading for this week to gain a better understanding of the kinds of questions science can and can’t address. In your essay, provide a brief background (first paragraph) in which you discuss how you came to this question and clearly state the question itself.

2. Find a primary, scientific source that provides evidence that speaks to your question. More detail about what counts as a primary, scientific source and different ways to find those sources will be provided in discussion section. Read the article you found, and in your essay, briefly recap the study and, most importantly, discuss the conclusions you take away from the study as they relate to the question you’ve asked (second paragraph). Also, be sure to provide a full citation of your source on a reference page by using either APA or Chicago Style citation approach. Information on how to correctly cite a source using APA (look under periodicals) or Chicago Style are linked to their names.

3. Professor Teresa White made this video a few years ago to show you one way to search for your source through the IU Libraries site for this assignment.

4. Think about how your original question has changed in light of the evidence you collected in #2. Is there a new question that’s emerged given what you now know? Has your question been partially answered and now you want to focus on a slightly different aspect? In your essay, discuss how and why your question has changed and conclude your paper with a revised question to ask moving forward (third and final paragraph).

5. So, the essay is three paragraphs plus a full citation at the end.

Key Points:

1. Cites a primary, scientific source (10’)

2. Recaps the source and connect the evidence to your question (10’)

3. Revises the question in light of the evidence you’ve presented (10’)

Rubric: