Template / Outline for Writing a Method Section
Research Experience in Psychology, Winter 2007
The purpose of a method section is to give the details about what you did to conduct your study.
After reading your method section, another researcher should be able to replicate your study
precisely. Your method section will probably be approximately 3 to 6 pages long, depending on
how complicated your procedures are and how many measures/materials you use (talk to your
faculty mentor about this).
The following outline is formatted in APA style (except for bullets and bold typeface). You can
download this document and integrate your study info into the bulleted points, and then string the
sections into prose form (also un-bold the section headings, which are bolded for emphasis right
now, and make sure everything is double-spaced). Be sure to look at several sample method
sections (i.e., from your mentor, from the research articles you collect, from other senior research
experience students), particularly from papers that have similar topics and/or methods to yours.
Be careful, however, not to copy any wording from similar Method sections.
Method
If your study is a part of a larger, ongoing research project, be sure to mention the project
and give a reference (or more than one). You can do this before the subsections or in the very
beginning of the first subsection, which is usually participants.
Participants
In one to two paragraphs, describe your participants, which usually includes the
following (not necessarily in this order):

Number of participants

Mention if special population, including if college students (“undergraduates
enrolled in an introductory psychology class”), a clinical sample (e.g., “clients at a
community mental health center”), a medical sample (e.g., “patients in a cancer
treatment program”), or some other special/select group (e.g., “employees at a large
advertising agency”) – indicate the source (e.g., introductory psychology class, public
elementary school, private mental health clinic, etc.) without giving information that
would identify the participants.

Mention selection procedures (inclusion and exclusion criteria), if applicable (e.g.,
“children scoring in the ‘moderate severity’ range on the Children’s Depression
Inventory in a school-wide screening.” “Adults scoring above X.X on Extraversion.”)

Any groupings (for independent variable) based on non-randomly-assigned
characteristics (e.g., age, grade, diagnostic status, IQ, geographic region) – and how
those classifications will be made (e.g., diagnostic interview, intelligence test, etc.)

Age (mean; give range and/or SD if children or if wide range); also give grade if
research is in a school setting

Sex: How many women (girls) and men (boys)
Colleen Conley ~ Knox College

Breakdown of racial/ethnic representation – can describe sample as a whole ( “a
predominantly Mexican American, rural sample;” “a predominantly White, uppermiddle class sample”) or give a breakdown (e.g., “78.4% White, 12.6% African
American, 9.0% other” – okay to use “other” instead of something like, “2.2% Asian
American, 3.2% Latino/a, 2.4% Native American, 1.2% biracial).

Other demographic information as it is relevant to your study (e.g., SES, geographic
region, religion, disability status, sexual orientation, immigrant status, primary
language).

Explain basis for participation – voluntary, paid, for course credit (e.g.,
“Participants received a cash stipend for their participation;” “Participants received
course credit for participating.”).

Give response/inclusion/participation rate (e.g., how many agreed to participate or
returned surveys versus declined, how many did not meet inclusion criteria, how
many participants had to be dropped because of experimenter error, equipment
malfunction, etc.). If longitudinal research, mention any attrition (and give reasons –
e.g., fatigue, not interested in follow-up, moved away, uncontactable) and compare
participants who remained in study versus those who dropped out {e.g., “Of the 167
families, 156 (93.4%) participated in the second annual assessment. Nonparticipants
at Wave 2 did not differ from participants in terms of sex [2(1) = .17, ns], ethnicity
[2 (1) = .08, ns], or depression (ts < .24, ns) at Wave 1.”}

For animal research report the genus, species, and strain number or other
identification information (e.g., source: name and location of supplier and stock
designation). Give number, sex, age, weight, and physiological condition of animals.
Specify relevant details of history (i.e., were they naive before study?; if not, what
other types of studies had they participated in?), treatment/handling (e.g., if and how
animals were euthanized after the study?).
If your faculty mentor suggests dropping/modifying any of these things or adding
anything else, follow those guidelines.
Procedure / Design
In one to two paragraphs, describe exactly what you did to complete your study (and
what participants did from start to finish), including:

How recruited participants (how contacted, what told about study) and got consent
for research (particularly if children; e.g., if did study in schools, describe permission
process from schools; passive or active consent from parents?)

Setting: where the study took place (e.g., laboratory, classroom, etc.), setup (e.g.,
individual, group, observation, interview, behavioral interaction), possibly who the
experimenter was (check with faculty mentor).

Formation of groups (e.g., randomization, self-identified).
Colleen Conley ~ Knox College

Any important details about study design (e.g., randomization, counterbalancing, and
other control features).

All relevant details walking the reader through what you/the experimenter did (e.g.,
instructions to participants, experimental procedure/manipulation) and what the
participants did – should convey to the reader a sense of what it was like to
participate in the study. Include details on sequence and timing, if relevant.

Note anything you did to reduce bias, subject reactivity or demand characteristics,
confounds (e.g., counterbalancing, experimenter blind to condition/hypotheses).

How long the session(s) lasted.

Debriefing procedures, if applicable (especially if deception or risk).
Measures / Materials
This section may also be called Stimuli or Stimulus Materials, especially in cognitive or
biological psychology research – check with your faculty mentor for the convention in your area
of research. The goal is to describe the assessment instruments (questionnaires, equipment)
and/or the materials used in your study with enough detail to be replicated.
If your study is measure-based, you will go measure by measure like this:
Title of Measure in Title Case Since Measures Usually Are (ACRONYM). (Give
reference associated with measure – usually the paper that presented it first, with validation
data). Give a one-paragraph description of each measure, including:

What it assesses (e.g., depressive symptoms, friendship quality, marital satisfaction,
quality of life, etc.)

Subscales included

Number of items (and number on each subscale if applicable)

Sample items (give one from each subscale if applicable)

Note if you modified, deleted, or added any items to the original scale

Instructions to participants (unless it’s a simple paper-and-pencil format)

Response format of measure (e.g., open-ended responses? Likert responses? – if
Likert, give anchors and numbers)

Describe scoring and/or coding system (how many coders/judges, who they are, how
they were trained, criteria they used, inter-rater reliability info)

Describe any equipment used for this measure/assessment (e.g., videorecordings,
eyetracking device, rat maze)
Colleen Conley ~ Knox College

Psychometric info: reliability (e.g., internal consistency alphas for rating scales,
temporal stability for measures assessed over time, and interrater reliability
coefficients or kappas if using a coding system), validity (discriminant, convergent,
criterion, construct, etc.), show measure is appropriate for answering your research
questions.

You may need to include measures/materials in an appendix if they are original.
If your study utilizes instruments/stimuli/apparatuses: If your research uses highly
specialized/technical equipment, apparatuses, or procedures (e.g., fMRI, eye tracker, animal
maze, Skinner box), be sure to follow the conventions for method sections in that type of
research (e.g., give brand names, voltage, dimensions, or any other relevant details). If you
created stimuli yourself, give the relevant/necessary details (i.e., so someone else could
reproduce them). For example, if you’re doing a study using words as stimuli, describe the
average length and frequency (familiarity) of the words, how those properties were
counterbalanced across conditions, etc. Look at samples from the field, particularly from your
faculty mentor.
Other helpful resources:
American Psychological Association (2001). Publication manual of the American
Psychological Association (5th ed). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.
Bem, D. J. (2003). Writing the empirical journal article. In J. M. Darley, M. P. Zanna, &
H. L. Roediger III, (Eds.) The compleat academic: A career guide. Washington, DC: American
Psychological Association.
Available at: http://www.psych.cornell.edu/dbem/writing_article.html
Cone, J. D., & Foster, S. L. (1993). Dissertations and theses from start to finish:
Psychology and related fields. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.
 Chapter 8
Colleen Conley ~ Knox College