Research Assignments
Complete ONE of the following.
Submit on January 18th.
Use APA format. Go to Owl Purdue & Citation
Machine to familiarize yourself with this documenting
format.
Be critical of the sources you find: no wiki, no “freefor-all-googling”. Try to find respectable, relevant
research. (Google Scholar can help)
Download the sample APA paper on Owl Purdue and
use it as a model * this is not an option; I will not
accept another format*
Guidelines
Use 3-5 sources.
Your paper should be a combination of the
information you find in these sources & your own
observations and insight.
Information from the sources should be mostly
paraphrased (from the original), but you will be
expected to use between 2 and 5 direct quotes, as
well.
Length: 1) cover page, 2) abstract, 3) 4-6 pages
(double spaced, 12 font) of content (use
subheadings), 4) reference page
Fake Psychological
Illness
•
Movies like “One Flew OVer the Cuckoo’s Nest” and “Primal
Fear” have main characters who fake psychological illness to
avoid legal problems. Explore the incidence of defendants who
use the insanity plea and how many win “not guilty by reason of
insanity” judgments.
•
What is the legal definition of insanity?
•
Do a significant number of defendants try to use insanity as a
defence?
•
Are there documented cases of people who successfully
faked insanity? Describe any of those cases or hypothesize
why there haven’t been many of these cases.
Famous People
and Mental Illness
Research a historical figure who did or is believed to
have battle mental illness.
•
What was their illness?
•
How did it affect their life?
•
Does the illness still exist today? What is its
prevalence?
You could choose: Abraham Lincoln, Vincent Van Gogh,
King George III of England, Rosemary Kennedy, Sylvia
Plath
•
Dissociative
Amnesia
A famous case of dissociative amnesia concerns the
daughter of the last Russian tsar Nicholas II. In 1920,
people believed that an amnesiac woman named Anna
Anderson was Anastasia, the youngest daughter of the tsar.
Research the Romanov family and the conflicting evidence
surrounding Anna Anderson.
•
What is dissociative amnesia?
•
Why did Anna arouse suspicions concerning her
identity?
•
What evidence supports Anna’s claims? What evidence
disputes them?
•
What means can researchers use to verify claims like
Anna’s?
Television Violence
Watch different television shows to see how violence is depicted in
each. You could watch a news broadcast, a sitcom, a police drama, a
medical drama and a nonspecific drama.
•
•
Define act of violence
•
How many acts of violence occur overall? How many occurred in
each show?
•
Does one type of program depict more violence than another? Why
or why not?
•
What was different about the violence depicted on the different
types of shows?
•
Would you feel comfortable letting children watch the acts you saw?
Why or why not?
•
What kinds of effects can violence in television have on behavior?