1. Complete article citation formatted in APA style. See the APA format example below for an article retrieved from an online database:
Author(s). (Year of Publication). Title of article. Journal Title, Volume (Issue Number), pages, if available. Retrieved from the electronic address, such as a general subject database or DOI number for online articles.
2. What hypothesis did the authors test?
State the relationship between the independent variable (IV) and its dependent variable(s) (DV) in one sentence. (HINT: Sometimes a well-written article title will mention the IV and DV of the research study)
INDEPENDENT VARIABLE: what was deliberately manipulated or tested in the experimental group, but not in the control group?
DEPENDENT VARIABLE: what was measured (analyzed) as a possible effect or outcome of the independent variable?
Why did the authors test this hypothesis? Why did they conduct this research? As background information for the hypothesis statement, write at least two sentences about why (according to the authors) this research expands our knowledge of biology.
3. Experimental design: Write a one to two-paragraph description of the experimental design and control group. Describe the sample size, length of the experiment, and materials being varied. Explain if a placebo was utilized.
4. Results and Conclusions: Write a one-paragraph description of the experimental results (include quantitative results, such as % or numbers, if available) and the authors conclusions. Did their experimental results support the hypothesis? Briefly explain your answer.
5. Personal Opinion: State your opinion about the article in one paragraph. Do you think this is a good experiment? What do you think of the results? Were any of the following faults present? (e.g., inadequate controls, biased sampling, sample size too small, conclusions not supported by experimental evidence, inappropriate extrapolation of the experimental group to the general population)
What did you learn from the study?
Be careful NOT to plagiarize your original research article. If you copy-paste key phrases or sentences verbatim from your article, enclose your copied information in quotation marks and properly cite the original authors according to APA style, for example, (Seo & Torabi, 2004). Using too many direct quotes is not recommended, so paraphrase using your own words as much as possible.
