Final Project Instructions Breakdown
Your final projection has you take various aspects from the prior weeks to assemble a collection of materials on a topic of your interest. The point and purpose of this is to model a common reality of academic work: building up a set of resources that may contribute to all aspects of a project. On top of this, while most academics will read outside their areas of specialization, each new project will generally build upon prior ones. Foundational literature reviews get augmented and updated with new information and insights. Older datasets may be combined with new waves of the same variables for longitudinal analyses; you may look to new datasets for key variables that other ones missed, allowing for seeing the feasibility of expanding or updating analyses.
• Here, you’re doing a pretty traditional annotation. Having annotations for (most) everything you read in an academic context allows you to have a repository of resources that you can turn to in your own work. Tasked with a final paper in another class and you can pick a topic of interest to you? You can turn to some of the literature you’ve already collected for inspiration!
• Informally, you may find that a particular approach to annotating/notetaking on things you’ve read works better for you. That’s great and actually something to work toward since it’ll make the use of the annotations that much stronger.
As a student, one thing that I know is a constant concern and worry is plagiarism, especially reusing work from one class in another. The way to think about it is: if you focused on issues of income and gender in this class, what do you do in another class if you want to approach that topic again? You can’t reuse the written work from one class to another (just submit the same thing to another professor) but you can definitely use some of your resources again. That knowledge and information you’ve gathered and gleaned do not need to be abandoned from course to course. If you look up articles from your professors, you’ll notice that they often have some pretty constant citations across their work, but their references lists are not identical. Same sort of thing here.
Final Project Instructions Breakdown
Final Project Instructions and Examples 2
So, what do you have to actually do/turn in? Note that next to each I specify which prior assignments that section is pulling from.
• Topic/Problem Overview (Project Idea) o You need to write 300-500 words that introduce your topic/problem,
motivate interest in it, and highlight the key variables of interest to you, both your primary dependent variable and your three independent variables.
• Annotated Bibliography (Exercises 1 & 2) o You need to provide a properly formatted APA citation for your 5
academic, peer review articles. Each entry needs to also have an annotation (approximately ½ to ¾ of a page each) that contains a summary, assessment, and reflection.
• Hypotheses (Lab & Project Idea) o You need to write three separate hypotheses. They should make logical
sense with what you’ve assembled thus far: they need to map onto the articles you’ve just annotated and have a clearly articulated independent variable and how (not why!) it may influence your dependent variable.
• Dataset/Data source (Exercises 3 & 4) o You need to find one dataset or data source. It needs to apply to your
topic with specific focus on your dependent variable. § If your project is how do race, gender, and age influence income,
income is the dependent variable so that is the most important thing for your dataset to contain/address
§ It can be a dataset on ICPSR, it can be an archive you’ve found in one of the databases, or something else. It can be qualitative or quantitative. You can search through other databases that contain datasets (there are some linked on the library). The idea is: you want it to be something that you could potentially explore.
o Please provide a summary (no more than a paragraph) of the dataset: what is, where it’s from/who made. Make sure to include relevant information (year(s), regions/states, groups).
o Please provide a short paragraph explaining why you think this dataset or data source is relevant for the project overall.
Final Project Instructions Breakdown
Final Project Instructions and Examples 3
How Can This Be Structured Below is a general mock-up of what to do in each section. You can use this approach to formatting/headings. In general, use standard, college paper formatting: size 12 Times New Roman typeface, double-spaced, 1” margins, etc. Topic Overview Introduce your topic. Let us know what it is, why it matters. Here, you really
can think of this as an almost introduction to a paper: you want to grab our attention,
motivate our interest in your topic, and also provide us with some level of specificity
on where you’re going to focus. So, a key difference here will be that rather than
having some sort of specific thesis that works for a traditional essay, you can utilize
a more summative or even focused closure at this point. For example, “Overall, these
materials are assembled for a project looking into how *your three independent
variables* may influence *your dependent variable*.” Variants of this gives a clear
and focused note for your reader as to how to read your project.
Annotated Bibliography Sweet, P.L. (2019). The sociology of gaslighting. American Sociological Review,
84(5), 851–875.
In the first section of this annotation, you need to provide a summary. Aim
for 50-100 words that give a clear and focused idea of what the resource is and does.
For Sweet’s article, I would probably write something like:
Final Project Instructions and Examples 4
“Sweet argues for a sociological theory of gaslighting so that we can
accurately and consistently identify within and across contexts. Key to Sweet’s
argument is that gaslighting is rooted in power inequalities, with a specific focus on
how the micro-interactional specificities of gaslighting are reflective of/rooted in
broader, macro-level structures. More specifically, ‘gaslighting dynamics are made
possible and effective due to gender-based stereotypes, intersecting inequalities, and
institutional vulnerabilities’ (869). In particular, gaslighting is gendered and wielded
more predominately against women.”
In the second section of this annotation, you need to provide an assessment
of this source. I find assessment to especially useful for reflecting upon the strength
of the case they make initially (as you move through your studies on a topic, your
annotations should begin to include overt and explicit notes about other readings it
connects to. Depending upon how much specificity you added in the first part, this
may be shorter or longer, depending upon need. Here probably 75-125 is more
realistic. At this juncture, evaluating the strength of their argument is especially
relevant. What I may write is something like:
“Since Sweet’s focus is on issues of power and inequity, and her literature
review centers issues of gender within the gaslighting specifically, her case draws a
larger research project, here focusing on domestic violence survivors. The
methodological approach (page 857) Sweet uses here centers on life story interviews
Final Project Instructions and Examples 5
with 43 DV survivors. She conducted multiple rounds of interviews, provides a
detailed approach to her coding scheme, and highlights triangulating her methods.
Overall, her methodological approach is strong and provides a solid, empirical
foundation for her theoretical argument.”
Finally, you need to supply a reflection. The reflection provides two key
things to think about: how is this resource useful for your thinking in general and
also for this particular project. Aim for about 50-100 words. Here is what I may
write:
“Overall, Sweet’s article is especially useful for thinking about and identifying
how micro-interactions are consistently rooted in broader, macro-structures. More
specifically for this project, Sweet’s article is especially useful in that its focus on
power inequities are a key facet for identifying what may be called
microaggressions. While Sweet does provide a thought experiment to apply her
theory more broadly, the particular focus on gender inequity is especially relevant,
with women.”
And once you’ve finished this, go onto your next citation and its annotation.
Keep in mind that these should be alphabetical.
Hypotheses
Final Project Instructions and Examples 6
Here you are just presenting three hypotheses. No need to explain why since
that should be clear from what you’ve already presented. While I have not presented
a larger study idea to you, let’s say that I’m interested in negative workplace
interactions, wanting to understand how employees from marginalized backgrounds
may experience being treated poorly. Notice that the hypothesis is clear and focused.
The independent variable (gender) is implied but it’s clear that it is hypothesized to
influence the dependent variable (negative interactions) with it being more
specifically which group will experience it more in a comparative sense. I’ve also
provided a second example so you can see that you can say the same general
structure in another way.
The first hypothesis is: In workplaces, women are much more likely than men
to report negative interactions in the workplace.
The second hypothesis is: Employees of color experience more negative
interactions in the workplace than white employees.
Dataset/Data source
Finally, I want you to find a dataset that in some way relates to your topic.
I’m not expecting perfection here of it representing every variable of interest to you.
But I do want you to find something that is related to your general topic. So, if my
topic here is about workplaces, inequality, and negative interactions, I’d want to see
Final Project Instructions and Examples 7
if I could find a dataset that surveyed people about their work experiences. I am
going to provide two examples here. The first will utilize the GSS, since searching
for particular variables is a bit easier; the second will utilize ICPSR/Archives as an
example. Without further ado, example number 1:
Example #1
One dataset well suited for investigating this topic is the General Social
Survey. when I search for “racism” I find that they have a variable named
“wkracism” and the survey question was “Do you feel in any way discriminated
against on your job because of your race or ethnic origin?” They also have a variant
for sexism. Throughout the datasets, they have a variety of questions about
demographics, work, and experiences of discrimination, highlighting this as a
potentially useful dataset for this project.” The GSS is a biannual, representative
survey, which also allows for longitudinal analysis of these issues.
This dataset is especially relevant for this project because it appears to contain
multiple relevant variables, allows for possible, longitudinal analysis, and can be
applied to a broad population.
Example #2
Through a search on the ICPSR looking into workplace inequality, the
resource “Data and Code for: “The Value of Working Conditions in the United States
and Implications for the Structure of Wages” by Maestas, Mullen, Powell, von
Final Project Instructions and Examples 8
Wachter, and Wenger is a study of wage inequality with a particular focus on working
conditions. Importantly, while they are centered on income in particular, because of
the broader focus on working conditions and the interactional components therein,
this is a potentially useful dataset for this project. While it is posted for replication
purposes of a study by the authors (hence the “Data and Code”) it can be used for
additional purposes.
While the specifics outlined by the creators of the dataset don’t automatically
all my variables of interest, the investigation of workplace conditions may provide
additional complexity for analysis by attending to a variety of conditions, which
setup specific interactional contexts to be investigated.
Example #3
Utilizing ArchiveGrid and search for archives related to “workplace racism,”
the collection “Aundrie Robinson papers 1987-2000”, housed at the New York
Public Library, provides an opportunity for a focused analysis of the issue. Because
Robinson’s focus is on Vermont, it allows for a deep dive into a particular aspect and
set of variables. The collection information notes it also includes a particular focus
on public schools, which may be especially useful for investigating workplace issues
in a particular field of employment.
The Robinson papers are an intriguing opportunity for a more focused,
historical analysis of a key context. While it would likely lack broad generalizability,
Final Project Instructions and Examples 9
it can provide an opportunity for identifying potential processes and pathways that
are obscured by surveys. By attending to educational settings, we may be able to see
how inequalities operate in a very particular setting.
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What are the components of the final project?,
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How should the Topic/Problem Overview be written?,
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What structure is required for the Annotated Bibliography?,
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How should the Hypotheses be formulated?,
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What are the requirements for selecting a Dataset/Data Source?
