Part 1: A description of two personal observations or experiences that you have made illustrating or exemplifying one social psychological principle or phenomenon covered in class. In other words, you will identify a principle or a phenomenon that you find interesting and write about two personal observations or experiences that both relate to this one social psychological principle or phenomenon.
Part 2: An explanation of the theory that comes closest to accounting for your observations or experiences. Although you may use the textbook or lecture as a starting point for identifying theory, you must do some outside research to support this as well. This research will take the form of a literature review of your topic from scholarly (i.e., peer-reviewed) psychology journals. You should not rely on websites (e.g., Wikipedia) or “pop psychology” sources (e.g., Psychology Today). Your paper must cite at least two peer-reviewed journal articles. You should briefly describe the methods and results of these studies as they relate to the explanation of the theory.
Part 3: An application of the theory you provided in part 2 to the real-world observations you described in part 1. To do this, describe how well the theory applies to or explains your real- world observations or experiences. Does the theory readily explain what you saw or experienced? Or does your experience not quite map onto how the theory is described in class?
If there is a discrepancy between the theory and the event, why do you think this? How could we improve the theory to account for your experience? If your theory and observations do fit each other well, describe an instance in which the theory might not explain real world situations.
Organization: Your paper should be well-organized, without spelling or grammatical errors. I recommend beginning with a brief introduction to the topic, followed by your descriptions of the events, the theory and supporting research that apply to the events, and concluding with the application of the theory to the events.
You may use these headings to help organize your paper, if you like. You should use social psychological theories, concepts, and principles precisely.
You must use proper APA style for your references in the text and the References list. The main body of your paper should be 5 double-spaced pages, and you should include a title page and references page, for a total of 7 pages.
