Author Archives: Jacklynn Fitzgerald

Introducing APA’s Journal Article Reporting Standards

Earlier this year the APA revised its Journal Article Reporting Standards (JARS). Originally published in 2008, the 2018 revision provides much-needed updates to APA’s standards for publication and reviews timely issues of debate revolving around reproducibility and preregistration. In addition and for the first time, JARS incorporates guidelines for writing about qualitative/mixed methods research, meaning that the JARS is now specific to either the use of quantitative methods (JARS-Quant) or qualitative (JARS-Qual). Both JARS are accessible as open access publications and appear alongside an editorial introducing the standards within a recent issue of the American Psychologist:

JARS-Quant: Journal Article Reporting Standards for Quantitative Research in Psychology: The APA Publications and Communications Board Task Force Report

JARS-Qual: Journal Article Reporting Standards for Qualitative Primary, Qualitative Meta-Analytic, and Mixed Methods Research in Psychology: The APA Publications and Communications Board Task Force Report

Editorial: Journal Article Reporting Standards

The JARS-Quant and JARS-Qual papers are excellent resources when considered in full. Below we’ve compiled several reasons why APAGS members may be interested in considering these resources when designing and reporting results from their own research and when serving as reviewers.

JARS-Quant

  1. Guidance on how to report non-experimental research

While the JARS-Quant was originally written to offer guidance on how to report studies with experimental manipulations, the 2018 revision offers new guidance on how to report results from studies that are observational, correlational, or which use a natural design (See JARS-Quant Table 3). This expands the scope of JARS considerably and is a much-welcomed resource for those of us who complete non-experimental research.

  1. Inclusion of sophisticated statistical approaches

As the need for more sophisticated statistical approaches for analysis continues to grow, JARS-Quant now offers guidance on what to report when using structural equation modeling (SEM), Bayesian statistics, meta-analytic research methods, and single-case studies (e.g., N-of-1 studies). Inclusion of these diverse approaches to analyzing data offer students up-front transparency in terms of what APA considers appropriate for reporting results from these less ‘straight-forward’ approaches. 

  1. Reporting standards for replication studies

Given heightened interest surrounding issues of reproducibility in psychological science, JARS-Quant provides new guidelines for what to report when publishing a replication study. Authors should consider suitability of replication studies for their individual studies; yet, these guidelines offer a good starting point for what details to consider including in a manuscript so that your study can be considered for replication. Conversely, these guidelines are informative when attempting to replicate another scientist’s work. As new cultural shifts in our field that recognizes the importance and value of replicability, this provides helpful guidance on what information is useful and needed in published manuscripts in order to foster replication science. 

JARS-Qual

  1. Detailed discussion on what constitutes qualitative research and best reporting practices

The JARS-Qual includes a comprehensive yet basic primer for any reader interested in what constitutes qualitative research. In particular, the standards offer guidance regarding the number of participants that typically appear in qualitative research, the types of hypotheses that are tested, modes of data collection, and ways in which hypotheses may be validated. These guidelines further provide much needed clarification on what information needs to be reported and how. 

  1. Recommendations for reviewers reading qualitative research

As editorial board members for Translational Issues in Psychological Science, we often hear from student reviewers that they do not feel comfortable reviewing qualitative manuscripts given a lack of expertise in this arena. As such, we were thoroughly impressed to learn that detailed recommendations for reviewers appear within JARS-Qual (Table 1) to help these individuals better evaluate qualitative research integrity. These guidelines are written in lay language and provide examples of what sections should appear within a qualitative manuscript, thereby providing necessary details to keep handy when consuming qualitative research. 

  1. Inclusion of standards for mixed methods designs

As quantitative and qualitative research vary considerably in terms of design and analysis structure, it is particularly nice to see an entire section detailing how to integrate both methods (See section: Mixed Methods Article Reporting Standards [MMARS]). This makes the JARS-Qual a comprehensive tool for any investigator wishing to complete a stand-alone qualitative study or, alternatively, using limited qualitative data collection to help inform quantitative work.

 

Author Bios

Jacklynn Fitzgerald, PhD currently serves as the APAGS Member-at-Large for Research and Academic Affairs. She is a post-doctoral research fellow at the University of Wisconsin Milwaukee, Department of Psychology, where she studies the impact of psychological trauma on neural functioning during emotion and emotion regulation. Outside of the lab she considers ways training in psychological science can be improved, and is committed to advancing under-represented students in the sciences, particularly women. She can be contacted here.

Renee Cloutier, MS currently serves as the APAGS Science Committee Chair. She is a fifth year doctoral student in the Experimental Psychology/Behavioral Science program at the University of North Texas and is a F31 recipient from NIDA/NIH. She studies the role of anxiety and social context in substance use behaviors/cognitions among adolescents and emerging adults. In addition to her research, she seeks ways to promote science within psychology and devotes her time to mentoring younger students. She can be contacted here.

Acquiring a Research-Oriented Post-doc

Graduate school doesn’t last forever, which means that as you approach your defense date you must also consider how to navigate an impending job market. For students interested in research careers, a logical next-step may be to acquire a post-doc, which affords more time after school to expand research skills. Although many psychology students now choose a post-doc as their next career move, the specifics as to how to actually land one are often unclear.

Because this process doesn’t need to be as mysterious as it usually is, below we’ve compiled some tips to help students navigate the post-doc market. Since we’ve already written on the topic of landing a health services psychology (HSP)-oriented post-doc, here we cater more to readers specifically interested in research-specific options.

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4 Tips to Help you Become a Better Editor

“Write like you’re in love. Edit like you’re in charge.” – James Scott Bell

EditingHere on the APAGS blog we’ve previously offered some tips on how to become a better scientific writer, addressing ways to make it easier to put words onto paper (and finish your thesis/dissertation/manuscript!). But good writing mostly happens in between drafts one and two … or 19 and 20, as editing your own work effectively is consequential to getting your point across. So to pay homage to the skill that is fine-tuning, below I’ve assembled some tips to help you become a better editor. Hopefully they will help you transform your original ideas into digestible content.

Edit as if you were another person

You will always be your best editor when you can look at your writing from the vantage point of your audience. First, this helps remove the emotional baggage from reviewing your own piece, whether this involves feeling as if you are not good enough or – just as dangerous – as if you are Nobel Prize worthy. While we always want to feel invested in our work, and proud of the pieces we put forth, much about writing effectively has less to do about you, and everything to do about your reader. So try forgetting for a moment that you wrote what’s in front of you and ask yourself: what is the author trying to convey here? Answering this question time and again will help you identify areas that are either not clear enough or need reframing.

Print out your draft

I’m not usually an advocate for printing many things on paper these days, but when editing your writing you may consider making an exception. Seeing words on paper simply has a different effect on a reader versus seeing them on a screen. Plenty has been written about this topic, enough to ensure me that I’m not the only one that feels this way. So if your stuck in your writing and unsure how to move it forward, print out what you have thus far and read it away from your computer. Annotate edits in the margins (for old time’s sake). Another tip is that if you have multiple pages already complete, start with printing just page one and go from there. Often you’ll notice that there is something to attend to early on and you’ll need to change it right away before moving forward. So save your paper (and toner) and go one page at a time.

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5 Tips for Writing from Home

Home office “You can always find a distraction if you’re looking for one.” – Tom Kite

For those of you currently immersed in a large writing project (dissertation, anyone?), taking a day or afternoon to write from home can be a good way to maximize productivity by eliminating time spent on commute, meetings, and putting on real pants. However, as we all know, the promise of accomplishing much when writing from home is easily thwarted by the black hole known as YouTube (there are literally hours of must-see Beyoncé music videos), or the immense desire to clean your refrigerator in the middle of the afternoon. In addition, the invisible tug of e-mail doesn’t go away just because you’re away from the office. Because we’ve all been there, I’ve compiled a few tips below to help you steer clear of these distractions so you can spend more time writing (and finishing) your project.

1. Create a writing space

In your office it’s much easier to get down to work because this space was designed and organized specifically for such an endeavor. The area of your desk where the computer sits is where you write, but this space is separate from the couch where you read articles, from the table where you meet with students, and from the conference room where you attend meetings. These spaces provide expectations (and tools) for the work that will be done there, but their boundaries are harder to establish at home. As a consequence, tasks can easily bleed together and make it more difficult to carve out time for writing when away from the office. Help yourself out by dedicating a room, corner of a room, or even a corner of your kitchen table just for writing. Acknowledge that when in that space, you’re committed to writing rather than checking e-mail, answering the phone, or grading papers. Clear clutter out of the area and add in items that help you write, such pen and paper for making notes on the fly, ear-plugs or headphones, and your favorite chewing gum or mints. You may even consider putting out a specific candle or incense and burn it only when writing to more fully distinguish this space.

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6 Tips to Help You Become a Better Writer

typing

“There is nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and bleed.” – Ernest Hemingway

Being confident in your ability to formulate thoughts into words that end up as coherent text on paper is a necessary skill for succeeding in your graduate career, to say nothing of life beyond. Yet many students view good writing not as a skill—that is, something that can be learned—but as a blessing gifted to the fortunate few: like winning the lottery or having nice hair.

But as your incoming APAGS Member-at-Large, Research/Academic Focus , I’m here to tell you that writing is a skill, and becoming a better writer takes little more than practice, dedication, and time. As communicating ideas through writing is an essential aspect of psychological science, I’ve assembled some tips for how to become a better scientific writer below. They may not make academic life effortless, but they do a pretty good job at stopping the bleeding.

  1. Write what you mean…

Seems pretty simple, right? More often than not though we find ourselves knee-deep in word-muck at the end of our third paragraph, unable to decipher which variable we hypothesized to predict what outcome. At the outset, it is very easy to get wrapped up in jargon so write exactly what you mean, even if it sounds (at first blush) like a kindergartner wrote your introduction. You can always go back through your writing a second time to polish it up, but the single most important thing in writing is to manifest readable content.

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