How do I come up with a good topic for Senior Seminar?

Writing Tips: How do I come up with a good topic for Senior Seminar?

Senior Seminar in Psychology is a capstone course requiring that students write a comprehensive paper. Senior Seminar differs from Senior Project in that students do not collect data from subjects. Your project in Senior Seminar is a comprehensive review of the literature and not an empirical project.

Because you are not conducting an empirical research project, you will not be testing a hypothesis. And your paper will not have a clear statement of the hypothesis that you tested. Do not say in your paper that you tested a hypothesis. However, this does not mean that your paper does not have a clear focus. All good writing has a clear focus.

Instead of a hypothesis, your paper will have a purpose statement and/or thesis statement. Your thesis is the main point that you are trying to make. It is the central claim about your topic that you are going to try and support by the evidence presented in the scientific literature which you have collected, organized, and summarized in your review. Just like a hypothesis, your thesis statement must be specific enough for an assessment to be as to whether or not you have been successful at supporting your claims in your paper. Just like a hypothesis, your thesis statement should normally be located toward the end of your introduction just prior to the beginning of your review of the literature.

Your paper may have a purpose statement rather than or in addition to a thesis statement. A purpose statement makes a commitment to the reader regarding what the paper is going to be about in terms of the paper’s topic, direction, and scope. But a purpose statement differs from a thesis in that it does not indicate specific conclusions that the author is going to defend. Just like a hypothesis, your purpose statement should normally be located toward the end of your introduction just prior to the beginning of your review of the literature.

There are some very important fundamental things to remember about this project:

 Regardless of whether you decide on a purpose statement, thesis statement, or combination of both, it is absolutely essential that your topic be adequately narrowed. If your topic is too broad, then your paper is destined from the beginning to be of very poor quality. It will not be possible for you to cover the topic with the depth required for a successful senior-level university paper written to fulfill capstone course requirements.

Notice the “it will not be possible” part. This is one of those tasks that must have some decisions made correctly from the very start. You will be in a mess if you do not have a good topic to start with. Adherence to proper grammar, spelling, and APA style are all crucial to a successful paper. But if your topic is too general your paper will of necessity read more as if it was written by a 3rd grader than a senior in college. Your paper must have depth. You must become an authority on a properly narrowed topic.

•   You are writing a scientific paper. If you do your own search for writing tips online you may encounter suggestions indicating that it is acceptable for authors to state their beliefs and opinions about their topics. Not all online sources of writing tips and suggestions are for authors writing scientific papers. In a scientific paper your reader wants you to present evidence for your position. This is true whether you have conducted the research yourself or are collecting and summarizing the research of others. Do not state in your paper what you “think,” what you “feel,” or what you “believe.” Do present facts that you have identified in your research and properly cite them.
•   It is expected that your topic will continue to develop as you learn more about the subject. This is perfectly normal. You may not know your final position until your research is complete. If you knew all about it already, then there would be little point to the research. But it is important that you keep the goal of having a properly narrowed topic in mind as your learn more so that you can continue to refine both the title of your paper and the purpose or thesis of your paper.