This course will require students to undertake a quantitatively oriented research project and provide a 10,000 word report of this study formatted for an identified scientific journal (eg Ecological Monographs).

Full-time research

None

Students will be required to write a project proposal and a comprehensive report based on independent research that is analysed using the most appropriate quantitative methods learned during the first two terms of their programme or a synthetic and critical review of a quantitative research topic. For a data analysis based project, the report should be written up to a high standard of English, in the style of a research paper appropriate for publication, including a critical analysis of the background literature and how the results fit into the context of the broader body of literature (60% of the mark). For a literature review or meta-analysis, students should identify a research question that would benefit from integration of literature across a wide range of studies, relevant to a defined thesis or proposal for a new way of thinking about a particular topic, and write a synthetic and critical review appropriate for publication. Students will be required to submit a research proposal before starting on their projects (25%) and will be given a mark for performance and diligence during the experimental and analytical parts of the project (15%) by the project supervisor.

The aim of this course is to have students undertake a quantitatively oriented independent research project, in which they will use the knowledge gained in the taught course components to design a feasible experiment, write a proposal, and implement, analyse and write up a discrete project.

By the end of this course students will be able to integrate knowledge learned across the taught components of the course to:

■ Identify a research problem and an appropriate species/system in which it can be studied

■ Design an experiment, meta-analysis or synthetic literature review that is feasible in the timeframe of the third term

■ Write a proposal that outlines the motivation for the study, a clear statement of the objectives to be addressed, the basic methods to be used and the expected outcomes and significance

■ Undertake a quantitatively oriented independent research project, meta-analysis or synthetic literature review based on this proposal

■ Write a report of the study of 7,000 - 10,000 words formatted for an identified scientific journal (e.g. Ecological Monographs, Annual Review of Ecology, Evolution and Systematics). See appendix for further information on report formatting.