How to Write a Psychology Essay Following Few
Starting work on an essay on psychology, find out if you understand everything in the task of your lecturer. Can you choose a topic yourself? How many words do you need to write? What is the deadline and are there any special requirements that you need to take into account?
If the choice of the topic is yours, then the next step is to state what you want to write about clearly. You should define the topic rather narrowly and specifically, but so that you can find enough information in the library or the internet.
Start Work but Do Not Write Yet
Top tip! By following it, you will already get more chances for a good mark compared to your classmates. Leave yourself plenty of time. We are sure that you plan to start the task in advance every time. But with this task, try really not to delay work until the last evening. They say that there are people who can write an ingenious work in the last moment just for an hour. But we never saw them. So, you won’t lose if you start earlier.
Take into account the limit of words. Psychology essays for 1000 words and 2000 words are very different. The larger the test, the more references to research you will need to do. Accordingly, it is twice as much preparatory work. Usually, the constraints are not too stringent. You can write 100–200 words more or less. But note that to shorten the text is much more complicated than to add.
Make a plan. Experienced writers can avoid this item. Although they can save time by determining in advance the structure of the text. The plan will help you to adhere to the goal, express thoughts consistently by following the logical chain. When you see, what subtopics your work will consist of, you will understand what information you still need to find. Such preparation will help you not to forget about all the details. You can always make changes to the plan, but thanks to the structure, you will see a complete picture of your work before it is written.
APA Formatting for Psychology Essay
Students of psychological faculty probably have heard of the formal writing style of the American Psychological Association. You might think that this is just an additional constraint on your imagination and creativity or the complexity of the task that your lecturer invented. But in fact, the structure of the APA is very helpful to you and those who check such texts.
APA implies a specific essay structure. Using it makes it easier to arrange your ideas in the text so that they logically follow each other:
- Introduction
- Theme 1~ point 1-3
- Theme 2~ point 4-5
- Theme 3~ point 6
- Conclusion
Formatting APA involves the requirements for page segmentation:
- Page title
- The abstract
- Main body
- References
Don’t forget about the correct quotation. It is better to take this into account at the beginning than to correct it later:
- The title of the source is to be in capitals
- In case the author’s name is not provided use initials for the title
- Capitalize the authors’ initials and name
Psychology Essay Structure Guide
Regardless of the topic of the essay, such paper looks better if it has a narrative structure from those parts: the introduction, the founding part, and conclusion.
Introduction. The first part of your text has several tasks and functions:
- Describe the topic of your essay
- Clarify why this topic is relevant
- Mark theses
- To interest readers and convince to read the work to the end
Introductory paragraphs form the first impression of your essay. If you start well and interestingly, you may be forgiven for some mistakes in this work. Therefore, the main task is to attract attention. Describe the problem, provide impressive figures and facts, tell the reader about the background so that all terms are clear when reading the essay. Some students write an introduction when the rest of the work is already written – it’s up to you.
Body paragraphs. The main part – the body of your work, is your space for expressing your opinion. In this part, it is especially important to follow the structure. Each next paragraph should contain a separate thought, while its idea follows from the previous paragraph. If you ever saw psychology essay example, you might notice the logical chain: hypothesis (idea) – your opinion – the opinion of recognized scientists (plus a reference to the research).
The conclusion. The final part summarizes your paper. You thematically repeat the main ideas and prove that you answered all the questions that were voiced in the introduction of psychology essay. Try to avoid repetitions, the student should show the possibilities of his vocabulary in the essay. The length of the conclusion is approximately the same as the entry – about 10% of your paper.
Check Your Text for Mistakes. Then Check Again
It is very disappointing to do a brilliant study, write an interesting essay, and lose points due to mistakes in the text. Therefore, be sure to read and proofread your work.
The best thing to do it not the same day you write the text. Set it aside for a while, give yourself a chance to rest from this work. After a couple of days, you are more likely to see your paper as a reader and be able to evaluate it adequately.
In addition to checking spelling and grammatical errors, make sure that you said everything you wanted to say on this topic.
Do not judge yourself too harshly. After all, college is the place where you learn and develop your skills. With each time with each new paper, you will write better and better. And the ability to formulate your thoughts and analyze information will definitely be useful to you in the future.
