Psychology: Human Behaviour Literature Review Marking Criteria

Psychology: Human Behaviour Literature Review Marking Criteria

Selection of appropriate scholarly sources

To score well on this criterion you need to include appropriate scholarly sources (see lecture and tutorial notes for what is deemed ‘appropriate’) that are relevant to the research topic.

	Title and Abstract

Unsatisfactory	Needs	Meets	Exceeds	Outstanding
	Improvement	Expectations	Expectations	Scholarship
The title is absent	The title is present	The title is present	The title is present	The title is clear and
or irrelevant	but simply repeats	but does not	and is a clear	concise, about 10-‐
	or rewords the	clearly summarise	attempt to	12 words long,
	literature review	the main theme of	summarise the	summarises the
	question	the literature	main theme of the	main theme of the
		review	literature review. It	literature review,
			may be too long	including reference
			(more than 12	to key concepts.
			words), or miss key
			concepts.
❏ 0	❏ 0.5	❏ 1	❏ 1.5	❏ 2

The abstract is	An attempt has	An attempt has	A good attempt	A clear attempt has
absent or	been made to	been made to	has been made to	been made to
irrelevant	include an	include an	summarise the	summarise the
	abstract. The	abstract. The	literature review	literature review
	abstract is longer	abstract is longer	within 100 words.	within 100 words.
	than 100 words	than 100 words	The abstract is	The abstract
	and/or is MISSING	and/or is MISSING	MISSING one of	INCLUDES ALL of
	MOST of the key	two of the	the following	the following
	components	following features:	features: an	features: an
	needed to	an introduction to	introduction to the	introduction to the
	summarise the	the topic, a	topic, a statement	topic, a statement
	literature review.	statement of the	of the purpose of	of the purpose of
		purpose of the	the work, an	the work, an outline
		work, an outline of	outline of the main	of the main theories
		the main theories	theories or	or concepts
		or concepts	concepts discussed	discussed, and a
		discussed, and a	and a statement of	statement of
		statement of	conclusions or	conclusions or
		conclusions or	implications	implications
		implications
❏ 0	❏ 1	❏ 2	❏ 2.5	❏ 3
	Information	Literacy

Unsatisfactory	Needs	Meets	Exceeds	Outstanding
	Improvement	Expectations	Expectations	Scholarship
The review lacks	The review cites	The review relies	The review relies	The review relies
appropriate	some appropriate	mostly on	entirely on	entirely on
scholarly sources.	scholarly sources,	appropriate	appropriate	appropriate
This is because the	but also relies in	scholarly sources,	scholarly sources,	scholarly sources,
paper either 1)	part on	with infrequent	with no reference	with no reference to
relies entirely on	inappropriate	(one or two)	to inappropriate	inappropriate
inappropriate	sources (e.g. the	references to	sources.	sources.
sources (e.g. the	textbook, informal	inappropriate	Most of the	All of the scholarly
textbook, informal	website pages).	sources.	scholarly sources	sources used are
website pages), or	Many of the	Many of the	used are relevant	relevant to the
2) does not cite any	sources that are	scholarly sources	to the topic,	research topic and
research findings.	appropriate (i.e.	used are relevant	although some are	contribute
	are scholarly) are	to the topic,	slightly off track.	meaningfully to the
	not relevant to the	although some are		discussion.
	research topic.	slightly off track.

❏ 0 ❏ 2 ❏ 3 ❏ 4 ❏ 5

101184 Psychology: Human Behaviour Literature Review Marking Criteria (/35)						2

		Information Literacy
	Unsatisfactory	Needs	Meets	Exceeds	Outstanding
		Improvement	Expectations	Expectations	Scholarship
Explanation and	Reference to the	Although some	A clear attempt	A good attempt	An excellent
Interpretation of	literature included	attempt at	has been made to	has been made to	attempt has been
literature	is almost entirely	paraphrasing is	paraphrase	explain the	made to paraphrase
To score well on	through direct	present, there is a	information and	literature through	and explain the
To score well on	quotes of the	clear reliance on	explanations from	paraphrasing of	literature
this criterion you	original resources.	direct quotes and	the original source.	the information in	referenced. It is
need to paraphrase	There is no attempt	limited use of	This may still	the original	clear that the
original sources	to explain the	paraphrasing for	include very few	resources. There	student has
and explain the	literature in the	explanation.	direct quotes in	are no direct	attempted to
details of the	student’s own		appropriate	quotes of the	interpret and
research and its	words.		situations.	original sources.	understand the
outcomes in your					literature, rather
own words.					than simply repeat it
					in its original form.
	❏ 0	❏ 1	❏ 1.5	❏ 2	❏ 3

Critical evaluation	There is no attempt	There is a very	There is a clear	There is a good	An excellent
of the literature	at critical	limited attempt at	attempt at critical	attempt at critical	attempt to critically
To score well on	evaluation of the	critical evaluation	evaluation of	evaluation of	evaluate the
To score well on	literature, with only	of literature, with	literature, with	literature, with	literature, including
this criterion you	a surface level	majority of review	clear effort to	clear consideration	more than just a
need to not only	description of	focused on surface	include more than	of more than just	description of
describe the	research.	level description of	just a surface level	surface level	surface details of
research that is		the research (e.g.	description of the	details of research	the research. The
relevant to your		what was done or	research (e.g. what	(e.g. what was	paper includes a
argument or		found).	was done or	done or found),	clear explanation of
position on the			found), including	including good	why the literature is
topic, but also			some	effort to explain	important or
think more deeply			consideration of	why the research is	relevant to the
about the research			why the research is	important, and/or	overall question,
findings and how			important or what	what can be	and/or what the
they (in			can be learned	learned from the	reader can learn
combination with			from the	research reviewed.	from the combined
other findings) can			outcomes.		outcomes of the
help us learn					research included in
something about					the review.
the topic.
	❏ 0	❏ 2	❏ 3	❏ 4	❏ 6
Support from	Empirical research	Empirical research	Empirical research	Relevant empirical	Relevant empirical
empirical research	findings are not	findings are	findings are	research findings	research findings
To score well on	present, or not	present and mostly	present, are mostly	are explained and	are explained and
To score well on	relevant to the	relevant but are	relevant, and are	used to support	used to support all
this criterion you	overall argument or	not clearly related	often related to, or	most key premises.	key premises.
should use relevant	premises	to, or used as	used to support,
empirical research		support for, key	key premises.	On more than one	The function of all
to support the		premises.		occasion,	empirical research
statements made.			On many	statements are	within the paper is
Think: what		More often than	occasions,	made without	clear and all
evidence do I have		not, statements	statements are	adequate support	statements are
for this statement?		are made without	made without	from appropriate	supported by
Hint: Evidence		adequate support	adequate support	research findings.	appropriate
should be from		from appropriate	from appropriate		research findings.
empirical research!		research findings.	research findings.

❏ 0 ❏ 2 ❏ 3 ❏ 4 ❏ 6

101184 Psychology: Human Behaviour Literature Review Marking Criteria (/35)

Structure and Clarity

Structure

To score well on this criterion you should try to connect ideas together logically.

Unsatisfactory

The logic within and between each paragraph cannot be followed. There is no clear link between the research being reviewed

Needs Improvement

The logic within each paragraph can sometimes be followed, but there is little or no logical structure between paragraphs

Meets Expectations

The logic within most paragraphs is clear, and paragraph conclusions build to the overall literature review conclusion.

Exceeds Expectations

The logic within each paragraph is clear, and

the author explains how

paragraph conclusions logically combine to

support the overall literature review conclusion

❏ 0 ❏ 1 ❏ 2 ❏ 3

Clarity

To score well on this criterion you need to try to write as clearly as you can. It helps to use short sentences that each have one key idea. Also avoid heavy use of jargon (especially if the terms are not defined and explained in the paper) and try to write with formal academic style.

The paper is very unclear		The paper is sometimes
and at times difficult to		unclear. This is due to at
read. This may be due to		least one of the following
any of the following:		−	An overreliance on
−	An overreliance on		jargon that is not
	jargon that is not		explained
	explained		adequately
	adequately	− Use of very long
− Use of very long			sentences or lack of
	sentences or lack of		paragraph structure
	paragraph structure	−	Overuse of
−	Overuse of		colloquial or casual
	colloquial or casual		language
	language	− Errors in grammar or
− Errors in grammar or			sentence structure
	sentence structure		that indicate lack of
	that indicate lack of		proofreading
	proofreading

The paper is mostly clear and easy to follow. There may still be a tendency to use long sentences or rely on jargon or colloquial language but on the whole these do not impair the clarity of the paper.

The paper is clear, concise and is easy to read.

❏ 0		❏ 1
		Grammar and Style

❏ 2 ❏ 3

		Unsatisfactory
Formatting		The literature review has several
		formatting errors (title page,
		margins, line spacing, font size,
		etc.), according to the Learning
		Guide.

Needs Improvement

The literature review is mostly formatted correctly (title page, margins, line spacing, font size, etc.), according to the Learning Guide.

Meets Expectations

The literature review is formatted correctly (title page, margins, line spacing, font size, etc.), according to the Learning Guide

		❏ 0
Spelling and		There are many spelling or
Grammar		grammatical errors.

There are a few spelling or grammatical errors.

❏ 0.5

There are no spelling or grammatical errors.

❏ 1

		❏ 0
In Text References		The formatting of most in-‐text
(APA style)		references is not correct APA style

❏ 0.5

The formatting of most in-‐text references is correct APA style

❏ 1

The formatting of all in-‐text references is correct APA style

		❏ 0
Reference List		The reference list formatting is
(APA style)		mostly incorrect. It may contain
.		many APA errors or references
		that are not cited in the literature
		review. Sources cited in the
		literature review may be absent
		from the reference list.

❏ 0.5

The reference list formatting is mostly correct. It may contain systematic APA errors or a reference that was not cited in the literature review. All sources cited in the literature review are in the reference list.

❏ 1 The reference list formatting is perfect or near-‐perfect. It may contain one or two minor slips, but the vast majority of references are formatted according to APA style. All items in the reference list were cited in the literature review and sources cited in the literature review are all in the reference list.

❏ 0

❏ 0.5 ❏ 1

Psychology: Human Behaviour Literature Review Marking Criteria

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