Consortia & Workshops

Consortia 

Workshops 

  • APA Advanced Training Institute: Research Methods with Diverse Racial and Ethnic Groups

    Research Methods with Diverse Racial and Ethnic Groups



    Michigan State University East Lansing, Michigan June 1-5, 2020

    Although the topic receives little coverage in most textbooks on research methods, important advances have been made in recent decades in methods for psychological research involving racial and ethnic minority groups. The purpose of this ATI is to introduce participants to a variety of research approaches that have been used with diverse racial and ethnic groups to produce significant and useful knowledge about these populations. Participation in this ATI will help investigators to conduct psychological research that is culturally appropriate and relevant for the groups being studied.

    The ATI will be led by Dr. Frederick Leong, who is Professor of Psychology and Director of the Consortium for Multicultural Psychology Research at Michigan State University. Dr. Leong recently co-edited a special issue of Cultural Diversity and Ethnic Minority Psychology (the journal of APA Division 45) on methodologies for research with racial and ethnic minority populations. Other instructors for the ATI will come from Michigan State and other leading institutions.

    Among the topics to be covered in this ATI are: (a) Methodologies for Investigating Treatment Outcomes with Culturally Diverse Populations; (b) Archival Research and Secondary Data Analysis with Culturally Diverse Populations; (c) Culturally Sensitive Qualitative Research Methods with Diverse Populations (d) Social Network Research with Culturally Diverse Populations; (e) Evaluating Measurement Equivalence of Research Measures; (f) Integrating Social Class Measurement into Racial and Ethnic Minority Psychology Research; (g) Grant Funding for Non-Medical Research Projects; (h) Culture and Neuroscience: Methodological Strategies; and (i) Genomic Research in Ethnic Minority Communities.

    The course will be tailored to faculty, post-docs, and graduate students who aim to conduct research with racial and ethnic groups and are interested in learning about the latest methodological approaches and challenges. There are no prerequisites, but participants should come to the course with an idea for a specific research project. Participants can choose between two options and they will be divided into various teams based on the option that they have chosen:

    Option A Participants can bring their own project that they would like to discuss and receive feedback on from instructors and teammates. 

    Option B Participants can develop a project that they would like to carry out based on secondary analysis of datasets. Information regarding these archival datasets will be provided prior to the workshop.

    It is expected but not required that the teams will complete the research projects following the ATI and submit the work for publication. Up to 35 participants will be chosen to attend this ATI.

    For additional information and instructions on applying, click here.

  • E-Prime: Introduction to Programming Computerized Behavioral Tasks
    Format: Online, not-for credit course
    Time Frame: 4 weeks to complete roughly 14 to 15 hours of course work
    Price: $300 (Volume discounts available for 4 or more registrations. Students and staff of Michigan State University may also be eligible for discounts. Details available upon request.)
    Contact Information: ep101@msu.edu

    Computerized behavioral experiments are now commonplace in psychology. They are used to study everything from the most basic of cognitive and neural processes to the most complex of social interactions. Simply put, knowing how to design and program a computerized experiment is an essential skill in modern-day psychology. But, learning to program behavioral tasks can be daunting, whether you use E-Prime® or any other programming platform. The user manuals provided with the programming software make an indispensable start, but they are static and their scope may seem selective. Our experience is that even after reading the manual researchers are left wondering, "what next?"

    This online video course, "E-Prime®: Introduction to Programming Computerized Behavioral Tasks," is designed to give students hands-on experience in making computerized experiments in E-Prime®. The course was designed by and is led by Instructor David McFarlane. For years David has applied his extensive experience with behavioral research labs, computer technology, and electronic systems to making E-Prime® work for researchers like you in hands-on workshops at Michigan State University. Now that course is packaged into an online video course that you can take right at your lab.

    In this course, David takes students on a systematic step-by-step tour introducing the full range of core elements of E-Prime® 2.0. Through a series of guided exercises, you will see E-Prime® in action, and make your own working programs using text, images, sound, movies, and so on. The course even includes a lesson on using E-Prime® for fMRI and psychophysiology studies.

    David presents not only the "what" and "how", but also the "why", the core principles and concepts, sometimes with useful analogies. But it is not enough to simply have a working knowledge of a set of tools, you need to know how best to put them to use in your work. So along the way David also gives advice on best practices and habits, and warns about "gotchas" that you may run across. David also gives pointers on where to go for further information and help.

    Lessons include quizzes and simple yet effective assignments to ensure that you get practice in the skills presented. Although the course adopts E-Prime® as a platform for learning behavioral task programming, it is set in the broader context of behavioral research in general, and considers alternative programming platforms.

    Learning to program behavioral tasks can be daunting, but you don't have to scale that peak without help. Hire a guide. Take "E-Prime®: Introduction to Programming Computerized Behavioral Tasks" and get the training you need to start your expedition.

    The course is an approved Michigan State University Continuing Education Course. Successful completion of the course will result in the assignment of 1.5 CEUs (Continuing Education Units). This is an official record that provides evidence of completing the course. The official record is kept at Michigan State University's Office of the Registrar.


    Required Materials & Additional Information:

    • This course uses E-Prime® 2.0 Professional. (The course does not cover E-Prime® 3.)
    • E-Prime® must be purchased separately from Psychology Software Tools (www.pstnet.com).
    • You may enroll in the course at any time. The course should take 10 to 15 hours. We recommend that you spread this out into sessions over several days. Once enrolled you will have access to the course materials for a period of four weeks in which to complete the course.
    • Our learning platform (D2L Brightspace) prefers the following web browsers more or less in this order: Firefox, Chrome, Safari, Edge, and Internet Explorer
    • The course videos should work with HTML5 and Adobe Flash players.
    • E-Prime® is a product of Psychology Software Tools (PST). Michigan State University is not affiliated with PST or any of its products.

    Self-Registration
    (to register someone other than yourself, please contact the instructor for additional instructions):

    • Each person to be registered must have an MSU NetID (for members of MSU) or Community ID (all others). To get a Community ID, go to community.idm.msu.edu.
    • Once you have an ID, click on the "Register" button here. This will take you directly to the E-Prime® 2.0 course item at the MSU Psychology CASHNet store.
    • Enter your full e-mail address as the enrollee. (Select a Group code only if you have first contacted the instructor.) Then Add the item to your basket.
    • Make sure that everything is correct on the next page, then click "Checkout".
    • On the next page, enter reference information for the person making payment, then click "Continue Checkout".
    • On the next page, select Credit or Purchase Order, then click "Continue Checkout". (If you wish to pay by purchase order, please contact us first.)
    • If paying by credit, enter billing information on the next page, then click "Continue Checkout".
    • Once again make sure that everything is correct on the next page, then click "Submit Payment".
    • Your receipt page will appear.
    • Once registered, you may immediately access the course through the MSU D2L Brightspace system. To do that, go to d2l.msu.edu and log in with your MSU ID. Once logged in, you will find the course listed in the "My Courses" area under "Non-Credit". Click on the course link to open the Course Home screen for the course, and follow the instructions from there.

    Click here to register.