The impact of solitary confinement: How does solitary confinement impact people in prisons?
For this week our SEA prep work will focus on selecting a topic for our literature review and oral presentation assignments due in week seven. It may help to begin by reviewing the assignment details and grading criteria. For this week, please complete the following steps of the research process by addressing the following questions and tasks:
1. Identify the topic you have selected for this assignment.
- Discuss your preliminary goals for your research-In other words, what is the purpose of your research? What would you like to learn about this topic? How would you like to use this information in the future (either to conduct your own research or perhaps in a professional setting)? In other words, would you have a basic research or applied research focus for your assignment?
2. Next, let’s attempt to use some of the key research terms from week one to help set up a framework for our research by doing the following:
- Identifying the independent variable (the presumed cause)
- Identifying the dependent variable (the presumed effect)
For example, imagine I am interested in researching the impact of job skills training while incarcerated has on future recidivism rates. I might predict that my independent variable is the skills training received and the dependent variable is the recidivism rate.
3. Finally, at least one citation for a resource you are planning to use for your final paper and describe briefly (2-3 sentences) how using this resource helps illustrate your information literacy competency.
For further guidelines, please refer to the SEA Prep and Weekly Assignments Rubric 
