Research Essay: Guidelines and Suggestions
The essay is worth 40% of your total grade. As such, it is very important that you follow the instructions
below and attend tutorials to ensure that you receive a good mark. Allow at least three weeks for
writing your essay. Plan to finish writing it several days before the due date to allow time for checking
and revision. To complete the essay, you need to follow the steps listed below:
Choose ONE of the following research questions. You need to insure that your work has focus, an
argument and an analytical discussion. You should present a clear, thoughtful, reflective and well-presented piece of work. All essays should be carefully referenced with a complete reference list.
QUESTION 1:
Recently, the Queensland Government discontinued the use of court-referred youth
conferencing, choosing instead to pursue other options for youth offenders. One of these
options is the use of boot camps, which has been controversial in other places such as the
United States. In Queensland, there is strong media and public support for these camps.
Conduct research into the use of youth boots camps in other countries, and address the
following questions:
1. What other places than Australia have these camps generally been used? What is
their background and why have they been popular?
2. Have these camps generally been effective in reducing youth offending? What
criteria have been used to determine effectiveness?
3. It is possible to ascertain whether or not these camps are cost-effective in reducing
offending?
4. Following your findings, what criminological theory/ies best explain why this type of
youth intervention either is, or is not, effective in reducing youth offending?
5. What is their likely outcome/success in Queensland, based on your findings?
QUESTION 2:
In the past two decades, crime in Australia has dropped significantly. Virtually all types of
property crimes and most types of violent crime have followed this trend. The major
exception to this has been assault, which has not dropped but rather risen almost 25% since
1996 (see chart below). Write an essay addressing the following questions:
1. Explain the basic patterns in criminal offending for the last twenty-five or so
years in Australia. What are the reasons normally provided for the decrease in
crime generally?
2. Why do rates of assault not follow the general trend in crime? Make sure to
provide accurate crime data for offenses. Also, make sure to identify what, in
your estimation, are the primary factors for the increase in assaults since the
middle of the 1990s.
3. Explain your findings with reference to one or more of the criminological theories
we look at this semester.
Source: AIC, Australian Crime Fact & Figures, 2011
QUESTION 3:
According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, “The number of female prisoners in
Australia is growing at a faster rate than males . . . The number of women behind bars has
increased 8.4 per cent over the last 12 months and 48 per cent since 2002. This compares to
the number of male prisoners which increased 0.4 per cent over the last 12 months and 29
per cent since 2002.”
Write an essay that addresses the following questions:
1. Why have women been incarcerated at a rate faster than men during the same
period? What factors explain this difference?
2. Is this is a new phenomenon?
3. What theory/ies best explains this disparity, and why?
4. What is the significance of the growing number of women in prison, from the point
of view of the theory you use to explain this trend (and your own point of view)?
Format and Guidelines:
Please refer to the APA Publication Manual, 6
th
edition, for style and referencing guidelines.
There is an online tutorial here (http://www.apastyle.org/learn/tutorials/basics-tutorial.aspx). Griffith also has an online referencing tool here
(https://app.secure.griffith.edu.au/reference_tool/index-core.php)
Assessment Criteria: You will be assessed on four criteria for the essay. These are:
1. Structure and Argument
2. Content
3. Referencing
4. Presentation
Please look at the attached marking sheet to familiarize yourself with how you will be
assessed, and what we will be looking for in your essays. Please note in particular that there
is an expected minimum of eight scholarly works that should be used in your essay. This
means that you are expected to conduct outside research, i.e. scholarly works outside of the
materials presented in the class. Also, “scholarly works” mean peer-review journal articles,
academic books, and governmental publications. If you are unsure, ask your lecturer or
tutor.
Suggestions for Writing the Essay
1. Develop your ESSAY PLAN – Take notes from your resources, make your own interpretations, jot
down references (i.e. the author, date, publication title, publication place, publisher and page
numbers).
2. Draft AN OUTLINE of the essay, with topic sentences for each paragraph.
3. Write a SUMMARY STATEMENT (introduction) at the beginning of your essay which presents your
thesis statement, as well as an overview of the essay itself.
o Also, think of your first paragraph as especially important in gaining the interest of your reader. Like a
song, if the first 20 seconds are bad, the listener is likely to turn the song off – and the same goes for
writing as well.
4. Write the body of the essay, using the outline as a guide
5. Write your CONCLUDING STATEMENT (conclusion) that brings together all the main points you have
made and makes clear to the reader what your argument is.
6. REVISE the essay – You may need to do this several times, so make sure you leave enough time
(especially if you want a tutor to have another quick look at it). Look at the MARKING GUIDE and see
if you have covered all the things we will be looking for in your essay!
7. Write a FINAL DRAFT of the essay. Make sure that it is checked for correct spelling, grammar,
punctuation and that the reference list uses a consistent and recognized citation format.
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