This assignment is designed to give you the opportunity to investigate a medical disorder, disease, behaviour or aspect of anatomy and physiology from an evolutionary perspective.
In this assignment, the evolutionary element is crucial; you need to establish how an evolutionary view improves our understanding of or knowledge about the disease or disorder you have chosen (lower back pain).
This will require good research skills to search for literature, evaluate the literature (only using good quality publications such as peer reviewed journal articles) and then summarising the topic you have researched using the material you have collected.
The assignment should be typed, in Times New Roman 12 pt font with double line spacing. This is an essay and as such must have an introduction a body and a conclusion. It is best to think of this as "telling a convincing story" about what you have found in your research.
There are several guides placed on Blackboard, the most appropriate is the "academic essay" tip sheet.
Introduction: In this section briefly explain why the disease or disorder you are examining is of interest, outline the potential advantage(s) of using an evolutionary perspective to explore this topic and briefly describe what the reader can expect (i.e., what follows in the rest of the essay).
Body: In the body of your essay you need to critically examine the research topic you have chosen. You need to introduce the research material you have used and develop a convincing scientific argument.
Your opinion should be based on the evidence. In the body you may use subheadings to help organize the material you are presenting. This is acceptable and encouraged. Subheadings help to keep your writing focused on the topic.
Please be sure to use topic sentences for each of your paragraphs, carefully check the structure of your paragraphs and try to link one paragraph to the next so it flows like a story. Conclusion: In the conclusion you should summarise your argument. Restate your original plan or statement about the topic you have studied and summarise the central points you have made that support your view.
Here and in the body you can identify strengths and limitations of the area you have researched. You may like to identify factors or evidence you feel are missing and need to be gathered for a stronger conclusion to be made. The focus of this essay is how you put together and present the information you have gathered. Remember to focus on your use of English, presentation and structure.
How many references are appropriate? This will depend a lot on the topic you are examining. Some topics will have been well researched while for other topics you may be making the first evolutionary analyses. A good number of references is 8. More is acceptable (within reason), less is not advised.
This will show you have examined a range of high quality resources (journal articles or books). Remember, you will need references covering the disease or disorder and other references covering the evolutionary perspectives and probably some combining the two views. Please use in-text referencing with an author and date style. Make sure you include the reference list at the end of your essay (end-text references). Ensure all of the in-text references are there, they are formatted correctly and they are in alphabetical order. References used must be referenced APA 6th edition.