My main goal for the class this year is to write a paper
that is fully evidenced and explained that I am ultimately proud of. Last year,
I ended up completing a paper based on a topic that I did not have a passion
for, and the whole process was a chore. By the end of the paper, I was proud of
my work, but knew everything would have been easier if I had just chosen a
topic I was truly interested in. This year, I hope that what I love and am
truly enthusiastic about is the central focal point for my paper, ensuring that
I enjoy the class and can be excited for what I discover.
Right now, I have a job as an EEG technician at the
Scottsdale ADD Clinic. This marks my starting point for the project, as I plan
to delve into the sphere of psychology and mental disorders. I do not want to completely close off any other potential pathways for research, but I am really excited about where I am headed now.
My process has been using that base of psychology research as a launching point to explore other avenues. I have refined and narrowed down my topic based on the advice from my peers and research into the field to focus primarily on the merits of neurofeedback therapy/alternative therapy methods to prescription medication for treating mental illnesses like depression, OCD, and ADD. I have been scouring academic journals online and influential books my boss has provided me to truly grasp what ADHD is and what neurofeedback entails. The topic is something I am truly interested in, thus establishing a personal tie to me. Furthermore, it is researchable and I have found a myriad of existing literature about ADHD and even about EEG training, a relatively new but attractive form of therapy. I can already see the significance in investigating this area, due to the novelty of this form of therapy and the growing number of cases especially in the U.S of ADD and mental health disorders. This could be important in weighing the costs and benefits of prescription medication v. alternate forms of therapy. There is a gap with the research that does exist, as there are not that many comparisons of the two. I can bridge this gap by analyzing both separately and possibly getting permission to incorporate the progress of patients at the clinic to indicate success rates. All of this makes my research topic compelling and meeting the criteria for a research topic and I am very excited to get started and learn more.
My process has been using that base of psychology research as a launching point to explore other avenues. I have refined and narrowed down my topic based on the advice from my peers and research into the field to focus primarily on the merits of neurofeedback therapy/alternative therapy methods to prescription medication for treating mental illnesses like depression, OCD, and ADD. I have been scouring academic journals online and influential books my boss has provided me to truly grasp what ADHD is and what neurofeedback entails. The topic is something I am truly interested in, thus establishing a personal tie to me. Furthermore, it is researchable and I have found a myriad of existing literature about ADHD and even about EEG training, a relatively new but attractive form of therapy. I can already see the significance in investigating this area, due to the novelty of this form of therapy and the growing number of cases especially in the U.S of ADD and mental health disorders. This could be important in weighing the costs and benefits of prescription medication v. alternate forms of therapy. There is a gap with the research that does exist, as there are not that many comparisons of the two. I can bridge this gap by analyzing both separately and possibly getting permission to incorporate the progress of patients at the clinic to indicate success rates. All of this makes my research topic compelling and meeting the criteria for a research topic and I am very excited to get started and learn more.
Sunskruthi, I really appreciate how thoughtful and reflective you are in looking back at your Seminar experience and seeing where you went wrong (by picking something about which you didn't truly care). I think it's that level of reflection that will allow you not only to do rich research, but also have a fulfilling experience doing it.
ReplyDeleteI like how you're already working to consider the existing gap in the research and how you're already reflecting on what you're passionate about. I encourage you to reach out to the people at your internship and talk to them about what you're considering. I think this will help give you direction and focus that is feasible and significant.
Hey Sunskruthi! Just like Mrs. Haag said, great job reflecting on Seminar and learning from your past to make this project much better! I really like how you are taking your knowledge on mental issues and using it as a platform to boost your research, and not only as just a crutch. In my opinion, that will make your research paper just more innovative and fun to read!
ReplyDeleteOne question I have for you is this: When you work with patients, you obviously have to fill out proper forms and attend the ethics classes in order to do the research. Will this be feasible and will you be able to collect enough data in the time that we have?
Another question I have is on your broadness. I know that obviously we just started researching, and that it might take a little longer to narrow it down to a final choice, but would it not be beneficial right now to focus on one alternate therapy to ADHD rather than the entire category? I don't know exactly how much research there is, but I'm worried that if you spend a lot of time reading all of the literature about all possible forms of alternate treatment, you may end up wasting time that could have been used to narrow in on a more specific therapy.
This topic overall seems really interesting and I look forward to hearing more about it in class on Wednesday!
Hey Sunskruthi,
ReplyDeleteI think that the careful consideration you have been taking before committing to a research topic is extremely useful and will pay off later, as you said. Alternative ADHD treatments are extremely important and fascinating areas of research, so I like where you are at right now! One thing to note on the blog side of things is that some of your readers (including me) do not know what an EEG is, so in your next blog post, perhaps outlining the basics of the alternative treatments along with their acronyms would help readers out.
One question that I had was how do researchers in the medical field (specifically for ADHD) measure the success of treatments? Although you have a lot of time, I think you should already be thinking about setting up the best criteria for measuring the success of a treatment. Also, at your workplace, do they use a variety of treatments, including prescription, EEGs, and other alternatives? It is important if you are comparing treatments to have access to various treatments, since you cannot conduct a randomized clinical trials to test out different treatments for different patients (talk about paperwork!!).
Other than that, I am really excited to see how your research progresses!!