Rivas
Back to Psych 221 Projects 2013
For my project, I chose to create a Wikipedia page on the von Kries coefficient law.
Background
I chose this project because I thought that this would give me the opportunity to go very in-depth into a topic, become more well-versed in literature reviews, and learn how to write academically to a wide audience. I decided to write on the von Kries coefficient law because I had found the chromatic adaptation section the most interesting in class, and wanted to expand on my knowledge in this part of the class.
Methods
Literature Review
This was one of the most extensive parts of the process. I read several books, papers, and journals on or related to the von Kries coefficient law, its history, applications, and arguments for/against it. I sifted through all of the sources to find the ones that I felt would be most relevant to the general population, that added new and useful information, and that would fit in well with the overall vision of the Wikipedia page.
Structure
I then decided how to structure the page so that it flowed nicely and looked appealing to the reader. I decided that it would be important and relevant to include the prior history of the law so that people could see how it came about; I also included an equation section so that the reader could visually see what the law was explaining. I also felt that the evaluation and application section was important to include; this is where much of the information from journals and papers showed up. I felt this part was most interesting, because it shows the continual learning process of academia; even if a law has been around and used for more than 100 years, it does not mean that it is flawless; people will have differing opinions based on how they conduct their research and what they choose is relevant.
Sourcing
I included the sources as I wrote the paper; the majority of my Wikipedia article is an assembly of different pieces of information found from different papers. I tried to find a balance between including a lot of sources and having my paper too bogged down by citations.
Results - What you found
The wikipedia article is currently under review:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Articles_for_creation/von_Kries_Coefficient_Law
Conclusions
In this project, I learned an extensive amount of the von Kries coefficient law and, especially, on how to read journals and papers. I learned how to select relevant information from the papers and assemble them into a format that is open to the general public. I also learned how to write in a dense, consise manner, and got extensive experience in citing sources. This was a very enlightening experience, and I hope that I wrote a Wikipedia article that can be useful to someone in the future.
(included in Wikipedia page)