Bringing the semester’s research design and evidence into one IMRAD article.
MA3 functions as the portfolio’s culminating research article. This page follows the same assignment layout used in MA2, but centers the final IMRAD draft alongside the supporting artifacts that document the article’s evidence base, revision path, and remaining development spaces.
Quick jump
Use these links to move between the reflection, the embedded IMRAD article, and the related artifact surfaces gathered below.
Reflection
In my MA3 IMRAD Research Article, I progressed in several course outcomes, including Generating Inquiry, Multiple Ways of Writing, Information Literacy, Research Genre Production, Contributing Knowledge, and Revision. My final research question was, “How do rhetorical strategies used by political creators on Instagram Reels shape both the framing and the factual accuracy of information about the ICE controversy?” By this stage, my research question changed a couple times to adapt to the goals of my research. I started out with the goal to compare the rhetoric on Instagram Reels and traditional media, before narrowing the scope to just Instagram Reels for the sake of time. Then my project developed beyond identifying rhetorical strategies and political framing alone and began to examine how those strategies also shaped factual reliability. As a result, my sub-questions focused on what rhetorical strategies appeared most often, what kinds of factual problems appeared most often, how rhetoric and factual accuracy related to each other, and how audience comments reflected or reinforced the framing used in the Reels. For Multiple Ways of Writing, I used multimodality most clearly in the Results section through charts and graphs that displayed rhetorical coding patterns, fact-check verdict distributions, and comment response patterns. I made choices to choose which visuals to include by selecting only the charts that directly supported my research question, labeling them clearly, and using them to supplement my report. For Information Literacy, I chose to use a new Instagram account when gathering samples to reduce algorithmic bias. I also set a clear inclusion and exclusion criteria for Reels and comments. Lastly, I added a fact-checking system that separated factual claims from opinions and rhetorical framing. For Research Genre Production, I organized the paper into the sections required in an IMRAD article and matched the tone and structure of an academic research paper. Lastly, I progressed in Revision by using feedback from earlier assignments, drafts, and previous Major Assignments to refine my research question, strengthen the coding system, and avoid making similar mistakes.
IMRAD research article
The final MA3 article is embedded below as the main assignment artifact.
Related Artifacts
Supporting materials that document how my research turned into my final paper.
Fact-Checking Report Dashboard
This supporting artifact tracks the claim-level fact-checking behind the MA3 article. The compact summary below draws from the dedicated dashboard data, while the disclosure at the bottom opens the full report PDF inside this page when needed.
Feedback Summary and Revision Plan
My revision plans showed my ability to interpret and respond to feedback by focusing on the areas my professor pointed out most often, especially clarity, source integration, structure, and explanation of my process. In MA1, I revised the introduction to give more background on the issue before shifting into social media, improved some source integration so the paper sounded more like I was reporting the research conversation, and corrected MLA details where they were needed. In MA2, I clarified parts of my sampling plan, made my coding categories more developed, and improved the explanation of what each category was meant to analyze. Some revisions I did not fully make were adding every possible popular source for background and fully reworking all paragraphs for stronger multi-source synthesis, mainly because those changes would have required a larger rewrite than I was willing to do. Overall, the revisions I made show that I was able to take feedback, identify the main weaknesses in my drafts, and make specific changes that improved the project.
Instagram Reels Coding Matrix
The Reels coding spreadsheet demonstrates progress in Generating Inquiry, Information Literacy, Contributing Knowledge, and Revision. For Generating Inquiry, it shows how I turned my research question into coding categories, such as rhetorical appeals, political framing, and multimodal elements, so I could code the Instagram Reels while gathering samples. For Information Literacy, I used a set criteria to code each Reel, which made the coding process more consitant and repeatable. It also shows Contributing Knowledge because the coded patterns helped me draw conclusions in my Results and Discussion sections. Finally, it shows Revision because I expanded my original coding system into more detailed subcategories after I recieved feedback, which made the spreadsheet more precise and useful for analysis.