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Competition - post a photo you've taken of nature >>
Competition - post a photo you've taken of nature >>
Competition - post a photo you've taken of nature >>

Environmental Systems and Societies Extended Essay

Hi all,

I'm new here and it's 3 am and maybe I'm freaking out about my EE but mostly I'm just looking for someone to tell me I'm doing this right *sigh*

Anyway, I'm just getting started with my EE. I have my topic picked and thesis [roughly] written and I've found most, if not all, of my sources.

I'm going to be writing on the effects of the plastic industry and consumerism on marine life, as ocean trash is a topic I feel passionately about and have a pretty knowledgable background in already.

I probably have too many subtopics to be talking about, but here's my list so far:

•

Entanglements

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Chemicals bound to plastics from runoff

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Chemicals leeched from plastics

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Plastispheres/Invasive Species

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Ingestion

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Bioaccumulation



So my questions are these:

How many sources should I have? I mean, I'm already up to about 50 and I haven't even started writing! However, I know that all of my sources are reliable as most are either peer-reviewed studies or data from conservation groups. I feel like I'm being ridiculously thorough and I'm not entirely sure whether that's good or bad.

Also, I have access to both raw data that I would have to dig up and analyze myself through patient records at a marine mammal veterinary hospital as well as published data from scientific journals. So how would I go about that with my essay formatting? Do I treat it as an experiment or just a research essay? I'm not actually doing any experimenting, and I don't particularly want to. However, unless the vet hospital has already done research on the topic, I'm going to have to dig through thousands of records to get data about the animals they've seen (yay!). I don't want to omit said data, because as of right now it is my only data about marine mammal entanglements and ingestion, which will be one of my main subtopics in my essay.

Can any of you guys help me? I'm actually legitimately excited to write my EE and I think I've picked a solid topic that I wont get too tired of! :smile:

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