01/16/08

Research Class

Research questions, variables and hypothesis.

1. What are research questions? example: US census, is just a big research project.

Research problems vs. Research Questions.

• Research Problem : problem to be solved, area of concern, general question, etc....
• eg We want to increase the use of technology in K-3 classrooms in Utah
• Research Question: a clarification of the research problem which is the focus of the research and drives the methodology chosen
• eg Does integration of technologyu into teachin in K-3 lead to higher standardized acheivement scores than traditional teaching methods alone.
• nature of the question is driving the methodology.

Researchable Research Questions - questions that can be addressed with research

• experimenter interests
• application issues
• replication issues, do these results replicate in different situations

Do they focus on a product or process, or neither?
Are the questions researchable or unresearchable?

• Researchable Questions contain empirical referents - something that can be observed and/or quantified in some way. eg the Pepsi challenge - which soda do people prefer more? Coca-Cola or Pepsi? (Coke is always couple degrees warmer)
• Unresearchable questions do not contain empirical referents, involve value judgements. eg should prayer be allowed in schools?

Essential characteristics of Good Research Questions

1. they are feasable.
2. they are clear - a. conceptual or constitutive definition = all terms in the question must be well defined and understood. should be defined sonewehre in the research statement - not necessarily in one sentence. b. operational definition = specify how the dependant variable will be measured. operationalize = how are we going to measure it.
3. they are significant, address some fundamental, important, issue.
4. they are ethical - protect participants from harm - ensure confidientiality - should subjects be deceived? if so, subjects should be debriefed afterwards

Variables: Quantitative vs. categorical

1. quantitative variables are numerical variables - continous or discontinous (discrete)
2. categorical variables - cannot be given a number - political affiliation, college major, religious affiliation

Can look for a relationship among

1. two quantative variables - height and weight
2. two categorical variables - religion and political affiliation
3. one of each - age and occupation
4. quantative made as categorical - age 0-5, 6-10, 11-20, 21-30 etc. same with income $15,000-30,000 etc.

Independant vs. Dependant variables

• independant variable - the variable that we are manipulating in the experiment, the variable we have control over. manipulated or selected. (eg gender is selected but not manipulated)
• dependent variable - what we are studying, the variable that we are measuring.
• extraneous variable - or the confound. uncontrolled factor that affect the dependent variable - the things that mess up, or could mess up, our study

Quantative Research Hypothesis

• they should be stated in declaritive form - make a statement not ask a question
• they should be based on facts/research/theory
• they should be testable
• they should be clear and concise
• if possible, they should be directional. (non directional "females GRE scores are DIFFERENT than males?") "female GRE scores are better than males" or maybe "females GRE scores are worse than males"

Qualitative Research Questions

• they are written aout a central phenomenon instead of a prediction
• not too general, not too specific.
• amenable to change as data collection progresses.
• unbiased by researcher's assumptions or hoped findings

Group Assignment

• Anxiety and test-taking

Does higher anxiety in a student produce lower test scores.

Identifying Research Articles

- What type of source is it?

1. Primary Source - original research article
2. Secondary Source - reviews, summarizes or discusses research conducted by others
3. Tertiary Source - summary of a basic topic rather than summaries of individual studies

We are supposed to always look for Primary Sources.

Is it peer reviewed?

1. Refereed journals - editors v. reviewers - blind reviews - level of journal in field
2. Non-refereed journals - summary journals, practitioner magazines, rerely see primary source articles in them

Why peer review?

• Importance of verification before dissemination - once the media disseminated the information it is hard to undo the damage - scientists arguing autism as a result of MMR vaccine never published his results in a scientific journal - claim of first human baby clone was based only on company's statement -
• greater signfcance of the finding the more important it is to ensure that the finding is valid.

Is peer review an insurance policy? NOPE!, just a check.

• not exactly - some fraudulent (or incorrect) claims may still make it through publication - Korean scientist who fabricated data supporting the landmark claim in 2004 that he created the world's first stem cells from a cloned human embryo
• peer review is another source of information for: funding allocation - quality of research/publication in scientific journals - quality of research institutions (both on departmental and university levels) - policy decisions

http://web.ebscohost.com/ehost/search?vid=1&hid=16&sid=11ec807d-8aef-4abd-b66d-5e0075f5f56c%40sessionmgr9

always choose "Journal Articles" and "Researchers" and check "Full Text"

• 2 weeks to find article
• have it approved by me by 1/30
• Initial analysis due 2/6

Hansen et al (2004a)

• More Experimental Design
• 2/20
• we are leading the discussion