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INFORMATION BELOW IS FROM
POSSIBLE TEXTBOOKS, WHICH YOU MAY USE TO
GUIDE YOUR PROJECT.
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Survey
or Other
Action Research Project |
Have an action research
project idea? |
Textbook: Nardi, P. M.
(2006). Doing survey research: A
guide to quantitative methods.
(2nd ed.) Boston: Pearson.
The Action Research Project is
typically an applied study, which is
short on library research and long
on actual survey, focus group, or
other active data collection and
analysis. Talk with your advisor in
advance, and submit your proposal to
the faculty. You can use a proposal
prepared in another course (e.g., CA
517).
Project Organization
APA 1.06
Title Page
Use a
descriptive scholarly title, which
clearly explains the paper’s
content—NOT an attention-getter.
Give your name, Park University,
date.
APA 1.07
Abstract (100 -150
word summary of the question,
method, and results)
APA 1.08
I. Introduction
This is
the background to the problem.
A.
Research question.
1.
A brief history of interest
in the area.
2.
Specify unresolved issues,
theoretical questions, and/or social
concerns.
3.
Rationale for the study.
B.
Review of Literature. A review of
literature is an examination of key
peer-reviewed journal articles on
the topic. In an action research
project, this might be a brief
overview of theory building in the
field. Group information according
to ideas, NOT according to research
articles. This section is NOT an
annotated bibliography. Please use
subheadings to generally describe
each idea.
1.
Paragraphs about first idea from
review of literature.
2.
Paragraphs about second idea from
review of literature.
3.
Paragraphs about third idea from
review of literature.
C.
Problem Statement -- Drawing from
the literature review of 20-50
sources, explain the ideas you plan
to investigate. Include the
following:
1.
Identify variables (dependent
and independent variables).
2.
Delineate the research
problem to explain the relationships
expected among variables (research
questions or hypotheses).
APA
1.09 Method
1.
Description of Method
a.
Describe why the research
method (e.g., survey research) is
used.
2.
Instruments or measures
a.
Operational definitions of
dependent and independent variables
b.
Instrument – rationale for
the measure to be used (e.g.,
questionnaire, focus group,
interview).
3.
Participants and procedures
a.
Selection of subjects (i.e.,
who and how to get them -- sampling
procedure).
b.
Explain how materials will be
distributed.
c.
Describe how data will be
collected.
d.
Describe how data will be
analyzed.
APA
1.10 Results
APA
1.11 Discussion
APA
1.13 References
(emphasize peer-reviewed articles in the field
of communication and leadership).
Each reference listing needs to be cited
in your final proposal and each
citation in your final proposal will
be in the reference list.
APA
1.14 Appendix (e.g.,
text under study, measure or unpublished test and its
validation, the printout of results
from surveymonkey.com).
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Survey Monkey
If using a measure, you can use a measure that already
exists or create your own measure. For an experiment, you might have
subjects complete the survey (pre-treatment), then do the
experimental treatment, then repeat the measure (post-treatment).
You
will want to write your questions in advance so you have an idea of
what you need to ask. You'll want to decide whether to ask
open-ended or close-ended questions or both. Here is some information
about
types of questions from San Diego State University:
How Do I
Know Which Type of Question to Use?
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Type of question... |
Best Used for... |
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Open-ended |
Breaking the ice
in an interview; when respondents' own words are important;
when the surveyor doesn't know all the possible answers.
If you use an interview, you will need a script of all your
questions. |
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Closed-ended |
Collecting rank
ordered data; when all response choices are known; when
quantitative statistical results are desired. |
Likert-scale
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To assess a
person's feelings about something. |
Multiple-choice
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When there are a
finite number of options (remember to instruct respondents
as to the number of answers to select). |
Ordinal
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To rate things in
relation to other things. |
Categorical
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When the answers
are categories, and each respondent must fall into exactly
one of them. |
Numerical
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For real numbers,
like age, number of months, etc. |
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SurveyMonkey.com is a free service for data collection. More
sophisticated data collection and analysis can be purchased, but
you'll be able to do an array of work with the free service.
Everything is kept confidential on data collection so you don't know
who says what.
Click here
to go to SurveyMonkey. I've never had any problem with the
service.
Step 1: Create an account.
Step 2: Create your survey.
The key link tabs are at the top. Select
"Create Survey."
To create the survey,
start from scratch.
First select the colors.
Then enter questions you want to ask in the
order you want to ask them. Keep it short. Ask ONLY
questions you need answered. Use the dropdown menu to select
the type of question.
Make sure your questions are clear and have a single idea in each
question.
Add a introductory page
and thank you page.
You can select the colors you like.
You'll
want to proof your survey and make sure it looks like you want.
You might want to have a
friend test your survey to see if everything is clear.
When your survey is done and you have previewed it, go to
"Collect Responses." You'll need the url so you can collect
data. Here is my example,
click here.
Step 3: Email people about your survey. This will be a long url because it will go to your specific survey.
Step 4: Analyze the results by going to
the "Analyze Results" tab to see the answers.
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Reading Summary
Quoted directly or
closely adapted from
Nardi, P. M. (2006). Doing survey
research: A guide to quantitative
methods. (2nd ed.) Boston: Pearson.
For use by students who have enrolled in
the course and purchased this textbook.
This information is protected by the
publisher's copyright and is for use
only in this course. |
 |
Outline
1. Why
We Do Research.
Everyday Thinking.
Scientific Thinking.
The
Purposes of Scientific Research.
Research Methods.
2. Finding Ideas to Research.
Generating Topics.
Searching for Research.
Literature Reviews.
Theory
and Reasoning.
The
Ethics of Research.
3. Designing Research: Concepts,
Hypotheses, and Measurement.
Variables and Hypothesis.
Levels
of Measurement.
Scales
and Indexes.
Accuracy and Consistency in
Measurement.
4. Developing a Questionnaire.
Using
Questionnaires in Survey
Research.
Conceptualizing the Task.
Measuring Attitudes and
Opinions.
Measuring Behavior.
Demographics.
Formatting the Questionnaire.
Online
Survey Design.
Pilot
Testing the Questionnaire.
Coding
Questionnaires.
Ethical
Concerns in Questionnaire
Design.
Finding
Respondents.
5. Sampling.
Some
Basic Sampling Concepts.
Probability Sampling.
Nonprobability Sampling.
Cross-Sectional and Longitudinal
Studies.
Sample
Size.
6. Presenting Data: Descriptive
Statistics.
Presenting Univariate Data.
The
Normal Curve and Z-Scores.
7. Analyzing Data: Bivariate
Relationships.
Presenting Nominal and Ordinal
Data In Tables.
Testing
Bivariate Relationships.
8. Analyzing Data: Comparing
Means.
T-Tests.
Analysis of Variance (ANOVA).
Differences not Strength.
9. Analyzing Data: Multiple
Variables.
Elaborating Relationships:
Control Variables.
Multiple Relationships.
10. Presenting Results, Making
Conclusions, and Writing Reports.
Interpretations and Conclusions.
Audiences and Reports.
The
Journey Finishes.
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Chapter One
WHY WE DO RESEARCH
Quoted directly or
closely adapted from
Nardi, P. M. (2006). Doing survey
research: A guide to quantitative
methods. (2nd ed.) Boston: Pearson.
For use by students who have enrolled in
the course and purchased this textbook.
This information is protected by the
publisher's copyright and is for use
only in this course. |
|
Learning Goals
In
this chapter, the differences
between everyday thinking and
scientific thinking are discussed.
An argument is made about the
advantages of doing survey research
and understanding various kinds of
research: exploratory, descriptive,
explanatory, and evaluation. The
chapter concludes with a comparison
of quantitative and qualitative
research methods. By the conclusion,
you should be able to give examples
of everyday thinking, discuss the
components of scientific reasoning,
list the different types of research
methods, and describe them.
The
purpose of this chapter is to
understand that the quantitative
research method is one of many
different ways people come to
understand the world around them.
Some argue that the social and
behavioral sciences (such as
sociology, psychology, political
science, and anthropology) are not
“real sciences” and that any
attempts to mimic them just do not
work. After all, social sciences
deal with human
behavior, that is, it is governed by
free will and the vagaries of every
day life. Science just won’t
do.
Engaging students in a debate about
what is science and what is not is a
good
way to begin a course that
emphasizes the more scientific,
quantifiable, and statistical
methods used to gather data. The
outcome could be a solid
understanding that the scientific
method itself might also be a
“social construction,” albeit one
that has been verified over time and
has withstood numerous attempts to
change it.
Equally productive is to help
students arrive at an awareness of
the many ways throughout a typical
day they engage in both “scientific”
methods and “everyday thinking” with
its inaccurate generalizations and
sampling techniques. This allows
them
to see that we manage to survive
without scientific reasoning in many
daily routines, yet for many
important decisions we depend on a
more structured and systematic
method. This also gets students to
see that they already know some
quantitative methods and that the
course will build on their strengths
and develop the techniques in more
depth.
It
goes without saying that many
students are frightened, worried,
and anxious about the quantitative
methods or statistics course. This
is often not an elective chosen to
fill out their schedule, but a
requirement for their major.
Whatever can be done the first day
to alleviate these concerns should
be done. And one way is to engage
them in a discussion of what they
already know that could be helpful
in learning the course’s material.
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Chapter Two
FINDING IDEAS TO RESEARCH
Quoted directly or
closely adapted from
Nardi, P. M. (2006). Doing survey
research: A guide to quantitative
methods. (2nd ed.) Boston: Pearson.
For use by students who have enrolled in
the course and purchased this textbook.
This information is protected by the
publisher's copyright and is for use
only in this course. |
|
Learning Goals
Discovering topics to study by
searching for research ideas and
finding existing studies is one of
the goals of this chapter. Learning
to write a good literature review is
discussed, especially in the context
of using theory to guide your
research. The chapter also raises
the ethical issues involved in doing
research. By the end of the chapter
you should be able to search for
topics in the library and in
computer databases, write a coherent
and focused review of the research
literature, and raise the ethical
concerns various kinds of research
topics might create.
Students
often
wonder where to begin a research
project. Too many times, they have a
very large topic that is virtually
impossible to study and they need to
learn how to narrow it to something
more manageable. Understanding how
to do a good library search and
literature review is an important
step in the research process. If
often
helps to bring in examples of literature reviews from journal articles
and show the students what goes into
writing them. Too
often
people begin by summarizing one
study
after
another without any attempt at
distilling key themes or organizing
them in any coherent way.
All
research requires attention to
ethics and ethical matters should be
a major focus of the discussion.
Ethical issues are easily
illustrated with actual examples
from research studies and by
presenting situations that can
result in
different
ethical dilemmas and
interpretations. The key goal is to
open
students’
eyes
to the impact of
what they are doing, not just to
have them come up with a definite
solution to an ethical
situation.
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Chapter Three
DESIGNING RESEARCH:
CONCEPTS, HYPOTHESES, AND
MEASUREMENT
Quoted directly or
closely adapted from
Nardi, P. M. (2006). Doing survey
research: A guide to quantitative
methods. (2nd ed.) Boston: Pearson.
For use by students who have enrolled in
the course and purchased this textbook.
This information is protected by the
publisher's copyright and is for use
only in this course. |
|
Learning Goals
Central to doing survey research is
understanding the idea of
operationalization and how to go
from ideas to concepts to variables.
Learning the various levels of
measurement is also essential for
analyzing data. This chapter
discusses how to write
hypotheses using independent and
dependent variables and how to
evaluate the reliability and
validity of measures. By the end of
the chapter you should be able to
distinguish the different levels of
measurement: nominal, ordinal, and
interval/ratio; discuss the various
kinds of reliability and validity;
and write one-directional,
twodirectional, and null
hypotheses.
This
chapter is central to the use of
statistics later in the book.
Decisions about which statistic to
use are typically based on their
levels of measurement, so it is
crucial that you spend time working
through the topics in Chapter 3.
These ideas can be difficult ones to
grasp initially, especially if you
are unfamiliar with research. If you
have questions, be sure to talk to
your advisor.
Although many of the concepts have
everyday meanings (such as reliable,
valid, hypothesize, median) slightly
different from the scientific usage,
it does facilitate learning to think
about how you use them in ordinary
conversations. In so doing, the
terms and concepts might seem less
foreign to your.
It
is also important to communicate
that how researchers decide to
measure a concept can affect the
subsequent data analysis and
interpretations. Think about
“trade-offs” decisions and how no
study can be perfectly designed,
which helps to illustrate that some
choices even at these early stages
of research can have differing
impacts later on.
This is also a good time to think
about the “art” of doing research,
that is, to think about the creative
element in the design of research.
When researchers have to construct
their own measurements, to develop
interesting and unique research
questions or hypotheses, and to
decide on which concepts to assess,
they have the
opportunity to create innovative
work. The easy way is to simply do
what everyone else has, but
the imaginative route is to do
something unique.
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Chapter Four
DEVELOPING A QUESTIONNAIRE
Quoted directly or
closely adapted from
Nardi, P. M. (2006). Doing survey
research: A guide to quantitative
methods. (2nd ed.) Boston: Pearson.
For use by students who have enrolled in
the course and purchased this textbook.
This information is protected by the
publisher's copyright and is for use
only in this course. |
|
Learning Goals
In
this chapter you will read about the
strengths and weaknesses of
different types of
survey methods. You will also learn
how to design a questionnaire: How
to write attitude, behavior,
and demographic questions and format
a survey. Coding responses and
preparing data for computer analysis
are important skills discussed as
well. By the end of the chapter, you
should be able to critique poorly
written questionnaires, write a good
questionnaire for distribution in a
small study, and understand the
different ways of designing
questions and format for surveys.
Writing a questionnaire is a creative task that comes more
easily to some than to
others. Faced with a blank screen or
piece of paper, many people have no
idea where or how to begin. This
chapter provides some guidelines
about putting together a good survey
for beginners.
Like
any writing assignment, drafts
should be reviewed and comments
provided on early versions of any
survey. It is important that enough
time be planned to allow for
rewrites and learning how to write a
survey good enough to distribute.
One useful task is to have other
students in the course or friends be
respondents for your survey. They
can “take” the survey and provide
feedback before a final version is
printed or put on SurveyMonkey and
distributed.
Sometimes it helps to think about
and to talk out loud about what you
want to know. Too often students
have a very vague or broad idea
about what to study. This makes it
difficult to begin to write a clear
and concise questionnaire. Carry on
a conversation with a friend about
the topic. How would you begin? What
kinds of things would you like to
know that you don’t know already?
Talk with your advisor about your
ideas.
As
with all new skills, practice is
important, so the more you can
review published questionnaires,
poor quality ones in magazines and
junk mail, and items printed in
academic articles, the more you will
see what goes into operationalizing,
formatting, and designing a
questionnaire.
You may want to use a questionnaire
that has been developed by a scholar
or professional in the field of
communication studies. That approach
is fine too.
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Chapter Five
SAMPLING
Quoted directly or
closely adapted from
Nardi, P. M. (2006). Doing survey
research: A guide to quantitative
methods. (2nd ed.) Boston: Pearson.
For use by students who have enrolled in
the course and purchased this textbook.
This information is protected by the
publisher's copyright and is for use
only in this course. |
|
Learning Goals
This
chapter explains random probability
sampling and describes
different
methods for obtaining samples. You
will learn about longitudinal and
cross-sectional research designs. By
the end of the chapter you should be
able to distinguish several types of
probability and non-probability
sampling, describe various kinds of
longitudinal research designs, and
explain the idea of sampling error.
There are many ways to generate a
sample of respondents, but only a
few methods allow researchers to
make generalizations about a
population with any accuracy and
consistency. A key idea is to
recognized that unless you use a
probability sampling technique, your
results can only be reported about
those people completing the study.
The results will not be
generalizable.
Many
people erroneously assume that going
around and giving out surveys
randomly results in an actual random
sample.
It’s
important to distinguish the everyday use of the word
“random”
from
the more scientific meaning it has
when attached to sampling
strategies.
Most
assignments for a Master's project
do not allow the time and do not
have the funds to generate a large
sample. Yet it is not impossible to
attempt a random sample strategy.
More than likely, however, the
return rate for surveys, especially
on a college campus, is too low to
result in a representative or random
sample. Understand the limitations
of the sample you are likely to
generate.
Critical thinking plays an important
part in reading surveys and journal
articles. Think about call-in or
on-line computer surveys--e.g.,
SurveyMonkey.com.
As
always, journal articles provide
ample examples of sampling and the
limitations of response rates in
actual research.
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Chapter Six
PRESENTING DATA: DESCRIPTIVE STATISTICS
Quoted directly or
closely adapted from
Nardi, P. M. (2006). Doing survey
research: A guide to quantitative
methods. (2nd ed.) Boston: Pearson.
For use by students who have enrolled in
the course and purchased this textbook.
This information is protected by the
publisher's copyright and is for use
only in this course. |
|
Learning Goals
Understanding how to describe your
findings using graphs, tables, and
statistics is the focus of this
chapter. By the end of the chapter
you should be able to decide how to
use the mean, median, mode, standard
deviation when presenting data. You
should also understand the concept
of the normal curve and z-scores. In
addition, you will learn the idea of
probability and statistical
significance.
This
is the first of four chapters
devoted to explaining basic
statistical analyses. And this
information is the start of much
anxiety for many students. If
needed, your advisor can help you
review some very basic mathematics
and reassure you that the most
important skill is thinking
quantitatively, not calculating
arithmetic. You can use calculators,
online calculators, Excel, or SPSS,
or whatever software you want that
your advisor accepts.
What is crucial is your ability
to
make decisions about which
statistics are most appropriate in
different conditions and learning
how to interpret statistical output
and results. Knowing when to use
particular statistics and knowing
what they mean are the skills
stressed in these chapters instead
of how to calculate them by hand.
Some
faculty believe that students really
learn statistics by having them work
through problems and calculating
formulas. Others feel that math
anxiety overwhelms students’
abilities to understand the material
when they are expected to learn the
mathematics. For the purpose of your
project, figure out what you want to
know, what data you will collect,
and how you will analyze that data.
Students often relate well to data
analysis when they see themselves in
it.
The
statistics in Chapter 6 are the
basic building blocks for later
ideas.
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