research chapter 6 example

Contributors and Copyright
Chapter 1: Introduction to Scholarly Research
Chapter 2: Literature Review
Chapter 3: Methods Section
Chapter 4: Results
Chapter 5: Discussion

Chapter 6: Research Study

Chapter 7: Presenting Your Findings
Appendix: Installing Zotero Transcript
Appendix: Saving References to Zotero Transcript
Appendix: Citing Using Zotero and Creating a Bibliography Transcript
Chapter 2 Appendix
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Vocabulary List

Implications: The possible effects or consequences of something.
Prevalence: The proportion or percentage of a population that has a particular disease or condition at a specific point in time.
Randomized: Selected by chance or without bias.
Indented: Set in from the margin or starting point.
Concisely: Expressing ideas or information in a clear and brief manner.
Concise: Brief and to the point.
Transformations: Changes or alterations in form, appearance, or nature. In public health, transformations can refer to changes in health behaviors, policies, or interventions aimed at improving health outcomes or addressing health disparities.

6.1 Writing the Final Research Paper

(Price et al., 2017)

6.1.1 Title Page

An APA-style research report begins with a title page. The title is in bold and centered in the upper half of the page, with each important word capitalized. The title should communicate the research question in 12 words or fewer. The following are examples of titles:

Social Determinants and Implications for Infectious Diseases

Effects of Mosquito Nets on Malaria Prevalence Rates

Antibiotics for Prevention: Results of a Randomized Clinical Trial

Below the title are the authors’ names and, on the next line, their university. Multiple authors list their names alphabetically. The next three lines list the name of the course, the instructor’s name, and the date.

6.1.2 Abstract

The abstract is a brief summary of the study, limited to 200 words. It is on the second page of the manuscript, with the heading Abstract centered and in bold. The first line is not indented. The abstract concisely presents the research question, a summary of the methods, the basic results, and the most important conclusions.

6.1.3 Introduction

The introduction begins on the third page of the manuscript and should be three to four pages long. The heading at the top of this page is the full title of the paper.

Contents of the Introduction:

An introduction to your research topic.

A concise and comprehensive review of the literature.

A summary of what we know and how we know it.

A summary of what is still unknown about the subject.

A concluding paragraph summarizing the topic and how it connects to your study and hypothesis.

In-text citations for all sources cited in your literature review with matching references at the end of the paper.

6.1.4 Methods

The Methods section is approximately one page long and contains four subsections: methods, design, participants, and procedures.

6.1.5 Results

The results section presents the main results of the study and the statistical analyses.

Begin with the number of responses, a justification of why any were excluded, and any data transformations or scoring that needed to be performed. Next, answer your research question(s), presenting the relevant statistics and including the following:

At least one demographic statistic.

One statistical test using the Analysis ToolPak.

One statistic of your choosing, such as ANOVA, t-test, or other demographic statistic.

Summarize the general finding. You can follow up by describing any secondary analyses you did that further explain what you found using a similar pattern.

Embed tables and figures within the text after they are first mentioned. Number each table and figure in the order they are discussed in your paper.

6.1.6 Discussion

Begin with at least one paragraph summarizing your results without using statistics, that includes a clear answer to your research question. Then include the following:

Implications: Explain what impact your results have on the scientific understanding of the topic. Briefly refer to previous research.

Limitations: Identify what makes your conclusions strong and weak.

Future Research: Identify what researchers should do next regarding this topic of study.

Conclusion: Write three sentences to summarize your project’s hypothesis, methods, and primary finding.

6.1.7 References

(Brigham Young University-Idaho, Pryor, 2024)

The References section is on a separate page at the end of your paper.

The following are APA rules for the reference page:

Center and bold the heading. List all sources that have in-text citations earlier in your paper, in alphabetical order.

Use double line spacing and hanging indents for each entry.

For each entry, you must include the author, date, title, and source.

Author: Listed with last name and initials, no titles. May be an individual, group, or organization. Examples: Author, A. A., Author, B. B., & Author, C. C. or World Health Organization.

Date: In parentheses. Examples: (2020). (2020, August 26). (2022, July).

Title: Use the title of the article or chapter, using sentence case without capitalizing each word. Example: Parks build healthy communities: Success stories.

Source: Use italics for a journal or book title, and include DOI. For a website, give the title and URL. Example: National Recreation and Park Association. https://www.nrpa.org

NOTE: All content is licensed CC-BY-NC unless otherwise noted. This courseware includes resources from multiple individuals and organizations. See the “References” section at the bottom of each page for copyright and licensing information specific to the material on that page. If you believe that this courseware violates your copyright, please contact us.

Price, P. C., Jhangiani, R., Chiang, I.-C. A., Leighton, D. C., & Cuttler, C. (2017). Research Methods in Psychology . Pressbooks. https://opentext.wsu.edu/carriecuttler/chapter/11-2-writing-a-research-report-in-american-psychological-association-apa-style/

License: CC-BY-NC

This content is provided to you freely by BYU-I Books.

Access it online or download it at https://books.byui.edu/pubh_391_readings/chapter_6_research_study .

Chapter 6. Reflexivity

Introduction.

Related to epistemological issues of how we know anything about the social world, qualitative researchers understand that we the researchers can never be truly neutral or outside the study we are conducting. As observers, we see things that make sense to us and may entirely miss what is either too obvious to note or too different to comprehend. As interviewers, as much as we would like to ask questions neutrally and remain in the background, interviews are a form of conversation, and the persons we interview are responding to us . Therefore, it is important to reflect upon our social positions and the knowledges and expectations we bring to our work and to work through any blind spots that we may have. This chapter discusses the concept of reflexivity and its importance for conducting reliable qualitative research.

Reflexivity: What It Is and Why It Is Important

Remember our discussion in epistemology ? Qualitative researchers tend to question assertions of absolute fact or reality, unmediated through subject positions and subject knowledge. There are limits to what we know because we are part of the social worlds we inhabit. To use the terminology of standpoint theorists, we have a standpoint from which we observe the world just as much as anyone else. In this, we too are the blind men, and the world is our elephant. None of us are omniscient or neutral observers. Because of this epistemological standpoint, qualitative researchers value the ability to reflect upon and think hard about our own effects on our research. We call this reflexivity. Reflexivity “generally involves the self-examination of how research findings were produced, and, particularly, the role of the researcher in their construction” ( Heaton 2004:104 ).

There are many aspects of being reflexive. First, there is the simple fact that we are human beings with the limitations that come with that condition. We have likes and dislikes, biases, blind spots, preferences, and so on. If we do not take these into account, they can prevent us from being the best researcher we can be. Being reflective means, first and foremost, trying as best as possible to bracket out elements of our own character and understanding that get in the way. It is important to note that bias (in this context, at least) is not inherently wrong. It just is. Unavoidable. But by noting it, we can minimize its impact or, in some cases, help explain more clearly what it is we see or why it is that we are asking the questions we are asking. For example, I might want to communicate to my audience that I grew up poor and that I have a lot of sympathy and concern for first-generation college students as a result. This “bias” of mine motivates me to do the work I do, even as I try to ensure that it does not blind me to things I find out in the course of my research. [1]

A second aspect of being reflexive is being aware that you yourself are part of the research when you are conducting qualitative research. This is particularly true when conducting interviews, observing interactions, or participating in activities. You have a body, and it will be “read” by those in the field. You will be perceived as an insider or an outsider, as a friend or foe, as empathetic or hostile. Some of this will be wrong. People will prejudge you based on the color of your skin, your presented gender, the accent of your language. People will classify you based on the clothes you wear, and they will be more open to you if you remind them of a friendly aunt or uncle and more reserved if you remind them of someone they don’t like. This is all natural and inevitable. Your research will suffer if you do not take this into account, if you do not reflect upon how you are being read and how this might be influencing what people tell you or what they are willing to do in front of you. The flip side of this problem is that your particular body and presence will open some doors barred to other researchers. Finding sites and contexts where your presented self is a benefit rather than a burden is an important part of your individual research career. Be honest with yourself about this, and you will be more successful as a qualitative researcher. Learn to leverage yourself in your research.

The third aspect of being reflexive is related to how we communicate our work to others. Being honest with our position, as I am about my own social background and its potential impact on what I study or about how I leveraged my own position to get people to open up to me, helps our audiences evaluate what we have found. Maybe I haven’t entirely eliminated my biases or weaknesses, but by telling my audience who I am and where I potentially stand, they can take account of those biases and weaknesses in their reading of my findings. Letting them know that I wore pink when talking with older men because that made them more likely to be kind to me (a strategy acknowledged by Posselt [ 2016 ]) helps them understand the interview context. In other words, my research becomes more reliable when my own social position and the strategies I used are communicated.

Some people think being reflective is just another form of narcissistic navel-gazing. “The study is not about you!” they might cry. True, to some degree—but that also misses the point. All studies on the social world are inevitably about us as well because we are part of that social world. It is actually more dangerous to pretend that we are neutral observers, outside what we are observing. Pierre Bourdieu makes this point several times, and I think it is worth quoting him here: “The idea of a neutral science is fiction, an interested fiction which enables its authors to present a version of the dominant representation of the social world, naturalized and euphemized into a particularly misrecognizable and symbolically, therefore, particularly effective form, and to call it scientific” (quoted in Lemert 1981:278 ).

Bourdieu ( 1984 ) argues that reflective analysis is “not an epistemological scruple” but rather “an indispensable pre-condition of scientific knowledge of the object” ( 92 ). It would be narcissistic to present findings without reflection, as that would give much more weight to any findings or insights that emerge than is due.

The critics are right about one thing, however. Putting oneself at the center of the research is also inappropriate. [2] The focus should be on what is being researched, and the reflexivity is there to advance the study, not to push it aside. This issue has emerged at times when researchers from dominant social positions reflect upon their social locations vis-à-vis study participants from marginalized locations. A researcher who studies how low-income women of color experience unemployment might need to address her White, upper-class, fully employed social location, but not at the cost of crowding out the stories, lived experiences, and understandings of the women she has interviewed. This can sometimes be a delicate balance, and not everyone will agree that a person has walked it correctly.

Examples of Reflexivity in Practice

Most qualitative researchers include a positionality statement in any “methods section” of their publications. This allows readers to understand the location of the researcher, which is often helpful for gauging reliability . Many journals now require brief positionality statements as well. Here are a few examples of such statements.

The first is from an ethnographic study of elite golfers. Ceron-Anaya ( 2017 ) writes about his class, race, and gender and how these aspects of his identity and social location affected his interactions with research participants:

My own class origins, situated near the intersection between the middle and the lower-middle class, hindered cooperation in some cases. For example, the amiable interaction with one club member changed toward the end of the interview when he realized that I commonly moved about in the city by public transportation (which is a strong class indicator). He was not rude but stopped elaborating on the answers as he had been doing up to that point.…Bodily confidence is a privilege of the privileged. My subordinate position, vis-à-vis golfers, was ameliorated by my possession of cultural capital, objectified in my status of researcher/student in a western university. However, my cultural capital dwindled in its value at the invisible but firm boundary between the upper-middle and the upper class. The few contacts I made with members of the upper class produced no connections with other members of the same group, illustrating how the research process is also inserted in the symbolic and material dynamics that shape the field. ( 288 )

What did you learn from Ceron-Anaya’s reflection? If he hadn’t told you about his background, would this have made a difference in reading about elite golfers? Would the findings be different had Ceron-Anaya driven up to the club in a limousine? Is it helpful to know he came by bus?

The second example is from a study on first-generation college students. Hinz ( 2016 ) discusses both differences and similarities between herself and those she interviewed and how both could have affected the study:

I endeavored to avoid researcher bias by allowing the data to speak for itself, but my own habitus as a White, female, middle-class second-generation college student with a few years of association with Selective State [elite university] may have influenced my interpretation. Being a Selective State student at the time of the interviews provided a familiarity with the environment in which the participants were living, and an ease of communication facilitated by a shared institutional culture. And yet, not being a first-gen myself, it seemed as if I were standing on the periphery of their experience, looking in. ( 289–290 )

Note that Hinz cannot change who she is, nor should she. Being aware (reflective) that she may “stand on the periphery” of the experience of those she interviews has probably helped her listen more closely rather than assume she understands what is really going on. Do you find her more reliable given this?

These statements can be quite long, especially when found in methodological appendixes in books rather than short statements in articles. This last lengthy example comes from my own work. I try to place myself, explaining the motivations for the research I conducted at small liberal arts colleges:

I began this project out of a deep curiosity about how college graduates today were faring in an increasingly debt-ridden and unequal labor market. I was working at a small liberal arts college when I began thinking about this project and was poised to take a job at another one. During my interview for the new job, I was told that I was a good fit, because I had attended Barnard College, so I knew what the point of a liberal arts college was. I did. A small liberal arts college was a magical place. You could study anything you wanted, for no reason at all, simply for the love of it. And people would like you for it. You were surrounded by readers, by people who liked to dress up in costume and recite Shakespeare, by people who would talk deep into the night about the meaning of life or whether “beauty” existed out there, in nature, or was simply a projection of our own circumstances. My own experience at Barnard had been somewhat like that. I studied Ancient Greek and Latin, wrote an undergraduate thesis on the legal standing of Vestal Virgins in Ancient Rome, and took frequent subway rides to the Cloisters, the medieval annex of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, where I sketched the courtyard and stared at unicorn tapestries. But I also worked full-time, as a waitress at a series of hectic and demanding restaurants around the city, as a security guard for the dorm, as a babysitter for some pretty privileged professors who lived in doorman buildings along Riverside Park, and at the library (the best job by far). I also constantly worried I would not be able to finish my degree, as every year I was unsure how I would come up with the money to pay for costs of college above and beyond the tuition (which, happily, was covered by the college given my family’s low income). Indeed, the primary reason I studied the Classics was because all the books were freely available in the library. There are no modern textbooks—you just find a copy of the Iliad. There are a lot of those in a city like New York. Due to my fears, I pushed to graduate one year early, taking a degree in “Ancient Studies” instead of “Classics,” which could have led on to graduate training. From there, I went to law school, which seemed like a safe choice. I do not remember ever having a conversation with anyone about how to find a job or what kinds of job one could do with a degree in Ancient Studies. I had little to no social networks, as I had spent my time studying and working. And I was very lucky, because I graduated with almost zero debt. For years, until that job interview, I hadn’t really thought my Barnard experience had been that great or unusual. But now it was directly helping me get a job, about fifteen years after graduation. And it probably had made me a better person, whatever that means. Had I graduated with debt, however, I am not so sure that it would have been worth it. Was it, on balance, a real opportunity and benefit for poor students like me? Even now? I had a hunch of what I might find if I looked: small liberal arts colleges were unique places of opportunity for low-income first-generation working-class students who somehow managed to find and get in to one of them (no easy task). I thought that, because of their ethos, their smallness, the fact that one could not hide from professors, these colleges would do a fair job equalizing opportunities and experiences for all their students. I wanted to tell this story. But that is not the story that I found, or not entirely. While everyone benefits from the kind of education a small liberal arts college can offer, because students begin and continue so differently burdened and privileged, the advantages of the already-advantaged are amplified, potentially increasing rather than decreasing initial inequalities. That is not really a surprising story, but it is an important one to tell and to remember. Education doesn’t reduce inequality. Going to a good college doesn’t level the playing field for low-income, first-generation, working-class students. But perhaps it can help them write a book about that. ( Hurst 2019:259–261 )

What do you think? Did you learn something about the author that would help you, as a reader, understand the reasons and context for the study? Would you trust the researcher? If you said yes, why?

How to Do It

How does one become a reflective researcher? Practice! Nearly every great qualitative researcher maintains a reflexive journal (there are exceptions that prove the rule), a type of diary where they record their thinking on the research process itself. This might include writing about the research design (chapter 2), plotting out strategies for sample selection (chapter 6), or talking through what one believes can be known (chapter 3). During analysis, this journal is a place to record ideas and insights and pose questions for further reflection or follow-up studies. This journal should be highly personal. It is a place to record fears, concerns, and hopes as well. Why are you studying what you are studying? What is really motivating you? Being clear with yourself and being able to put it down in words are invaluable to the research process.

Today, there are many blogs out there on writing reflective journals, with helpful suggestions and examples. Although you may want to take a look at some of these, the form of your own journal will probably be unique. This is you, the researcher, on the page. Each of us looks different. Use the journal to interrogate your decisions and clarify your intent. If you find something during the study of note, you might want to ask yourself what led you to note that. Why do you think this “thing” is a “thing”? What about your own position, background, or researcher status that makes you take note? And asking yourself this question might lead you to think about what you did not notice. Other questions to ask yourself include the following: How do I know “that thing” I noted? So what? What does it mean? What are the implications? Who cares about this and why? Remember that doing qualitative research well is recursive , meaning that we may begin with a research design, but the steps of doing the research often loop back to the beginning. By keeping a reflective journal, you allow yourself to circle back to the beginning, to make changes to the study to keep it in line with what you are really interested in knowing.

One might also consider designing research that includes multiple investigators, particularly those who may not share your preconceptions about the study. For example, if you are studying conservative students on campus, and you yourself thoroughly identify as liberal, you might want to pair up with a researcher interested in the topic who grew up in a conservative household. If you are studying racial regimes, consider creating a racially diverse team of researchers. Or you might include in your research design a component of participatory research wherein members of the community of interest become coresearchers. Even if you can’t form a research team, you can reach out to others for feedback as you move along. Doing research can be a lonely enterprise, so finding people who will listen to you and nudge you to clarify your thinking where necessary or move you to consider an aspect you have missed is invaluable.

Finally, make it a regular part of your practice to write a paragraph reporting your perspectives, positions, values, and beliefs and how these may have influenced the research. This paragraph may be included in publications upon request.

Internal Validity

Being reflexive can help ensure that our studies are internally valid. All research must be valid to be helpful. We say a study’s findings are externally valid when they are equally true of other times, places, people. Quantitative researchers often spend a lot of time grappling with external validity , as they are often trying to demonstrate that their sample is representative of a larger population. Although we do not do that in qualitative research, we do sometimes make claims that the processes and mechanisms we uncover here, in this particular setting, are likely to be equally active in that setting over there, although there may be (will be!) contextual differences as well. Internal validity is more peculiar to qualitative research. Is your finding an accurate representation of what you are studying? Are you describing the people you are observing or interviewing as they really are? This is internal validity , and you should be able to see how this connects with the requirement of reflexivity. To the extent that you leave unexamined your own biases or preconceptions, you will fail at accurately representing those people and processes you study. Remember that “bias” here is not a moral failing in the way we commonly use bias in the nonresearch world but an inevitable product of our being social beings who inhabit social worlds, with all the various complexities surrounding that. Because of things that have happened to you, certain things (concepts, quotes, activities) might jump out at you as being particularly important. Being reflexive allows you to take a step back and grapple with the larger picture, reflecting on why you might be seeing X (which is present) but also missing Y (which is also present). It also allows you to consider what effect/impact your presence has on what you are observing or being told and to make any adjustments necessary to minimize your impact or, at the very least, to be aware of these effects and talk about them in any descriptions or presentations you make. There are other ways of ensuring internal validity (e.g., member checking , triangulation ), but being reflective is an essential component.

Advanced: Bourdieu on Reflexivity

One researcher who really tackled the issue of reflexivity was Pierre Bourdieu. [3] Known in the US primarily as a theorist, Bourdieu was a very capable and thorough researcher, who employed a variety of methods in his wide-ranging studies. Originally trained as an anthropologist, he became uncomfortable with the unreflective “outsider perspective” he was taught to follow. How was he supposed to observe and write about the various customs and rules of the people he was studying if he did not take into account his own supposedly neutral position in the observations? And even more interestingly, how could he write about customs and rules as if they were lifted from but outside of the understandings and practice of the people following them? When you say “God bless you” to someone who sneezes, are you really following a social custom that requires the prevention of illness through some performative verbal ritual of protection, or are you saying words out of reflex and habit? Bourdieu wondered what it meant that anthropologists were so ready to attribute meaning to actions that, to those performing them, were probably unconsidered. This caused him to ponder those deep epistemological questions about the possibilities of knowledge, particularly what we can know and truly understand about others. Throughout the following decades, as he developed his theories about the social world out of the deep and various studies he engaged in, he thought about the relationship between the researcher and the researched. He came to several conclusions about this relationship.

First, he argued that researchers needed to be reflective about their position vis-à-vis the object of study. The very fact that there is a subject and an object needs to be accounted for. Too often, he argued, the researcher forgets that part of the relationship, bracketing out the researcher entirely, as if what is being observed or studied exists entirely independently of the study. This can lead to false reports, as in the case where a blind man grasps the trunk of the elephant and claims the elephant is cylindrical, not having recognized how his own limitations of sight reduced the elephant to only one of its parts.

As mentioned previously, Bourdieu ( 1984 ) argued that “reflective analysis of the tools of analysis is not an epistemological scruple but an indispensable precondition of scientific knowledge of the object” ( 92 ). It is not that researchers are inherently biased—they are—but rather that the relationship between researcher and researched is an unnatural one that needs to be accounted for in the analysis. True and total objectivity is impossible, as researchers are human subjects themselves, called to research what interests them (or what interests their supervisors) and also inhabiting the social world. The solution to this problem is to be reflective and to account for these aspects in the analysis itself. Here is how Bourdieu explains this charge:

To adopt the viewpoint of REFLEXIVITY is not to renounce objectivity but to question the privilege of the knowing subject, which the antigenetic vision arbitrarily frees, as purely noetic, from the labor of objectification. To adopt this viewpoint is to strive to account for the empirical “subject” in the very terms of the objectivity constructed by the scientific subject (notably by situating it in a determined place in social space-time) and thereby to give oneself awareness and (possible) mastery of the constraints which may be exercised on the scientific subject via all the ties which attach it to the empirical “subject,” to its interests, motives, assumptions, beliefs, its doxa, and which it must break in order to constitute itself . ( 1996:207 ; emphases added)

Reflexivity, for Bourdieu, was a trained state of mind for the researcher, essential for proper knowledge production. Let’s use a story from Hans Christian Andersen to illustrate this point. If you remember this story from your childhood, it goes something like this: Two con artists show up in a town in which its chief monarch spends a lot of money on expensive clothes and splashy displays. They sense an opportunity to make some money out of this situation and pretend they are talented weavers from afar. They tell the vain emperor that they can make the most magnificent clothes anyone has ever seen (or not seen, as the case may be!). Because what they really do is “pretend” to weave and sew and hand the emperor thin air, which they then help him to put on in an elaborate joke. They tell him that only the very stupid and lowborn will be unable to see the magnificent clothes. Embarrassed that he can’t see them either, he pretends he can. Everyone pretends they can see clothes, when really the emperor walks around in his bare nakedness. As he parades through town, people redden and bow their heads, but no one says a thing. That is, until one child looks at the naked emperor and starts to laugh. His laughter breaks the spell, and everyone realizes the “naked truth.”

Now let us add a new thread to this story. The boy did not laugh. Years go by, and the emperor continues to wear his new clothes. At the start of every day, his aides carefully drape the “new clothes” around his naked body. Decades go by, and this is all “normal.” People don’t even see a naked emperor but a fully robed leader of the free world. A researcher, raised in this milieu, visits the palace to observe court habits. She observes the aides draping the emperor. She describes the care they take in doing so. She nowhere reports that the clothes are nonexistent because she herself has been trained to see them . She thus misses a very important fact—that there are no clothes at all! Note that it is not her individual “biases” that are getting in the way but her unreflective acceptance of the reality she inhabits that binds her to report things less accurately than she might.

In his later years, Bourdieu turned his attention to science itself and argued that the promise of modern science required reflectivity among scientists. We need to develop our reflexivity as we develop other muscles, through constant practice. Bourdieu ( 2004 ) urged researchers “to convert reflexivity into a disposition, constitutive of their scientific habitus, a reflexivity reflex , capable of acting not ex poste , on the opus operatum , but a priori , on the modus operandi ” ( 89 ). In other words, we need to build into our research design an appreciation of the relationship between researcher and researched.

To do science properly is to be reflective, to be aware of the social waters in which one swims and to turn one’s researching gaze on oneself and one’s researcher position as well as on the object of the research. Above all, doing science properly requires one to acknowledge science as a social process. We are not omniscient gods, lurking above the humans we observe and talk to. We are human too.

Introduction to Educational Research

Student resources, chapter summary, chapter 6 • qualitative research methods.

Qualitative research involves the collection, analysis, and interpretation of narrative data.
The focus of qualitative research is typically on the quality of a particular activity.
Holistic description of the phenomenon, setting, or topic of interest is a key characteristic of qualitative research.
Both qualitative and quantitative research methods are valuable in their own rights.
When deciding on a research methodology, it is best to begin with a topic of interest or specific question and then select the method that will provide you with the best answer to that question.
Qualitative research is naturalistic.
Qualitative research is descriptive
Qualitative researchers are concerned with process as well as product.
Qualitative researchers analyze their data inductively.
Qualitative researchers are primarily concerned with how people make sense and meaning of their lives.
Although the basic steps are fairly consistent, those used in conducting qualitative research may occur out of sequential order, may overlap, and are sometimes conducted concurrently.
Identification of the phenomenon to be studied
Review of the related literature
Identification and selection of participants
Collection of data
Analysis of data
Generation of research questions
Additional data collection, analysis, and revision of research questions
Final interpretation of analyses and development of conclusions
Many different approaches exist for conducting qualitative research.
Commonly used qualitative approaches include ethnographic research, narrative research, historical research, grounded theory research, phenomenological research, and case study research.
Ethnographic research involves the in-depth description and interpretation of shared practices and beliefs of a social group or other community.
Narrative research is an approach used to convey experiences as they are lived and told by individuals.
Historical research describes events, occurrences, or settings of the past to better understand them.
Grounded theory research is used to discover an existing theory or generate a new theory resulting directly from data.
Phenomenological research is used to describe and interpret experiences or reactions of participants to a specific phenomenon from their individual perspectives.
Case study research is an in-depth analysis of a single entity, known as a case.
Ethnography is a research approach used to study human interactions in social settings.
Ethnographic research focuses on social behavior in natural settings.
It relies on narrative descriptions made by observers or participants in the group being studied.
Its perspective is holistic.
In some studies, research questions may emerge after data collection is well under way.
Procedures of data analysis involve contextualization within the group, setting, or event being observed.
A privileged observer, also known as a nonparticipant observer, does not engage in the activities of the group.
A participant observer actively engages in all activities as a regular member of the group being studied.
Naturalistic observation is a holistic technique where the researcher must record all pertinent information.
A strength of ethnographic research is its holistic view of education or personal behavior.
Concerns about ethnographic research involve the reliability of data and the validity of research conclusions, as well as the generalizability of findings.
Several forms of narrative research exist; all forms tell stories of lived experiences, but they differ according to perspective, amount of life story told, and theoretical lens.
A biographical study is a type of narrative research where the researcher records the experiences of another person’s life.
An autobiographical study also involves the experiences of a person’s life but is told by the individual who is the subject of the study.
A life history tells the story of an individual’s entire life.
A personal experience story is a study of an individual’s personal experience related to a single or multiple incidents.
An oral history is conducted by gathering personal reflections of events and their implications from one or more individuals.
A key technique used in narrative research is restorying, a process of reorganizing personal information and stories into a format that makes sense for the intended audience.
During the process of restorying, participants as well as the researcher may experience epiphanies.
A clear strength of narrative research is its ability to tell detailed stories of people’s lives.
Narrative research, however, is a lengthy process wherein the researcher must uncover a multitude of details in people’s lives.

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Doing Research in the Real World

Student resources, chapter 6: research design: quantitative methods.

Checklist for Using Theory

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6 Chapter 6 (Audience)

Both in and out of academic arguments, changing someone’s mind is not as simple as being factually correct. Large numbers of people continue to believe things contrary to what the preponderance of evidence happens to show, to a point that makes satire difficult. For example, according to some research, perhaps 4% of young people believe the earth is flat. A number of people continue to believe in a thoroughly discredited link between autism and vaccination. The list could carry on at length.

The Scope of Arguments

Changing someone’s mind outside of the realm of fact is frequently even harder, because moral issues are less permeable to fact, and rules or regulations based on moral judgments are even harder to fine-tune. If I believe in a particular policy and you prove that it has less of a benefit than I thought it did, I don’t have to change my mind. I just have to change the reasons I support it. This mindset is not odd, it is actually a default way of looking at things. This is more than simple Confirmation Bias at work, even though that is a powerful force. No, the real issue is something called the Backfire Effect.

Put in simple terms, most people who are confronted with evidence that an opinion they hold is wrong do not change their opinion. Instead, they reject the contrary evidence and hold to their opinion even more strongly. This means that in order to engage arguments, it is necessary to do more than to simply throw facts at each other. Instead, we must engage in critical, thoughtful discussions. Some research even shows that having those discussion–having the reflex to analyze new information before it enters into our memory–is one of the most effective tools available at preventing erroneous information from becoming locked into our worldviews.

In the terms of college research, no matter how open-minded researchers try to be, there is a very real chance that their biases will influence them. This is one reason why the peer-review process exists, and it is also a reason that scientific experimentation goes to great length to “blind” both participants and researchers to which subjects are receiving which treatments. Unless studies are performed carefully, it is possible for bias to enter the equation. For new researchers simply reading studies—or looking for studies to read—there can be a powerful tendency to read only those sources that confirm our biases. Preconceived notions and opinions need constant monitoring, and student researchers who are not willing to have their minds changed on a subject should probably consider whether or not they are actually researching the subject or simply repeating their own opinions.

Rhetoric and Dialectic

Aristotle famously proclaimed that rhetoric was the counterpart to dialectic. In essence, he suggested that while logical discourse could certainly help someone arrive at valid conclusions, that getting others to accept those conclusions required a certain amount of skill or technique in persuasion. Most students in college will already be familiar with the three modes or appeals of rhetoric (logos, ethos, and pathos), but it might be difficult to place them in the broader context of debate. They might be sterile concepts–fine for the classroom but without much other value. The reality is, however, that these three modes are important to any effort at advocacy, and they are much more vital than we tend to believe.

Logos: This is the emphasis for most research papers, for reasons discussed in the previous chapters. Suffice it to say, however, that in order to engage in an argument, it is useful to be familiar with logic, to be able to identify and counter common logical fallacies, and to be ready to set aside personal involvement in favor of analysis.

One important note is that many beginning writers make the mistake of leaving out what Toulmin would refer to as the warrants. In other words, they simply offer evidence and conclusions without explaining to readers why they believe the evidence in question supports the conclusions. Because not all readers will interpret the same facts identically, this sort of mistake can lead to misunderstanding.

Ethos: Whether it’s a job interview, a college paper, or an attempt to change the minds of many people on an issue of personal importance, ethos has a greater impact than most people consider, and it is shaped in any number of ways.

Consider clothing. While it is a superficial criterion, many employers embrace the idea that personal appearance is part of professionalism. It is. As much as we might like to live in a society that is immune to the impact of appearance, we do not. In fact, study after study has confirmed the idea that dress and attractiveness influence everything ranging from how likely someone is to be hired, how much someone will be made, and how trustworthy that person is considered.

Now consider reputation. A student writer who has already been caught making one mistake, exaggerating one claim, or trusting at least one unreliable source not lacks credibility when that same student writer offers a new line of reasoning or introduces another questionable source. A student who stretches the truth for one argument is not far more likely to be discounted when making a subsequent argument.

Outside of college essays, one of the most important concepts is identification. This refers to the tendency of people to hold positive views those they see as like themselves. That does not mean that the person in question is seen as “honest” or “credible” in a traditional sense. Instead, it simply means that if I see something of myself in you, I am more likely to respond favorably to you; likewise, if you see something of yourself in someone else, you are more likely to forgive missteps on their part (especially missteps you personally find relatable).

Pathos: It’s hard to ignore the fact that people aren’t rational. People make decisions on emotional bases all the time, and so it is important to be able to reach others emotionally. It is even more important to be able to show others how an emotional goal is not met by a course of action.

In simple terms, people confronted with a problem will frequently want to do something–anything–to resolve the problem. However, if that action does not actually have any solvency, then the emotional impulse to act will be misguided and have unintended consequences. Consider the example of post-9/11 airport security. The pressure to increase screening was so great that the U.S. added a number of measures that cost money and time. However, those measures have been found, repeatedly, to be ineffective.

Were there problems before 9/11? Obviously. Were those problems actually made better by the government’s action? That would be really tough to prove to a reasonable audience. One task researchers face is helping to overcome the emotional resistance of readers and trying to reach the point where people are willing to accept that they might be wrong about something.

Cutting the Knot

Imagine if a restaurant is known to serve extraordinarily spicy versions of typical dishes. People with a love for spicy food might argue that this makes the restaurant more appealing, while people with less tolerance for heat might want to avoid the exact same location. However, if the same restaurant can be demonstrated to have both spicy and non-spicy dishes, then maybe there isn’t a conflict at all.

Alexander the Great supposedly found himself confronted with an unsolvable knot, and his response was to cut it with his sword. Instead of trying to unravel every cord, he chopped the whole thing apart.

A number of issues are based on Gordian knots, and a skilled researcher is able to get to the core of an issue. If asked “is it worth violating civil liberties to use torture to gain information about terror acts?”, one knot-cutting question is “will torture even gain useful information about terror acts?” If it won’t, then there is no ethical quandary, because instead you’re just arguing about wanting to torture people.

A specific logical fallacy comes to play time and again when it’s time to cut knots, and that’s the fallacy of the complex question. Should I spend more money to buy myself a more reliable car? Well, maybe. However, if (within my price range) there is no difference in the reliability of the cars available, then there is no need to spend the extra money to gain a (nonexistent) increase in reliability. When considering the Toulmin model, people often assume warrants that should not be granted, and this causes their arguments to break down.

In order to fully engage arguments, it’s necessary to understand the emotional reasons people have for their beliefs. When engaging arguments, it’s important to remember that simply being correct by our own standards is not enough. Instead, researchers must try their best to meet the standards of a skeptical and even hostile audience.

Unreasonable People

One question that arises while performing any sort of research is “how much evidence is enough” to persuade someone? The answer varies dramatically, and it tends to be based on the readers of a given argument. In other words, in order for a researcher to know how much evidence is needed to make an argument, that researcher needs to have researched possible readers, as well. This is not actually hard, and it should not require significant extra work.

Good, thorough research will familiarize a researcher with the range of informed opinions that exist on a subject, already. Instead of guessing what those who disagree might believe, the researcher learns what the different opinions actually are—and learns why those opinions are held. This means that even sources that are not useful for supporting an argument can be useful to frame concessions or to offer background. In the course of this research, it is very likely that students will encounter people who cannot be readily persuaded by evidence.

One easy way to locate unreasonable readers (and researchers) is by how uninterested they are in learning about other viewpoints. Every so often, a researcher will encounter a source that does not seem to have done its own research, that uses hostile or derogatory language for those who disagree with it, or that makes sweeping assertions. An argument that frames its perspective, or other perspectives, without qualifiers should be held in skepticism. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, but some people seem to believe that extraordinary claims should be accepted on the basis of their personal authority.

How does an academic argument reach these readers? Well, the reality is that it might not be possible to reach all audiences. At no point does an academic researcher have an obligation to compromise on fact. However, it is sometimes best to refine the scope of an argument so readers only have to accept so much change or controversy at one time.

A student writing about reducing drug regulation might not be able to reach people who have a strict moral resistance to drugs, but that same student can avoid antagonizing readers who have lost family members to drug abuse by admitting that rehabilitation programs and other safety nets are not completely effective. Likewise, that same student might not be able to persuade someone who outright refuses to consider that different drugs have different rates of addiction and different side effects.

Finally, as in non-academic settings, there are some arguments that simply are not reasonable topics for an academic essay. Essays attempting to establish that birds are living beings (and not drones) or that the Earth is round (and not flat) do not have reasonable readers available. Those readers who could be persuaded by evidence likely have been, and those readers who are not persuaded by the existing evidence are unlikely to change their mind after reading a few pages. This is similar to a professional setting, wherein an employee might have a great proposal in mind but the business itself is unable or unwilling to listen to such ideas except in special settings.

When writing an academic argument, it is safe to assume a reasonable and moderately educated readership, but nothing more (and nothing less). That means that a wide variety of viewpoints need to be considered, and also that an overly rude or informal tone or substantially fringe arguments are not appropriate.

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How To Write The Discussion Chapter

A Simple Explainer With Examples + Free Template

By: Jenna Crossley (PhD) | Reviewed By: Dr. Eunice Rautenbach | August 2021

If you’re reading this, chances are you’ve reached the discussion chapter of your thesis or dissertation and are looking for a bit of guidance. Well, you’ve come to the right place ! In this post, we’ll unpack and demystify the typical discussion chapter in straightforward, easy to understand language, with loads of examples .

Overview: The Discussion Chapter

What the discussion chapter is
What to include in your discussion
How to write up your discussion
A few tips and tricks to help you along the way
Free discussion template

What (exactly) is the discussion chapter?

The discussion chapter is where you interpret and explain your results within your thesis or dissertation. This contrasts with the results chapter, where you merely present and describe the analysis findings (whether qualitative or quantitative ). In the discussion chapter, you elaborate on and evaluate your research findings, and discuss the significance and implications of your results .

In this chapter, you’ll situate your research findings in terms of your research questions or hypotheses and tie them back to previous studies and literature (which you would have covered in your literature review chapter). You’ll also have a look at how relevant and/or significant your findings are to your field of research, and you’ll argue for the conclusions that you draw from your analysis. Simply put, the discussion chapter is there for you to interact with and explain your research findings in a thorough and coherent manner.

Free template for discussion or thesis discussion section

What should I include in the discussion chapter?

First things first: in some studies, the results and discussion chapter are combined into one chapter . This depends on the type of study you conducted (i.e., the nature of the study and methodology adopted), as well as the standards set by the university. So, check in with your university regarding their norms and expectations before getting started. In this post, we’ll treat the two chapters as separate, as this is most common.

Basically, your discussion chapter should analyse , explore the meaning and identify the importance of the data you presented in your results chapter. In the discussion chapter, you’ll give your results some form of meaning by evaluating and interpreting them. This will help answer your research questions, achieve your research aims and support your overall conclusion (s). Therefore, you discussion chapter should focus on findings that are directly connected to your research aims and questions. Don’t waste precious time and word count on findings that are not central to the purpose of your research project.

As this chapter is a reflection of your results chapter, it’s vital that you don’t report any new findings . In other words, you can’t present claims here if you didn’t present the relevant data in the results chapter first. So, make sure that for every discussion point you raise in this chapter, you’ve covered the respective data analysis in the results chapter. If you haven’t, you’ll need to go back and adjust your results chapter accordingly.

If you’re struggling to get started, try writing down a bullet point list everything you found in your results chapter. From this, you can make a list of everything you need to cover in your discussion chapter. Also, make sure you revisit your research questions or hypotheses and incorporate the relevant discussion to address these. This will also help you to see how you can structure your chapter logically.

Need a helping hand?

How to write the discussion chapter

Now that you’ve got a clear idea of what the discussion chapter is and what it needs to include, let’s look at how you can go about structuring this critically important chapter. Broadly speaking, there are six core components that need to be included, and these can be treated as steps in the chapter writing process.

Step 1: Restate your research problem and research questions

The first step in writing up your discussion chapter is to remind your reader of your research problem , as well as your research aim(s) and research questions . If you have hypotheses, you can also briefly mention these. This “reminder” is very important because, after reading dozens of pages, the reader may have forgotten the original point of your research or been swayed in another direction. It’s also likely that some readers skip straight to your discussion chapter from the introduction chapter , so make sure that your research aims and research questions are clear.

Step 2: Summarise your key findings

Next, you’ll want to summarise your key findings from your results chapter. This may look different for qualitative and quantitative research , where qualitative research may report on themes and relationships, whereas quantitative research may touch on correlations and causal relationships. Regardless of the methodology, in this section you need to highlight the overall key findings in relation to your research questions.

Typically, this section only requires one or two paragraphs , depending on how many research questions you have. Aim to be concise here, as you will unpack these findings in more detail later in the chapter. For now, a few lines that directly address your research questions are all that you need.

Some examples of the kind of language you’d use here include:

The data suggest that…
The data support/oppose the theory that…
The analysis identifies…

These are purely examples. What you present here will be completely dependent on your original research questions, so make sure that you are led by them .

Step 3: Interpret your results

Once you’ve restated your research problem and research question(s) and briefly presented your key findings, you can unpack your findings by interpreting your results. Remember: only include what you reported in your results section – don’t introduce new information.

From a structural perspective, it can be a wise approach to follow a similar structure in this chapter as you did in your results chapter. This would help improve readability and make it easier for your reader to follow your arguments. For example, if you structured you results discussion by qualitative themes, it may make sense to do the same here.

Alternatively, you may structure this chapter by research questions, or based on an overarching theoretical framework that your study revolved around. Every study is different, so you’ll need to assess what structure works best for you.

When interpreting your results, you’ll want to assess how your findings compare to those of the existing research (from your literature review chapter). Even if your findings contrast with the existing research, you need to include these in your discussion. In fact, those contrasts are often the most interesting findings . In this case, you’d want to think about why you didn’t find what you were expecting in your data and what the significance of this contrast is.

Here are a few questions to help guide your discussion:

How do your results relate with those of previous studies ?
If you get results that differ from those of previous studies, why may this be the case?
What do your results contribute to your field of research?
What other explanations could there be for your findings?

When interpreting your findings, be careful not to draw conclusions that aren’t substantiated . Every claim you make needs to be backed up with evidence or findings from the data (and that data needs to be presented in the previous chapter – results). This can look different for different studies; qualitative data may require quotes as evidence, whereas quantitative data would use statistical methods and tests. Whatever the case, every claim you make needs to be strongly backed up.

Step 4: Acknowledge the limitations of your study

The fourth step in writing up your discussion chapter is to acknowledge the limitations of the study. These limitations can cover any part of your study , from the scope or theoretical basis to the analysis method(s) or sample. For example, you may find that you collected data from a very small sample with unique characteristics, which would mean that you are unable to generalise your results to the broader population.

For some students, discussing the limitations of their work can feel a little bit self-defeating . This is a misconception, as a core indicator of high-quality research is its ability to accurately identify its weaknesses. In other words, accurately stating the limitations of your work is a strength, not a weakness . All that said, be careful not to undermine your own research. Tell the reader what limitations exist and what improvements could be made, but also remind them of the value of your study despite its limitations.

Step 5: Make recommendations for implementation and future research

Now that you’ve unpacked your findings and acknowledge the limitations thereof, the next thing you’ll need to do is reflect on your study in terms of two factors:

The practical application of your findings
Suggestions for future research

The first thing to discuss is how your findings can be used in the real world – in other words, what contribution can they make to the field or industry? Where are these contributions applicable, how and why? For example, if your research is on communication in health settings, in what ways can your findings be applied to the context of a hospital or medical clinic? Make sure that you spell this out for your reader in practical terms, but also be realistic and make sure that any applications are feasible.

The next discussion point is the opportunity for future research . In other words, how can other studies build on what you’ve found and also improve the findings by overcoming some of the limitations in your study (which you discussed a little earlier). In doing this, you’ll want to investigate whether your results fit in with findings of previous research, and if not, why this may be the case. For example, are there any factors that you didn’t consider in your study? What future research can be done to remedy this? When you write up your suggestions, make sure that you don’t just say that more research is needed on the topic, also comment on how the research can build on your study.

Step 6: Provide a concluding summary

Finally, you’ve reached your final stretch. In this section, you’ll want to provide a brief recap of the key findings – in other words, the findings that directly address your research questions . Basically, your conclusion should tell the reader what your study has found, and what they need to take away from reading your report.

When writing up your concluding summary, bear in mind that some readers may skip straight to this section from the beginning of the chapter. So, make sure that this section flows well from and has a strong connection to the opening section of the chapter.

Tips and tricks for an A-grade discussion chapter

Now that you know what the discussion chapter is , what to include and exclude , and how to structure it , here are some tips and suggestions to help you craft a quality discussion chapter.

When you write up your discussion chapter, make sure that you keep it consistent with your introduction chapter , as some readers will skip from the introduction chapter directly to the discussion chapter. Your discussion should use the same tense as your introduction, and it should also make use of the same key terms.
Don’t make assumptions about your readers. As a writer, you have hands-on experience with the data and so it can be easy to present it in an over-simplified manner. Make sure that you spell out your findings and interpretations for the intelligent layman.
Have a look at other theses and dissertations from your institution, especially the discussion sections. This will help you to understand the standards and conventions of your university, and you’ll also get a good idea of how others have structured their discussion chapters. You can also check out our chapter template .
Avoid using absolute terms such as “These results prove that…”, rather make use of terms such as “suggest” or “indicate”, where you could say, “These results suggest that…” or “These results indicate…”. It is highly unlikely that a dissertation or thesis will scientifically prove something (due to a variety of resource constraints), so be humble in your language.
Use well-structured and consistently formatted headings to ensure that your reader can easily navigate between sections, and so that your chapter flows logically and coherently.

If you have any questions or thoughts regarding this post, feel free to leave a comment below. Also, if you’re looking for one-on-one help with your discussion chapter (or thesis in general), consider booking a free consultation with one of our highly experienced Grad Coaches to discuss how we can help you.

Psst... there’s more!

This post was based on one of our popular Research Bootcamps . If you're working on a research project, you'll definitely want to check this out ...

38 Comments

Thank you this is helpful!

This is very helpful to me… Thanks a lot for sharing this with us 😊

This has been very helpful indeed. Thank you.

This is actually really helpful, I just stumbled upon it. Very happy that I found it, thank you.

Me too! I was kinda lost on how to approach my discussion chapter. How helpful! Thanks a lot!

This is really good and explicit. Thanks

Thank you, this blog has been such a help.

Thank you. This is very helpful.

Dear sir/madame

Thanks a lot for this helpful blog. Really, it supported me in writing my discussion chapter while I was totally unaware about its structure and method of writing.

With regards

Syed Firoz Ahmad PhD, Research Scholar

I agree so much. This blog was god sent. It assisted me so much while I was totally clueless about the context and the know-how. Now I am fully aware of what I am to do and how I am to do it.

Thanks! This is helpful!

thanks alot for this informative website

Dear Sir/Madam,

Truly, your article was much benefited when i structured my discussion chapter.

Thank you very much!!!

This is helpful for me in writing my research discussion component. I have to copy this text on Microsoft word cause of my weakness that I cannot be able to read the text on screen a long time. So many thanks for this articles.

This was helpful

Thanks Jenna, well explained.

Thank you! This is super helpful.

Thanks very much. I have appreciated the six steps on writing the Discussion chapter which are (i) Restating the research problem and questions (ii) Summarising the key findings (iii) Interpreting the results linked to relating to previous results in positive and negative ways; explaining whay different or same and contribution to field of research and expalnation of findings (iv) Acknowledgeing limitations (v) Recommendations for implementation and future resaerch and finally (vi) Providing a conscluding summary

My two questions are: 1. On step 1 and 2 can it be the overall or you restate and sumamrise on each findings based on the reaerch question? 2. On 4 and 5 do you do the acknowlledgement , recommendations on each research finding or overall. This is not clear from your expalanattion.

Please respond.

This post is very useful. I’m wondering whether practical implications must be introduced in the Discussion section or in the Conclusion section?

This is very instructive and educative

Sigh, I never knew a 20 min video could have literally save my life like this. I found this at the right time!!!! Everything I need to know in one video thanks a mil ! OMGG and that 6 step!!!!!! was the cherry on top the cake!!!!!!!!!

Thanks alot.., I have gained much

This piece is very helpful on how to go about my discussion section. I can always recommend GradCoach research guides for colleagues.

Many thanks for this resource. It has been very helpful to me. I was finding it hard to even write the first sentence. Much appreciated.

Thanks so much. Very helpful to know what is included in the discussion section

this was a very helpful and useful information

This is very helpful. Very very helpful. Thanks for sharing this online!

it is very helpfull article, and i will recommend it to my fellow students. Thank you.

Superlative! More grease to your elbows.

Powerful, thank you for sharing.

Wow! Just wow! God bless the day I stumbled upon you guys’ YouTube videos! It’s been truly life changing and anxiety about my report that is due in less than a month has subsided significantly!

Simplified explanation. Well done.

The presentation is enlightening. Thank you very much.

Thanks for the support and guidance

This has been a great help to me and thank you do much

I second that “it is highly unlikely that a dissertation or thesis will scientifically prove something”; although, could you enlighten us on that comment and elaborate more please?

Sure, no problem.

Scientific proof is generally considered a very strong assertion that something is definitively and universally true. In most scientific disciplines, especially within the realms of natural and social sciences, absolute proof is very rare. Instead, researchers aim to provide evidence that supports or rejects hypotheses. This evidence increases or decreases the likelihood that a particular theory is correct, but it rarely proves something in the absolute sense.

Dissertations and theses, as substantial as they are, typically focus on exploring a specific question or problem within a larger field of study. They contribute to a broader conversation and body of knowledge. The aim is often to provide detailed insight, extend understanding, and suggest directions for further research rather than to offer definitive proof. These academic works are part of a cumulative process of knowledge building where each piece of research connects with others to gradually enhance our understanding of complex phenomena.

Furthermore, the rigorous nature of scientific inquiry involves continuous testing, validation, and potential refutation of ideas. What might be considered a “proof” at one point can later be challenged by new evidence or alternative interpretations. Therefore, the language of “proof” is cautiously used in academic circles to maintain scientific integrity and humility.

This was very helpful, thank you!

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USC Libraries
Research Guides

Organizing Your Social Sciences Research Paper

Types of Research Designs
Purpose of Guide
Design Flaws to Avoid
Independent and Dependent Variables
Glossary of Research Terms
Reading Research Effectively
Narrowing a Topic Idea
Broadening a Topic Idea
Extending the Timeliness of a Topic Idea
Academic Writing Style
Applying Critical Thinking
Choosing a Title
Making an Outline
Paragraph Development
Research Process Video Series
Executive Summary
The C.A.R.S. Model
Background Information
The Research Problem/Question
Theoretical Framework
Citation Tracking
Content Alert Services
Evaluating Sources
Primary Sources
Secondary Sources
Tiertiary Sources
Scholarly vs. Popular Publications
Qualitative Methods
Quantitative Methods
Insiderness
Using Non-Textual Elements
Limitations of the Study
Common Grammar Mistakes
Writing Concisely
Avoiding Plagiarism
Footnotes or Endnotes?
Further Readings
Generative AI and Writing
USC Libraries Tutorials and Other Guides
Bibliography

Introduction

Before beginning your paper, you need to decide how you plan to design the study .

The research design refers to the overall strategy and analytical approach that you have chosen in order to integrate, in a coherent and logical way, the different components of the study, thus ensuring that the research problem will be thoroughly investigated. It constitutes the blueprint for the collection, measurement, and interpretation of information and data. Note that the research problem determines the type of design you choose, not the other way around!

De Vaus, D. A. Research Design in Social Research . London: SAGE, 2001; Trochim, William M.K. Research Methods Knowledge Base. 2006.

General Structure and Writing Style

The function of a research design is to ensure that the evidence obtained enables you to effectively address the research problem logically and as unambiguously as possible . In social sciences research, obtaining information relevant to the research problem generally entails specifying the type of evidence needed to test the underlying assumptions of a theory, to evaluate a program, or to accurately describe and assess meaning related to an observable phenomenon.

With this in mind, a common mistake made by researchers is that they begin their investigations before they have thought critically about what information is required to address the research problem. Without attending to these design issues beforehand, the overall research problem will not be adequately addressed and any conclusions drawn will run the risk of being weak and unconvincing. As a consequence, the overall validity of the study will be undermined.

The length and complexity of describing the research design in your paper can vary considerably, but any well-developed description will achieve the following :

Identify the research problem clearly and justify its selection, particularly in relation to any valid alternative designs that could have been used,
Review and synthesize previously published literature associated with the research problem,
Clearly and explicitly specify hypotheses [i.e., research questions] central to the problem,
Effectively describe the information and/or data which will be necessary for an adequate testing of the hypotheses and explain how such information and/or data will be obtained, and
Describe the methods of analysis to be applied to the data in determining whether or not the hypotheses are true or false.

The research design is usually incorporated into the introduction of your paper . You can obtain an overall sense of what to do by reviewing studies that have utilized the same research design [e.g., using a case study approach]. This can help you develop an outline to follow for your own paper.

NOTE: Use the SAGE Research Methods Online and Cases and the SAGE Research Methods Videos databases to search for scholarly resources on how to apply specific research designs and methods . The Research Methods Online database contains links to more than 175,000 pages of SAGE publisher's book, journal, and reference content on quantitative, qualitative, and mixed research methodologies. Also included is a collection of case studies of social research projects that can be used to help you better understand abstract or complex methodological concepts. The Research Methods Videos database contains hours of tutorials, interviews, video case studies, and mini-documentaries covering the entire research process.

Creswell, John W. and J. David Creswell. Research Design: Qualitative, Quantitative, and Mixed Methods Approaches . 5th edition. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2018; De Vaus, D. A. Research Design in Social Research . London: SAGE, 2001; Gorard, Stephen. Research Design: Creating Robust Approaches for the Social Sciences . Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2013; Leedy, Paul D. and Jeanne Ellis Ormrod. Practical Research: Planning and Design . Tenth edition. Boston, MA: Pearson, 2013; Vogt, W. Paul, Dianna C. Gardner, and Lynne M. Haeffele. When to Use What Research Design . New York: Guilford, 2012.

Action Research Design

Definition and Purpose

The essentials of action research design follow a characteristic cycle whereby initially an exploratory stance is adopted, where an understanding of a problem is developed and plans are made for some form of interventionary strategy. Then the intervention is carried out [the "action" in action research] during which time, pertinent observations are collected in various forms. The new interventional strategies are carried out, and this cyclic process repeats, continuing until a sufficient understanding of [or a valid implementation solution for] the problem is achieved. The protocol is iterative or cyclical in nature and is intended to foster deeper understanding of a given situation, starting with conceptualizing and particularizing the problem and moving through several interventions and evaluations.

What do these studies tell you ?

This is a collaborative and adaptive research design that lends itself to use in work or community situations.
Design focuses on pragmatic and solution-driven research outcomes rather than testing theories.
When practitioners use action research, it has the potential to increase the amount they learn consciously from their experience; the action research cycle can be regarded as a learning cycle.
Action research studies often have direct and obvious relevance to improving practice and advocating for change.
There are no hidden controls or preemption of direction by the researcher.

What these studies don't tell you ?

It is harder to do than conducting conventional research because the researcher takes on responsibilities of advocating for change as well as for researching the topic.
Action research is much harder to write up because it is less likely that you can use a standard format to report your findings effectively [i.e., data is often in the form of stories or observation].
Personal over-involvement of the researcher may bias research results.
The cyclic nature of action research to achieve its twin outcomes of action [e.g. change] and research [e.g. understanding] is time-consuming and complex to conduct.
Advocating for change usually requires buy-in from study participants.

Coghlan, David and Mary Brydon-Miller. The Sage Encyclopedia of Action Research . Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2014; Efron, Sara Efrat and Ruth Ravid. Action Research in Education: A Practical Guide . New York: Guilford, 2013; Gall, Meredith. Educational Research: An Introduction . Chapter 18, Action Research. 8th ed. Boston, MA: Pearson/Allyn and Bacon, 2007; Gorard, Stephen. Research Design: Creating Robust Approaches for the Social Sciences . Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2013; Kemmis, Stephen and Robin McTaggart. “Participatory Action Research.” In Handbook of Qualitative Research . Norman Denzin and Yvonna S. Lincoln, eds. 2nd ed. (Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE, 2000), pp. 567-605; McNiff, Jean. Writing and Doing Action Research . London: Sage, 2014; Reason, Peter and Hilary Bradbury. Handbook of Action Research: Participative Inquiry and Practice . Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE, 2001.

Case Study Design

A case study is an in-depth study of a particular research problem rather than a sweeping statistical survey or comprehensive comparative inquiry. It is often used to narrow down a very broad field of research into one or a few easily researchable examples. The case study research design is also useful for testing whether a specific theory and model actually applies to phenomena in the real world. It is a useful design when not much is known about an issue or phenomenon.

Approach excels at bringing us to an understanding of a complex issue through detailed contextual analysis of a limited number of events or conditions and their relationships.
A researcher using a case study design can apply a variety of methodologies and rely on a variety of sources to investigate a research problem.
Design can extend experience or add strength to what is already known through previous research.
Social scientists, in particular, make wide use of this research design to examine contemporary real-life situations and provide the basis for the application of concepts and theories and the extension of methodologies.
The design can provide detailed descriptions of specific and rare cases.
A single or small number of cases offers little basis for establishing reliability or to generalize the findings to a wider population of people, places, or things.
Intense exposure to the study of a case may bias a researcher's interpretation of the findings.
Design does not facilitate assessment of cause and effect relationships.
Vital information may be missing, making the case hard to interpret.
The case may not be representative or typical of the larger problem being investigated.
If the criteria for selecting a case is because it represents a very unusual or unique phenomenon or problem for study, then your interpretation of the findings can only apply to that particular case.

Case Studies. Writing@CSU. Colorado State University; Anastas, Jeane W. Research Design for Social Work and the Human Services . Chapter 4, Flexible Methods: Case Study Design. 2nd ed. New York: Columbia University Press, 1999; Gerring, John. “What Is a Case Study and What Is It Good for?” American Political Science Review 98 (May 2004): 341-354; Greenhalgh, Trisha, editor. Case Study Evaluation: Past, Present and Future Challenges . Bingley, UK: Emerald Group Publishing, 2015; Mills, Albert J. , Gabrielle Durepos, and Eiden Wiebe, editors. Encyclopedia of Case Study Research . Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications, 2010; Stake, Robert E. The Art of Case Study Research . Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE, 1995; Yin, Robert K. Case Study Research: Design and Theory . Applied Social Research Methods Series, no. 5. 3rd ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE, 2003.

Causal Design

Causality studies may be thought of as understanding a phenomenon in terms of conditional statements in the form, “If X, then Y.” This type of research is used to measure what impact a specific change will have on existing norms and assumptions. Most social scientists seek causal explanations that reflect tests of hypotheses. Causal effect (nomothetic perspective) occurs when variation in one phenomenon, an independent variable, leads to or results, on average, in variation in another phenomenon, the dependent variable.

Conditions necessary for determining causality:

Empirical association -- a valid conclusion is based on finding an association between the independent variable and the dependent variable.
Appropriate time order -- to conclude that causation was involved, one must see that cases were exposed to variation in the independent variable before variation in the dependent variable.
Nonspuriousness -- a relationship between two variables that is not due to variation in a third variable.
Causality research designs assist researchers in understanding why the world works the way it does through the process of proving a causal link between variables and by the process of eliminating other possibilities.
Replication is possible.
There is greater confidence the study has internal validity due to the systematic subject selection and equity of groups being compared.
Not all relationships are causal! The possibility always exists that, by sheer coincidence, two unrelated events appear to be related [e.g., Punxatawney Phil could accurately predict the duration of Winter for five consecutive years but, the fact remains, he's just a big, furry rodent].
Conclusions about causal relationships are difficult to determine due to a variety of extraneous and confounding variables that exist in a social environment. This means causality can only be inferred, never proven.
If two variables are correlated, the cause must come before the effect. However, even though two variables might be causally related, it can sometimes be difficult to determine which variable comes first and, therefore, to establish which variable is the actual cause and which is the actual effect.

Beach, Derek and Rasmus Brun Pedersen. Causal Case Study Methods: Foundations and Guidelines for Comparing, Matching, and Tracing . Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 2016; Bachman, Ronet. The Practice of Research in Criminology and Criminal Justice . Chapter 5, Causation and Research Designs. 3rd ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: Pine Forge Press, 2007; Brewer, Ernest W. and Jennifer Kubn. “Causal-Comparative Design.” In Encyclopedia of Research Design . Neil J. Salkind, editor. (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2010), pp. 125-132; Causal Research Design: Experimentation. Anonymous SlideShare Presentation; Gall, Meredith. Educational Research: An Introduction . Chapter 11, Nonexperimental Research: Correlational Designs. 8th ed. Boston, MA: Pearson/Allyn and Bacon, 2007; Trochim, William M.K. Research Methods Knowledge Base. 2006.

Cohort Design

Often used in the medical sciences, but also found in the applied social sciences, a cohort study generally refers to a study conducted over a period of time involving members of a population which the subject or representative member comes from, and who are united by some commonality or similarity. Using a quantitative framework, a cohort study makes note of statistical occurrence within a specialized subgroup, united by same or similar characteristics that are relevant to the research problem being investigated, rather than studying statistical occurrence within the general population. Using a qualitative framework, cohort studies generally gather data using methods of observation. Cohorts can be either "open" or "closed."

Open Cohort Studies [dynamic populations, such as the population of Los Angeles] involve a population that is defined just by the state of being a part of the study in question (and being monitored for the outcome). Date of entry and exit from the study is individually defined, therefore, the size of the study population is not constant. In open cohort studies, researchers can only calculate rate based data, such as, incidence rates and variants thereof.
Closed Cohort Studies [static populations, such as patients entered into a clinical trial] involve participants who enter into the study at one defining point in time and where it is presumed that no new participants can enter the cohort. Given this, the number of study participants remains constant (or can only decrease).
The use of cohorts is often mandatory because a randomized control study may be unethical. For example, you cannot deliberately expose people to asbestos, you can only study its effects on those who have already been exposed. Research that measures risk factors often relies upon cohort designs.
Because cohort studies measure potential causes before the outcome has occurred, they can demonstrate that these “causes” preceded the outcome, thereby avoiding the debate as to which is the cause and which is the effect.
Cohort analysis is highly flexible and can provide insight into effects over time and related to a variety of different types of changes [e.g., social, cultural, political, economic, etc.].
Either original data or secondary data can be used in this design.
In cases where a comparative analysis of two cohorts is made [e.g., studying the effects of one group exposed to asbestos and one that has not], a researcher cannot control for all other factors that might differ between the two groups. These factors are known as confounding variables.
Cohort studies can end up taking a long time to complete if the researcher must wait for the conditions of interest to develop within the group. This also increases the chance that key variables change during the course of the study, potentially impacting the validity of the findings.
Due to the lack of randominization in the cohort design, its external validity is lower than that of study designs where the researcher randomly assigns participants.

Healy P, Devane D. “Methodological Considerations in Cohort Study Designs.” Nurse Researcher 18 (2011): 32-36; Glenn, Norval D, editor. Cohort Analysis . 2nd edition. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2005; Levin, Kate Ann. Study Design IV: Cohort Studies. Evidence-Based Dentistry 7 (2003): 51–52; Payne, Geoff. “Cohort Study.” In The SAGE Dictionary of Social Research Methods . Victor Jupp, editor. (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2006), pp. 31-33; Study Design 101. Himmelfarb Health Sciences Library. George Washington University, November 2011; Cohort Study. Wikipedia.

Cross-Sectional Design

Cross-sectional research designs have three distinctive features: no time dimension; a reliance on existing differences rather than change following intervention; and, groups are selected based on existing differences rather than random allocation. The cross-sectional design can only measure differences between or from among a variety of people, subjects, or phenomena rather than a process of change. As such, researchers using this design can only employ a relatively passive approach to making causal inferences based on findings.

Cross-sectional studies provide a clear 'snapshot' of the outcome and the characteristics associated with it, at a specific point in time.
Unlike an experimental design, where there is an active intervention by the researcher to produce and measure change or to create differences, cross-sectional designs focus on studying and drawing inferences from existing differences between people, subjects, or phenomena.
Entails collecting data at and concerning one point in time. While longitudinal studies involve taking multiple measures over an extended period of time, cross-sectional research is focused on finding relationships between variables at one moment in time.
Groups identified for study are purposely selected based upon existing differences in the sample rather than seeking random sampling.
Cross-section studies are capable of using data from a large number of subjects and, unlike observational studies, is not geographically bound.
Can estimate prevalence of an outcome of interest because the sample is usually taken from the whole population.
Because cross-sectional designs generally use survey techniques to gather data, they are relatively inexpensive and take up little time to conduct.
Finding people, subjects, or phenomena to study that are very similar except in one specific variable can be difficult.
Results are static and time bound and, therefore, give no indication of a sequence of events or reveal historical or temporal contexts.
Studies cannot be utilized to establish cause and effect relationships.
This design only provides a snapshot of analysis so there is always the possibility that a study could have differing results if another time-frame had been chosen.
There is no follow up to the findings.

Bethlehem, Jelke. "7: Cross-sectional Research." In Research Methodology in the Social, Behavioural and Life Sciences . Herman J Adèr and Gideon J Mellenbergh, editors. (London, England: Sage, 1999), pp. 110-43; Bourque, Linda B. “Cross-Sectional Design.” In The SAGE Encyclopedia of Social Science Research Methods . Michael S. Lewis-Beck, Alan Bryman, and Tim Futing Liao. (Thousand Oaks, CA: 2004), pp. 230-231; Hall, John. “Cross-Sectional Survey Design.” In Encyclopedia of Survey Research Methods . Paul J. Lavrakas, ed. (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2008), pp. 173-174; Helen Barratt, Maria Kirwan. Cross-Sectional Studies: Design Application, Strengths and Weaknesses of Cross-Sectional Studies. Healthknowledge, 2009. Cross-Sectional Study. Wikipedia.

Descriptive Design

Descriptive research designs help provide answers to the questions of who, what, when, where, and how associated with a particular research problem; a descriptive study cannot conclusively ascertain answers to why. Descriptive research is used to obtain information concerning the current status of the phenomena and to describe "what exists" with respect to variables or conditions in a situation.

The subject is being observed in a completely natural and unchanged natural environment. True experiments, whilst giving analyzable data, often adversely influence the normal behavior of the subject [a.k.a., the Heisenberg effect whereby measurements of certain systems cannot be made without affecting the systems].
Descriptive research is often used as a pre-cursor to more quantitative research designs with the general overview giving some valuable pointers as to what variables are worth testing quantitatively.
If the limitations are understood, they can be a useful tool in developing a more focused study.
Descriptive studies can yield rich data that lead to important recommendations in practice.
Appoach collects a large amount of data for detailed analysis.
The results from a descriptive research cannot be used to discover a definitive answer or to disprove a hypothesis.
Because descriptive designs often utilize observational methods [as opposed to quantitative methods], the results cannot be replicated.
The descriptive function of research is heavily dependent on instrumentation for measurement and observation.

Anastas, Jeane W. Research Design for Social Work and the Human Services . Chapter 5, Flexible Methods: Descriptive Research. 2nd ed. New York: Columbia University Press, 1999; Given, Lisa M. "Descriptive Research." In Encyclopedia of Measurement and Statistics . Neil J. Salkind and Kristin Rasmussen, editors. (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2007), pp. 251-254; McNabb, Connie. Descriptive Research Methodologies. Powerpoint Presentation; Shuttleworth, Martyn. Descriptive Research Design, September 26, 2008; Erickson, G. Scott. "Descriptive Research Design." In New Methods of Market Research and Analysis . (Northampton, MA: Edward Elgar Publishing, 2017), pp. 51-77; Sahin, Sagufta, and Jayanta Mete. "A Brief Study on Descriptive Research: Its Nature and Application in Social Science." International Journal of Research and Analysis in Humanities 1 (2021): 11; K. Swatzell and P. Jennings. “Descriptive Research: The Nuts and Bolts.” Journal of the American Academy of Physician Assistants 20 (2007), pp. 55-56; Kane, E. Doing Your Own Research: Basic Descriptive Research in the Social Sciences and Humanities . London: Marion Boyars, 1985.

Experimental Design

A blueprint of the procedure that enables the researcher to maintain control over all factors that may affect the result of an experiment. In doing this, the researcher attempts to determine or predict what may occur. Experimental research is often used where there is time priority in a causal relationship (cause precedes effect), there is consistency in a causal relationship (a cause will always lead to the same effect), and the magnitude of the correlation is great. The classic experimental design specifies an experimental group and a control group. The independent variable is administered to the experimental group and not to the control group, and both groups are measured on the same dependent variable. Subsequent experimental designs have used more groups and more measurements over longer periods. True experiments must have control, randomization, and manipulation.

Experimental research allows the researcher to control the situation. In so doing, it allows researchers to answer the question, “What causes something to occur?”
Permits the researcher to identify cause and effect relationships between variables and to distinguish placebo effects from treatment effects.
Experimental research designs support the ability to limit alternative explanations and to infer direct causal relationships in the study.
Approach provides the highest level of evidence for single studies.
The design is artificial, and results may not generalize well to the real world.
The artificial settings of experiments may alter the behaviors or responses of participants.
Experimental designs can be costly if special equipment or facilities are needed.
Some research problems cannot be studied using an experiment because of ethical or technical reasons.
Difficult to apply ethnographic and other qualitative methods to experimentally designed studies.

Anastas, Jeane W. Research Design for Social Work and the Human Services . Chapter 7, Flexible Methods: Experimental Research. 2nd ed. New York: Columbia University Press, 1999; Chapter 2: Research Design, Experimental Designs. School of Psychology, University of New England, 2000; Chow, Siu L. "Experimental Design." In Encyclopedia of Research Design . Neil J. Salkind, editor. (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2010), pp. 448-453; "Experimental Design." In Social Research Methods . Nicholas Walliman, editor. (London, England: Sage, 2006), pp, 101-110; Experimental Research. Research Methods by Dummies. Department of Psychology. California State University, Fresno, 2006; Kirk, Roger E. Experimental Design: Procedures for the Behavioral Sciences . 4th edition. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2013; Trochim, William M.K. Experimental Design. Research Methods Knowledge Base. 2006; Rasool, Shafqat. Experimental Research. Slideshare presentation.

Exploratory Design

An exploratory design is conducted about a research problem when there are few or no earlier studies to refer to or rely upon to predict an outcome . The focus is on gaining insights and familiarity for later investigation or undertaken when research problems are in a preliminary stage of investigation. Exploratory designs are often used to establish an understanding of how best to proceed in studying an issue or what methodology would effectively apply to gathering information about the issue.

The goals of exploratory research are intended to produce the following possible insights:

Familiarity with basic details, settings, and concerns.
Well grounded picture of the situation being developed.
Generation of new ideas and assumptions.
Development of tentative theories or hypotheses.
Determination about whether a study is feasible in the future.
Issues get refined for more systematic investigation and formulation of new research questions.
Direction for future research and techniques get developed.
Design is a useful approach for gaining background information on a particular topic.
Exploratory research is flexible and can address research questions of all types (what, why, how).
Provides an opportunity to define new terms and clarify existing concepts.
Exploratory research is often used to generate formal hypotheses and develop more precise research problems.
In the policy arena or applied to practice, exploratory studies help establish research priorities and where resources should be allocated.
Exploratory research generally utilizes small sample sizes and, thus, findings are typically not generalizable to the population at large.
The exploratory nature of the research inhibits an ability to make definitive conclusions about the findings. They provide insight but not definitive conclusions.
The research process underpinning exploratory studies is flexible but often unstructured, leading to only tentative results that have limited value to decision-makers.
Design lacks rigorous standards applied to methods of data gathering and analysis because one of the areas for exploration could be to determine what method or methodologies could best fit the research problem.

Cuthill, Michael. “Exploratory Research: Citizen Participation, Local Government, and Sustainable Development in Australia.” Sustainable Development 10 (2002): 79-89; Streb, Christoph K. "Exploratory Case Study." In Encyclopedia of Case Study Research . Albert J. Mills, Gabrielle Durepos and Eiden Wiebe, editors. (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2010), pp. 372-374; Taylor, P. J., G. Catalano, and D.R.F. Walker. “Exploratory Analysis of the World City Network.” Urban Studies 39 (December 2002): 2377-2394; Exploratory Research. Wikipedia.

Field Research Design

Sometimes referred to as ethnography or participant observation, designs around field research encompass a variety of interpretative procedures [e.g., observation and interviews] rooted in qualitative approaches to studying people individually or in groups while inhabiting their natural environment as opposed to using survey instruments or other forms of impersonal methods of data gathering. Information acquired from observational research takes the form of “ field notes ” that involves documenting what the researcher actually sees and hears while in the field. Findings do not consist of conclusive statements derived from numbers and statistics because field research involves analysis of words and observations of behavior. Conclusions, therefore, are developed from an interpretation of findings that reveal overriding themes, concepts, and ideas. More information can be found HERE .

Field research is often necessary to fill gaps in understanding the research problem applied to local conditions or to specific groups of people that cannot be ascertained from existing data.
The research helps contextualize already known information about a research problem, thereby facilitating ways to assess the origins, scope, and scale of a problem and to gage the causes, consequences, and means to resolve an issue based on deliberate interaction with people in their natural inhabited spaces.
Enables the researcher to corroborate or confirm data by gathering additional information that supports or refutes findings reported in prior studies of the topic.
Because the researcher in embedded in the field, they are better able to make observations or ask questions that reflect the specific cultural context of the setting being investigated.
Observing the local reality offers the opportunity to gain new perspectives or obtain unique data that challenges existing theoretical propositions or long-standing assumptions found in the literature.

What these studies don't tell you

A field research study requires extensive time and resources to carry out the multiple steps involved with preparing for the gathering of information, including for example, examining background information about the study site, obtaining permission to access the study site, and building trust and rapport with subjects.
Requires a commitment to staying engaged in the field to ensure that you can adequately document events and behaviors as they unfold.
The unpredictable nature of fieldwork means that researchers can never fully control the process of data gathering. They must maintain a flexible approach to studying the setting because events and circumstances can change quickly or unexpectedly.
Findings can be difficult to interpret and verify without access to documents and other source materials that help to enhance the credibility of information obtained from the field [i.e., the act of triangulating the data].
Linking the research problem to the selection of study participants inhabiting their natural environment is critical. However, this specificity limits the ability to generalize findings to different situations or in other contexts or to infer courses of action applied to other settings or groups of people.
The reporting of findings must take into account how the researcher themselves may have inadvertently affected respondents and their behaviors.

Historical Design

The purpose of a historical research design is to collect, verify, and synthesize evidence from the past to establish facts that defend or refute a hypothesis. It uses secondary sources and a variety of primary documentary evidence, such as, diaries, official records, reports, archives, and non-textual information [maps, pictures, audio and visual recordings]. The limitation is that the sources must be both authentic and valid.

The historical research design is unobtrusive; the act of research does not affect the results of the study.
The historical approach is well suited for trend analysis.
Historical records can add important contextual background required to more fully understand and interpret a research problem.
There is often no possibility of researcher-subject interaction that could affect the findings.
Historical sources can be used over and over to study different research problems or to replicate a previous study.
The ability to fulfill the aims of your research are directly related to the amount and quality of documentation available to understand the research problem.
Since historical research relies on data from the past, there is no way to manipulate it to control for contemporary contexts.
Interpreting historical sources can be very time consuming.
The sources of historical materials must be archived consistently to ensure access. This may especially challenging for digital or online-only sources.
Original authors bring their own perspectives and biases to the interpretation of past events and these biases are more difficult to ascertain in historical resources.
Due to the lack of control over external variables, historical research is very weak with regard to the demands of internal validity.
It is rare that the entirety of historical documentation needed to fully address a research problem is available for interpretation, therefore, gaps need to be acknowledged.

Howell, Martha C. and Walter Prevenier. From Reliable Sources: An Introduction to Historical Methods . Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2001; Lundy, Karen Saucier. "Historical Research." In The Sage Encyclopedia of Qualitative Research Methods . Lisa M. Given, editor. (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2008), pp. 396-400; Marius, Richard. and Melvin E. Page. A Short Guide to Writing about History . 9th edition. Boston, MA: Pearson, 2015; Savitt, Ronald. “Historical Research in Marketing.” Journal of Marketing 44 (Autumn, 1980): 52-58; Gall, Meredith. Educational Research: An Introduction . Chapter 16, Historical Research. 8th ed. Boston, MA: Pearson/Allyn and Bacon, 2007.

Longitudinal Design

A longitudinal study follows the same sample over time and makes repeated observations. For example, with longitudinal surveys, the same group of people is interviewed at regular intervals, enabling researchers to track changes over time and to relate them to variables that might explain why the changes occur. Longitudinal research designs describe patterns of change and help establish the direction and magnitude of causal relationships. Measurements are taken on each variable over two or more distinct time periods. This allows the researcher to measure change in variables over time. It is a type of observational study sometimes referred to as a panel study.

Longitudinal data facilitate the analysis of the duration of a particular phenomenon.
Enables survey researchers to get close to the kinds of causal explanations usually attainable only with experiments.
The design permits the measurement of differences or change in a variable from one period to another [i.e., the description of patterns of change over time].
Longitudinal studies facilitate the prediction of future outcomes based upon earlier factors.
The data collection method may change over time.
Maintaining the integrity of the original sample can be difficult over an extended period of time.
It can be difficult to show more than one variable at a time.
This design often needs qualitative research data to explain fluctuations in the results.
A longitudinal research design assumes present trends will continue unchanged.
It can take a long period of time to gather results.
There is a need to have a large sample size and accurate sampling to reach representativness.

Anastas, Jeane W. Research Design for Social Work and the Human Services . Chapter 6, Flexible Methods: Relational and Longitudinal Research. 2nd ed. New York: Columbia University Press, 1999; Forgues, Bernard, and Isabelle Vandangeon-Derumez. "Longitudinal Analyses." In Doing Management Research . Raymond-Alain Thiétart and Samantha Wauchope, editors. (London, England: Sage, 2001), pp. 332-351; Kalaian, Sema A. and Rafa M. Kasim. "Longitudinal Studies." In Encyclopedia of Survey Research Methods . Paul J. Lavrakas, ed. (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2008), pp. 440-441; Menard, Scott, editor. Longitudinal Research . Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2002; Ployhart, Robert E. and Robert J. Vandenberg. "Longitudinal Research: The Theory, Design, and Analysis of Change.” Journal of Management 36 (January 2010): 94-120; Longitudinal Study. Wikipedia.

Meta-Analysis Design

Meta-analysis is an analytical methodology designed to systematically evaluate and summarize the results from a number of individual studies, thereby, increasing the overall sample size and the ability of the researcher to study effects of interest. The purpose is to not simply summarize existing knowledge, but to develop a new understanding of a research problem using synoptic reasoning. The main objectives of meta-analysis include analyzing differences in the results among studies and increasing the precision by which effects are estimated. A well-designed meta-analysis depends upon strict adherence to the criteria used for selecting studies and the availability of information in each study to properly analyze their findings. Lack of information can severely limit the type of analyzes and conclusions that can be reached. In addition, the more dissimilarity there is in the results among individual studies [heterogeneity], the more difficult it is to justify interpretations that govern a valid synopsis of results. A meta-analysis needs to fulfill the following requirements to ensure the validity of your findings:

Clearly defined description of objectives, including precise definitions of the variables and outcomes that are being evaluated;
A well-reasoned and well-documented justification for identification and selection of the studies;
Assessment and explicit acknowledgment of any researcher bias in the identification and selection of those studies;
Description and evaluation of the degree of heterogeneity among the sample size of studies reviewed; and,
Justification of the techniques used to evaluate the studies.
Can be an effective strategy for determining gaps in the literature.
Provides a means of reviewing research published about a particular topic over an extended period of time and from a variety of sources.
Is useful in clarifying what policy or programmatic actions can be justified on the basis of analyzing research results from multiple studies.
Provides a method for overcoming small sample sizes in individual studies that previously may have had little relationship to each other.
Can be used to generate new hypotheses or highlight research problems for future studies.
Small violations in defining the criteria used for content analysis can lead to difficult to interpret and/or meaningless findings.
A large sample size can yield reliable, but not necessarily valid, results.
A lack of uniformity regarding, for example, the type of literature reviewed, how methods are applied, and how findings are measured within the sample of studies you are analyzing, can make the process of synthesis difficult to perform.
Depending on the sample size, the process of reviewing and synthesizing multiple studies can be very time consuming.

Beck, Lewis W. "The Synoptic Method." The Journal of Philosophy 36 (1939): 337-345; Cooper, Harris, Larry V. Hedges, and Jeffrey C. Valentine, eds. The Handbook of Research Synthesis and Meta-Analysis . 2nd edition. New York: Russell Sage Foundation, 2009; Guzzo, Richard A., Susan E. Jackson and Raymond A. Katzell. “Meta-Analysis Analysis.” In Research in Organizational Behavior , Volume 9. (Greenwich, CT: JAI Press, 1987), pp 407-442; Lipsey, Mark W. and David B. Wilson. Practical Meta-Analysis . Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 2001; Study Design 101. Meta-Analysis. The Himmelfarb Health Sciences Library, George Washington University; Timulak, Ladislav. “Qualitative Meta-Analysis.” In The SAGE Handbook of Qualitative Data Analysis . Uwe Flick, editor. (Los Angeles, CA: Sage, 2013), pp. 481-495; Walker, Esteban, Adrian V. Hernandez, and Micheal W. Kattan. "Meta-Analysis: It's Strengths and Limitations." Cleveland Clinic Journal of Medicine 75 (June 2008): 431-439.

Mixed-Method Design

Narrative and non-textual information can add meaning to numeric data, while numeric data can add precision to narrative and non-textual information.
Can utilize existing data while at the same time generating and testing a grounded theory approach to describe and explain the phenomenon under study.
A broader, more complex research problem can be investigated because the researcher is not constrained by using only one method.
The strengths of one method can be used to overcome the inherent weaknesses of another method.
Can provide stronger, more robust evidence to support a conclusion or set of recommendations.
May generate new knowledge new insights or uncover hidden insights, patterns, or relationships that a single methodological approach might not reveal.
Produces more complete knowledge and understanding of the research problem that can be used to increase the generalizability of findings applied to theory or practice.
A researcher must be proficient in understanding how to apply multiple methods to investigating a research problem as well as be proficient in optimizing how to design a study that coherently melds them together.
Can increase the likelihood of conflicting results or ambiguous findings that inhibit drawing a valid conclusion or setting forth a recommended course of action [e.g., sample interview responses do not support existing statistical data].
Because the research design can be very complex, reporting the findings requires a well-organized narrative, clear writing style, and precise word choice.
Design invites collaboration among experts. However, merging different investigative approaches and writing styles requires more attention to the overall research process than studies conducted using only one methodological paradigm.
Concurrent merging of quantitative and qualitative research requires greater attention to having adequate sample sizes, using comparable samples, and applying a consistent unit of analysis. For sequential designs where one phase of qualitative research builds on the quantitative phase or vice versa, decisions about what results from the first phase to use in the next phase, the choice of samples and estimating reasonable sample sizes for both phases, and the interpretation of results from both phases can be difficult.
Due to multiple forms of data being collected and analyzed, this design requires extensive time and resources to carry out the multiple steps involved in data gathering and interpretation.

Burch, Patricia and Carolyn J. Heinrich. Mixed Methods for Policy Research and Program Evaluation . Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2016; Creswell, John w. et al. Best Practices for Mixed Methods Research in the Health Sciences . Bethesda, MD: Office of Behavioral and Social Sciences Research, National Institutes of Health, 2010Creswell, John W. Research Design: Qualitative, Quantitative, and Mixed Methods Approaches . 4th edition. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 2014; Domínguez, Silvia, editor. Mixed Methods Social Networks Research . Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2014; Hesse-Biber, Sharlene Nagy. Mixed Methods Research: Merging Theory with Practice . New York: Guilford Press, 2010; Niglas, Katrin. “How the Novice Researcher Can Make Sense of Mixed Methods Designs.” International Journal of Multiple Research Approaches 3 (2009): 34-46; Onwuegbuzie, Anthony J. and Nancy L. Leech. “Linking Research Questions to Mixed Methods Data Analysis Procedures.” The Qualitative Report 11 (September 2006): 474-498; Tashakorri, Abbas and John W. Creswell. “The New Era of Mixed Methods.” Journal of Mixed Methods Research 1 (January 2007): 3-7; Zhanga, Wanqing. “Mixed Methods Application in Health Intervention Research: A Multiple Case Study.” International Journal of Multiple Research Approaches 8 (2014): 24-35 .

Observational Design

This type of research design draws a conclusion by comparing subjects against a control group, in cases where the researcher has no control over the experiment. There are two general types of observational designs. In direct observations, people know that you are watching them. Unobtrusive measures involve any method for studying behavior where individuals do not know they are being observed. An observational study allows a useful insight into a phenomenon and avoids the ethical and practical difficulties of setting up a large and cumbersome research project.

Observational studies are usually flexible and do not necessarily need to be structured around a hypothesis about what you expect to observe [data is emergent rather than pre-existing].
The researcher is able to collect in-depth information about a particular behavior.
Can reveal interrelationships among multifaceted dimensions of group interactions.
You can generalize your results to real life situations.
Observational research is useful for discovering what variables may be important before applying other methods like experiments.
Observation research designs account for the complexity of group behaviors.
Reliability of data is low because seeing behaviors occur over and over again may be a time consuming task and are difficult to replicate.
In observational research, findings may only reflect a unique sample population and, thus, cannot be generalized to other groups.
There can be problems with bias as the researcher may only "see what they want to see."
There is no possibility to determine "cause and effect" relationships since nothing is manipulated.
Sources or subjects may not all be equally credible.
Any group that is knowingly studied is altered to some degree by the presence of the researcher, therefore, potentially skewing any data collected.

Atkinson, Paul and Martyn Hammersley. “Ethnography and Participant Observation.” In Handbook of Qualitative Research . Norman K. Denzin and Yvonna S. Lincoln, eds. (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 1994), pp. 248-261; Observational Research. Research Methods by Dummies. Department of Psychology. California State University, Fresno, 2006; Patton Michael Quinn. Qualitiative Research and Evaluation Methods . Chapter 6, Fieldwork Strategies and Observational Methods. 3rd ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2002; Payne, Geoff and Judy Payne. "Observation." In Key Concepts in Social Research . The SAGE Key Concepts series. (London, England: Sage, 2004), pp. 158-162; Rosenbaum, Paul R. Design of Observational Studies . New York: Springer, 2010;Williams, J. Patrick. "Nonparticipant Observation." In The Sage Encyclopedia of Qualitative Research Methods . Lisa M. Given, editor.(Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2008), pp. 562-563.

Philosophical Design

Understood more as an broad approach to examining a research problem than a methodological design, philosophical analysis and argumentation is intended to challenge deeply embedded, often intractable, assumptions underpinning an area of study. This approach uses the tools of argumentation derived from philosophical traditions, concepts, models, and theories to critically explore and challenge, for example, the relevance of logic and evidence in academic debates, to analyze arguments about fundamental issues, or to discuss the root of existing discourse about a research problem. These overarching tools of analysis can be framed in three ways:

Ontology -- the study that describes the nature of reality; for example, what is real and what is not, what is fundamental and what is derivative?
Epistemology -- the study that explores the nature of knowledge; for example, by what means does knowledge and understanding depend upon and how can we be certain of what we know?
Axiology -- the study of values; for example, what values does an individual or group hold and why? How are values related to interest, desire, will, experience, and means-to-end? And, what is the difference between a matter of fact and a matter of value?
Can provide a basis for applying ethical decision-making to practice.
Functions as a means of gaining greater self-understanding and self-knowledge about the purposes of research.
Brings clarity to general guiding practices and principles of an individual or group.
Philosophy informs methodology.
Refine concepts and theories that are invoked in relatively unreflective modes of thought and discourse.
Beyond methodology, philosophy also informs critical thinking about epistemology and the structure of reality (metaphysics).
Offers clarity and definition to the practical and theoretical uses of terms, concepts, and ideas.
Limited application to specific research problems [answering the "So What?" question in social science research].
Analysis can be abstract, argumentative, and limited in its practical application to real-life issues.
While a philosophical analysis may render problematic that which was once simple or taken-for-granted, the writing can be dense and subject to unnecessary jargon, overstatement, and/or excessive quotation and documentation.
There are limitations in the use of metaphor as a vehicle of philosophical analysis.
There can be analytical difficulties in moving from philosophy to advocacy and between abstract thought and application to the phenomenal world.

Burton, Dawn. "Part I, Philosophy of the Social Sciences." In Research Training for Social Scientists . (London, England: Sage, 2000), pp. 1-5; Chapter 4, Research Methodology and Design. Unisa Institutional Repository (UnisaIR), University of South Africa; Jarvie, Ian C., and Jesús Zamora-Bonilla, editors. The SAGE Handbook of the Philosophy of Social Sciences . London: Sage, 2011; Labaree, Robert V. and Ross Scimeca. “The Philosophical Problem of Truth in Librarianship.” The Library Quarterly 78 (January 2008): 43-70; Maykut, Pamela S. Beginning Qualitative Research: A Philosophic and Practical Guide . Washington, DC: Falmer Press, 1994; McLaughlin, Hugh. "The Philosophy of Social Research." In Understanding Social Work Research . 2nd edition. (London: SAGE Publications Ltd., 2012), pp. 24-47; Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy . Metaphysics Research Lab, CSLI, Stanford University, 2013.

Sequential Design

The researcher has a limitless option when it comes to sample size and the sampling schedule.
Due to the repetitive nature of this research design, minor changes and adjustments can be done during the initial parts of the study to correct and hone the research method.
This is a useful design for exploratory studies.
There is very little effort on the part of the researcher when performing this technique. It is generally not expensive, time consuming, or workforce intensive.
Because the study is conducted serially, the results of one sample are known before the next sample is taken and analyzed. This provides opportunities for continuous improvement of sampling and methods of analysis.
The sampling method is not representative of the entire population. The only possibility of approaching representativeness is when the researcher chooses to use a very large sample size significant enough to represent a significant portion of the entire population. In this case, moving on to study a second or more specific sample can be difficult.
The design cannot be used to create conclusions and interpretations that pertain to an entire population because the sampling technique is not randomized. Generalizability from findings is, therefore, limited.
Difficult to account for and interpret variation from one sample to another over time, particularly when using qualitative methods of data collection.

Betensky, Rebecca. Harvard University, Course Lecture Note slides; Bovaird, James A. and Kevin A. Kupzyk. "Sequential Design." In Encyclopedia of Research Design . Neil J. Salkind, editor. (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2010), pp. 1347-1352; Cresswell, John W. Et al. “Advanced Mixed-Methods Research Designs.” In Handbook of Mixed Methods in Social and Behavioral Research . Abbas Tashakkori and Charles Teddle, eds. (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2003), pp. 209-240; Henry, Gary T. "Sequential Sampling." In The SAGE Encyclopedia of Social Science Research Methods . Michael S. Lewis-Beck, Alan Bryman and Tim Futing Liao, editors. (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2004), pp. 1027-1028; Nataliya V. Ivankova. “Using Mixed-Methods Sequential Explanatory Design: From Theory to Practice.” Field Methods 18 (February 2006): 3-20; Bovaird, James A. and Kevin A. Kupzyk. “Sequential Design.” In Encyclopedia of Research Design . Neil J. Salkind, ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2010; Sequential Analysis. Wikipedia.

Systematic Review

A systematic review synthesizes the findings of multiple studies related to each other by incorporating strategies of analysis and interpretation intended to reduce biases and random errors.
The application of critical exploration, evaluation, and synthesis methods separates insignificant, unsound, or redundant research from the most salient and relevant studies worthy of reflection.
They can be use to identify, justify, and refine hypotheses, recognize and avoid hidden problems in prior studies, and explain data inconsistencies and conflicts in data.
Systematic reviews can be used to help policy makers formulate evidence-based guidelines and regulations.
The use of strict, explicit, and pre-determined methods of synthesis, when applied appropriately, provide reliable estimates about the effects of interventions, evaluations, and effects related to the overarching research problem investigated by each study under review.
Systematic reviews illuminate where knowledge or thorough understanding of a research problem is lacking and, therefore, can then be used to guide future research.
The accepted inclusion of unpublished studies [i.e., grey literature] ensures the broadest possible way to analyze and interpret research on a topic.
Results of the synthesis can be generalized and the findings extrapolated into the general population with more validity than most other types of studies .
Systematic reviews do not create new knowledge per se; they are a method for synthesizing existing studies about a research problem in order to gain new insights and determine gaps in the literature.
The way researchers have carried out their investigations [e.g., the period of time covered, number of participants, sources of data analyzed, etc.] can make it difficult to effectively synthesize studies.
The inclusion of unpublished studies can introduce bias into the review because they may not have undergone a rigorous peer-review process prior to publication. Examples may include conference presentations or proceedings, publications from government agencies, white papers, working papers, and internal documents from organizations, and doctoral dissertations and Master's theses.

Denyer, David and David Tranfield. "Producing a Systematic Review." In The Sage Handbook of Organizational Research Methods . David A. Buchanan and Alan Bryman, editors. ( Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 2009), pp. 671-689; Foster, Margaret J. and Sarah T. Jewell, editors. Assembling the Pieces of a Systematic Review: A Guide for Librarians . Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield, 2017; Gough, David, Sandy Oliver, James Thomas, editors. Introduction to Systematic Reviews . 2nd edition. Los Angeles, CA: Sage Publications, 2017; Gopalakrishnan, S. and P. Ganeshkumar. “Systematic Reviews and Meta-analysis: Understanding the Best Evidence in Primary Healthcare.” Journal of Family Medicine and Primary Care 2 (2013): 9-14; Gough, David, James Thomas, and Sandy Oliver. "Clarifying Differences between Review Designs and Methods." Systematic Reviews 1 (2012): 1-9; Khan, Khalid S., Regina Kunz, Jos Kleijnen, and Gerd Antes. “Five Steps to Conducting a Systematic Review.” Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine 96 (2003): 118-121; Mulrow, C. D. “Systematic Reviews: Rationale for Systematic Reviews.” BMJ 309:597 (September 1994); O'Dwyer, Linda C., and Q. Eileen Wafford. "Addressing Challenges with Systematic Review Teams through Effective Communication: A Case Report." Journal of the Medical Library Association 109 (October 2021): 643-647; Okoli, Chitu, and Kira Schabram. "A Guide to Conducting a Systematic Literature Review of Information Systems Research." Sprouts: Working Papers on Information Systems 10 (2010); Siddaway, Andy P., Alex M. Wood, and Larry V. Hedges. "How to Do a Systematic Review: A Best Practice Guide for Conducting and Reporting Narrative Reviews, Meta-analyses, and Meta-syntheses." Annual Review of Psychology 70 (2019): 747-770; Torgerson, Carole J. “Publication Bias: The Achilles’ Heel of Systematic Reviews?” British Journal of Educational Studies 54 (March 2006): 89-102; Torgerson, Carole. Systematic Reviews . New York: Continuum, 2003.

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Chapter 6: Experimental Research

In the late 1960s social psychologists John Darley and Bibb Latané proposed a counterintuitive hypothesis. The more witnesses there are to an accident or a crime, the less likely any of them is to help the victim (Darley & Latané, 1968) [1] .

They also suggested the theory that this phenomenon occurs because each witness feels less responsible for helping—a process referred to as the “diffusion of responsibility.” Darley and Latané noted that their ideas were consistent with many real-world cases. For example, a New York woman named Catherine “Kitty” Genovese was assaulted and murdered while several witnesses evidently failed to help. But Darley and Latané also understood that such isolated cases did not provide convincing evidence for their hypothesized “bystander effect.” There was no way to know, for example, whether any of the witnesses to Kitty Genovese’s murder would have helped had there been fewer of them.

So to test their hypothesis, Darley and Latané created a simulated emergency situation in a laboratory. Each of their university student participants was isolated in a small room and told that he or she would be having a discussion about university life with other students via an intercom system. Early in the discussion, however, one of the students began having what seemed to be an epileptic seizure. Over the intercom came the following: “I could really-er-use some help so if somebody would-er-give me a little h-help-uh-er-er-er-er-er c-could somebody-er-er-help-er-uh-uh-uh (choking sounds)…I’m gonna die-er-er-I’m…gonna die-er-help-er-er-seizure-er- [chokes, then quiet]” (Darley & Latané, 1968, p. 379) [2] .

In actuality, there were no other students. These comments had been prerecorded and were played back to create the appearance of a real emergency. The key to the study was that some participants were told that the discussion involved only one other student (the victim), others were told that it involved two other students, and still others were told that it included five other students. Because this was the only difference between these three groups of participants, any difference in their tendency to help the victim would have to have been caused by it. And sure enough, the likelihood that the participant left the room to seek help for the “victim” decreased from 85% to 62% to 31% as the number of “witnesses” increased.

The Parable of the 38 Witnesses

The story of Kitty Genovese has been told and retold in numerous psychology textbooks. The standard version is that there were 38 witnesses to the crime, that all of them watched (or listened) for an extended period of time, and that none of them did anything to help. However, recent scholarship suggests that the standard story is inaccurate in many ways (Manning, Levine, & Collins, 2007) [3] . For example, only six eyewitnesses testified at the trial, none of them was aware that he or she was witnessing a lethal assault, and there have been several reports of witnesses calling the police or even coming to the aid of Kitty Genovese. Although the standard story inspired a long line of research on the bystander effect and the diffusion of responsibility, it may also have directed researchers’ and students’ attention away from other equally interesting and important issues in the psychology of helping—including the conditions in which people do in fact respond collectively to emergency situations.

The research that Darley and Latané conducted was a particular kind of study called an experiment. Experiments are used to determine not only whether there is a meaningful relationship between two variables but also whether the relationship is a causal one that is supported by statistical analysis. For this reason, experiments are one of the most common and useful tools in the psychological researcher’s toolbox. In this chapter, we look at experiments in detail. We will first consider what sets experiments apart from other kinds of studies and why they support causal conclusions while other kinds of studies do not. We then look at two basic ways of designing an experiment—between-subjects designs and within-subjects designs—and discuss their pros and cons. Finally, we consider several important practical issues that arise when conducting experiments.

Darley, J. M., & Latané, B. (1968). Bystander intervention in emergencies: Diffusion of responsibility. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 4 , 377–383. ↵
Manning, R., Levine, M., & Collins, A. (2007). The Kitty Genovese murder and the social psychology of helping: The parable of the 38 witnesses. American Psychologist, 62 , 555–562. ↵

Research Methods in Psychology - 2nd Canadian Edition Copyright © 2015 by Paul C. Price, Rajiv Jhangiani, & I-Chant A. Chiang is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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Chapter 6: Proposals

Learning objectives, why write proposals.

In school, your instructors may ask you to write proposals to solve or improve a problem. For example, you could write a proposal to better meet the needs of students so 50% of them don’t fail to complete their degrees. Or you could attempt to solve that age-old problem of parking on overcrowded campuses. Instructors across the disciplines may ask you to write research proposals, outlining a topic, describing its significance, and presenting a schedule for more thoroughly researching the topic. In business classes, your teachers may assign business plans or your teachers may seek proposals to improve the curriculum.

Proposals are arguments that seek particular outcomes from the readers of the proposals. Proposals can offer to trade services for money or goods, proposals can seek funding to conduct research, and proposals might present a call for action.

Diverse Rhetorical Situations

In general, proposals address three distinct purposes:

Research Proposals : Students and professionals often write research proposals, describing research they’d like to complete in college classes, professional settings, and laboratories. For example, a student might write a proposal to conduct a full-length research report, essentially outlining the topic, describing the significance of the topic, and explaining when and how the research would be conducted.
Essay Proposals : People write proposals as editorials or essays, hoping to influence people about various topics. The proposals go beyond arguing one side of a topic: They present a call for action. For example, a student might write an editorial in the student newspaper calling for a task force to explore ways to create healthier food choices on campus. An activist might write an article for a magazine, advocating particular health care reforms. A terrorism expert might argue for enacting certain policies in airports.
Consulting Proposals : Did you know that billions of dollars are awarded to successful proposals every year? People write proposals seeking funding for necessary services. For example, an environmental consulting business might sell its services to the EPA, offering to conduct a water contamination report, or an accounting firm might sell its services as an independent auditor.

In the U.S. much of the research conducted by university faculty and scientists is funded by government agencies and private foundations. Professional researchers often refer to the Community of Science, a funding source database, which identifies $33 billion in funding opportunities. Another popular funding source database is IRIS.

As suggested by the table below, proposals are a remarkably diverse genre, coming in all shapes and sizes. Proposals can be page length or book length, covering hundreds of pages. Proposals can be presented in essay form and published in trade magazines. Alternatively, proposals can be submitted in an internal memo format or in an external report format. Some large organizations, such as the National Science Foundation, have online submission procedures.

Purposes	Audiences	Voices/Persona	Media

Rhetorical Analysis of Online Readings

Consider the context, audience, purpose, and media invoked by the following readings. Also examine how ideas are developed in these texts. Are assertions grounded in personal experience, interviews with authorities, questionnaires, Internet and library research, or empirical research?

MIT’s Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program (Sample Student Proposals)
DECA , an association of marketing students, calls for a variety of proposals, which can be entered into a nationwide competition.
Students at Brown University rewrote the Student Code of Conduct because they weren’t happy with the university’s code.
The Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry publishes Children and TV Violence to warn parents about the effects of violence on TV on their children, as suggested by the research of their members.
The American Psychological Association, the leading professional group of psychologists, has published Childhood Exposure to Media Violence Predicts Young Adult Aggressive Behavior , According to a New 15-Year Study.
The Union of Concerned Scientists publishes Powerful Solutions : 7 Ways to Switch America to Renewable Electricity, suggesting ways Americans can switch to renewable energy sources.
NSF , the National Science Foundation , offers many sample proposals on its Web site, helping to guide future proposal writers.
NEH, National Endowment for the Humanities , publishes successful proposals (in DOC and HTML and PDF formats) on its Web site; see sample proposals.
EPA, Environmental Protection Agency , provides hundreds of proposals on its site; see sample proposals.
Preventing AIDS: An Investment in the Future by Lawrence H. Summers . Representing the United States government as the Secretary of the Treasury, Lawrence H. Summers explains the importance of thinking globally when it comes to infectious

What Are Proposals?

Proposals typically outline a problem, detail solutions to the problem, and define the costs for solving the problem. Proposals provide information about the qualifications of the person or people suggesting the solution. When funds are sought to conduct the promised work, a detailed budget is provided. More formal proposals contain evaluation information–that is, a plan to evaluate the success of the proposal once it’s implemented.

Key Features of Proposals

A proposal designed to affect readers’ opinions about public policies differs from one seeking funding for research or to conduct research. Accordingly, the following analysis of key features is presented as a series of considerations as opposed to a comprehensive blueprint.

Proposal writers bring focus to their proposals by highlighting the urgency of the problem and by providing the evidence readers need to believe the proposed solution can work.

Development

It’s true that some proposals are won on appeals to emotion. But ultimately, an argument needs to be based on reason. You need to conduct research to find the facts, opinions, and research that support your proposal. Reading sample proposals can help you find and adopt an appropriate voice and persona. By reading samples, you can learn how others have prioritized particular criteria. Below are some additional suggestions for developing your proposal.

Define the Problem(s)

Obvious problems can be defined briefly, whereas more subtle problems may need considerable development. For example, Michael McManus details the problems with divorce for over five pages in Why Is It in the Government’s Interests to SaveMarriages? Thus, this part of your proposal may be as short as a sentence or many pages long. Occasionally writers will view the problem as so obvious to their audience that they won’t even introduce it; see, for example, What You Can Do About Global Warming by the Union of Concerned Scientists.

When they read the introduction to your proposals, readers are likely to ask these two questions:

Who benefits from the proposal? Will the project have significant impact? Who is submitting the proposal? What is their interest in solving the problem? Is this person or organization qualified to solve the problem?

In order to answer these questions, provide specifics including statistics, quotes from authorities, results from past research, interviews, and questionnaires. Notice how the following excerpt stuns readers in its introduction with gruesome statistics. These statistics provide the background information that readers may need to understand the proposal:

Three hundred million people live on less than US$l per day. Life expectancy is 48 years and falling. More than one-third of all children are malnourished; more than 40 per cent have no access to education. Twenty-eight million people live with HIV/AIDS, and for over 100 million people, war is a part of daily life. And yet, in spite of these grim statistics, there are still grounds for optimism. The spread of democracy and the growing strength of African civil society, combined with the efforts by some African leaders to chart a new course, offer a real chance to tackle the root causes of poverty and conflict.

Define Method(s)

How will you gather information (secondary research or primary research)? In the humanities, writers do not explicitly mention their methods, whereas in the sciences and social sciences writers often explicitly mention their methods.

If you are proposing to conduct research, your readers will want information regarding how you propose to conduct the research. Will your research involve Internet and library research? Will you interview authorities?
If your proposal calls for laboratory research, your readers will want to see that you have access to the laboratory and tools needed to carry out the research.
If you are proposing a service, readers will want to ensure you can actually provide the service.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=KYcLtBSDFbc%3Frel%3D0%26showinfo%3D0%26wmode%3Dtransparent

Present Your Solution(s)

Successful proposals are not vague about proposed solutions. Instead, they tend to outline step-by-step activities and objectives, perhaps even associating particular activities and objectives with dollar figures–if money is sought to conduct the proposal. Critical readers are likely to view proposals skeptically, preferring inaction (which doesn’t cost anything) to action (which may involve risk). As they review the solutions you propose, they may ask the following three questions:

Is the solution feasible?
How much time will it take to complete the proposal?
Will other factors resolve the problem over time? In other words, is the problem urgent?

Appeal to Character/Persona

People often imply or explicitly make “appeals to character.” In other words, they attempt to suggest they have credibility, that they are good people with the best interests of their readers in mind.

The persona you project as a writer plays a fundamental role in the overall success of your proposal. Your opening sentences generally establish the tone of your text and present to the reader a sense of your persona, both of which play a tremendous role in the overall persuasiveness of your argument. By evaluating how you define the problem, consider counterarguments, or marshal support for your claims, your readers will make inferences about your character.

When reviewing proposals, reviewers are particularly concerned about the credibility of the author. When an author is advocating a course of action, critical readers wonder about how the author(s) benefit from the proposal–or why they are presenting the proposal. Notice, for example, when the Brown American Civil Liberties Union rewrote the Code of Student Conduct, they were quick to agree with doubting readers that they also dislike “hate speech,” yet they thought stifling free speech on campus wasn’t the best way to counteract hate speech:

We at the Brown American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) are proposing the following changes to the Code of Student Conduct in an effort to ensure a consistent, unambiguous, and Constitutionally acceptable disciplinary code that does not consider protected speech a violation or an aggravating factor under any circumstances. We fully support the University’s efforts to promote tolerance, understanding, and to prevent discrimination and prejudice. However, we strongly disagree with the assertion that the current Code prohibits only “behavior” and not Constitutionally protected speech. In addition, we believe that although hate speech may be offensive, it should not be censored. The solution to hate speech is more speech, not less. Brown must insure that all opinions, no matter how unpopular, can be freely stated and challenged within a free and open University. The current “behavior” guidelines, no matter how well intentioned, can potentially still be used to punish unpopular, yet Constitutionally protected speech. The potential for the current code to be wrongly interpreted by the University Disciplinary Council (UDC) is great, and has been used in the past to justify harsher penalties for speech-related violations than for actual physical confrontations. We seek to rectify this situation, and we feel our proposals should satisfy both the desire to protect the Brown community and to protect the rights of community members. We urge the timely and respectful consideration of our reform proposals listed below. [Brown University: Revising the Code of Student Conduct]

In less formal circumstances, writers will speak personally about the importance of the proposal. Consider, for example, this excerpt from one of the students’ proposals featured at MIT’s site on Undergraduate Research Proposals:

I am very enthusiastic to continue working with the multidisciplinary team of researchers involved with this project. As a student, I am excited to be able to supplement my education with out-of-class research. While learning about the organizations that are perceived to be on the “cutting edge,” those that have incorporated the best technologies and most innovative organizational approaches into their management structures, I will gain a better understanding of the overall business environments of both our society and of our world. Because the scope of this initiative is greater than what current consulting firms have to offer, this project is particularly attractive. Having an interest in the field of professional consulting, work on this project would allow me to explore in greater depth the subject material that a future career in consulting would involve. In addition, I will have the honor of working with a distinguished group of faculty and staff members that are under the direction of [faculty supervisor’s name].

Because I am a student majoring in economics, minoring in psychology, and I possess a strong interest in management science, this multidisciplinary research initiative, which draws upon all three of these fields, really feels like a “nice fit” in terms of what it has to offer and by what I can give back. [Sample UROP Proposals]

In circumstances when a service is being proposed or when a research project is being proposed, they want to ensure the author has the resources, skills, and experience necessary to successfully provide the service.

Appeal to Emotion

Proposals are more firmly grounded in appeals to logic and character than appeals to emotion. Often, appeals to emotion would seem unethical or unprofessional. Critical readers tend to emphasize facts and qualifications when assessing proposals. Notice, for example, that:

The AMA doesn’t put a face on all of the deaths caused by insufficient organs. [ AMA House Supports Studies on Organ Donation Incentives ]

The Union of Concerned Scientists doesn’t emotionally describe the effects of global warming. [The Union of Concerned Scientists]

However, because of the power of emotional appeals, you may want to slip them into the introduction and conclusion of your proposal. Just be discreet and careful. Most modern, well-educated readers are quick to see through such manipulative attempts and they prefer the bulk of a proposal to be grounded in research and logic. Additional emotional appeals include:

Appeals to authority. (According to the EPA, global warming will raise sea levels.)
Appeals to pity. (I should be allowed to take the test again because I had the flu the first time I took it.)
Personal attacks on the opposition, which rhetoricians call ad hominem attacks. (I wouldn’t vote for that man because he’s a womanizer.)

Appeal to Logic

Successful proposals are firmly grounded in logic. You need to provide evidence if you hope to sway educated readers. Your description of the problem must be firmly grounded in research. You can add depth and persuasiveness to your proposal by citing authorities, interviewing experts, and researching past attempts to solve the problem. Trained as critical readers, your teachers and college-educated peers expect you to provide evidence–that is, logical reasoning, personal observations, expert testimony, facts, and statistics.

Consider Counterarguments

Typically, proposal writers are under severe word-length restrictions. In professional contexts, they may be competing with hundreds, perhaps thousands of writers who each have five pages to sell their solution. Accordingly, each word is precious so proposal writers do not want to give significant air time to articulating counterarguments or counter solutions.

Even so, at some point in your proposal, you may need to present counterarguments or consider the wisdom of alternative solutions. Essentially, whenever you think your readers may think your alternative solutions are more feasible, you need to account for their concerns. Elaborating on counterarguments is particularly useful when you have an unusual claim or a skeptical audience.

Consider, for example, Jonathan Trager’s “Libertarian Solutions: How Small-government Solutions Can Successfully Stop the Terrorist Threat.” Addressing the best ways to protect our airports in light of 9/11, Trager spends the bulk of his proposal critiquing other people’s solutions. In particular he critiques these three recommendations:

Have government bureaucrats man x-ray machines in airports.
Regulate immigration more effectively.
Grant more power to law enforcement.

Using an inductive organization, it really isn’t until the middle of his proposal that he cites his four solutions:

Stop disarming pilots.
Dismantle the drug war.
Return to a non-interventionist foreign policy.

Prohibit the American government from giving weapons–or money to buy weapons–to foreign nations.

Use Visuals

Readers love visual representations of proposals because they enable readers to see the proposal, engaging readers at a visual level. Consider the effects of the following creative uses of visuals: To augment their proposal on ways to alleviate parking problems at Harvard (see Students Tackle Parking Problems ), the students provided video clips, illustrating how robotic garages can best solve Harvard’s parking problems.

Chunk Your Contents

Consider “chunking” your proposal. For example, some proposals call for a 50-word abstract and a 500-word executive summary. Many of the proposals linked in this section provide brief and extended examples

Organization

Most proposals to conduct research or provide a service are organized as classical arguments: The author briefly presents the problem and then proposes the solutions. Occasionally, writers will employ a more inductive organization, particularly when the proposed solution may seem controversial.

You can make your proposal more persuasive by using unambiguous, concrete language, appealing to the reader’s senses and relating the subject or concept to information that the reader already understands, moving from given to new information.information.

Business Proposal

Describe the basic elements of a business proposal.
Discuss the main goals of a business proposal.
Identify effective strategies to use in a business proposal.

An effective business proposal informs and persuades efficiently. It features many of the common elements of a report, but its emphasis on persuasion guides the overall presentation.

Let’s say you work in a health care setting. What types of products or services might be put out to bid? If your organization is going to expand and needs to construct a new wing, it will probably be put out to bid. Everything from office furniture to bedpans could potentially be put out to bid, specifying a quantity, quality, and time of delivery required. Janitorial services may also be bid on each year, as well as food services, and even maintenance. Using the power of bidding to lower contract costs for goods and services is common practice.

In order to be successful in business and industry, you should be familiar with the business proposal. Much like a report, with several common elements and persuasive speech, a business proposal makes the case for your product or service. Business proposals are documents designed to make a persuasive appeal to the audience to achieve a defined outcome, often proposing a solution to a problem.

Common Proposal Elements

Effective business proposals are built around a great idea or solution. While you may be able to present your normal product, service, or solution in an interesting way, you want your document and its solution to stand out against the background of competing proposals. What makes your idea different or unique? How can you better meet the needs of the company that other vendors? What makes you so special? If the purchase decision is made solely on price, it may leave you little room to underscore the value of service, but the sale follow-through has value. For example, don’t consider just the cost of the unit but also its maintenance. How can maintenance be a part of your solution, distinct from the rest? In addition, your proposal may focus on a common product where you can anticipate several vendors at similar prices. How can you differentiate yourself from the rest by underscoring long-term relationships, demonstrated ability to deliver, or the ability to anticipate the company’s needs? Business proposals need to have an attractive idea or solution in order to be effective.

Traditional Categories

You can be creative in many aspects of the business proposal, but follow the traditional categories. Businesses expect to see information in a specific order, much like a résumé or even a letter. Each aspect of your proposal has its place and it is to your advantage to respect that tradition and use the categories effectively to highlight your product or service. Every category is an opportunity to sell, and should reinforce your credibility, your passion, and the reason why your solution is simply the best.

Table 2 Business Proposal Format


Executive Summary	Like an abstract in a report, this is a one- or two-paragraph summary of the product or service and how it meets the requirements and exceeds expectations.
Background	Discuss the history of your product, service, and/or company and consider focusing on the relationship between you and the potential buyer and/or similar companies.
Proposal	The idea. Who, what, where, when, why, and how. Make it clear and concise. Don’t waste words, and don’t exaggerate. Use clear, well-supported reasoning to demonstrate your product or service.
Market Analysis	What currently exists in the marketplace, including competing products or services, and how does your solution compare?
Benefits	How will the potential buyer benefit from the product or service? Be clear, concise, specific, and provide a comprehensive list of immediate, short, and long-term benefits to the company.
Timeline	A clear presentation, often with visual aids, of the process, from start to finish, with specific, dated benchmarks noted.
Marketing Plan	Delivery is often the greatest challenge for Web-based services—how will people learn about you? If you are bidding on a gross lot of food service supplies, this may not apply to you, but if an audience is required for success, you will need a marketing plan.
Finance	What are the initial costs, when can revenue be anticipated, when will there be a return on investment (if applicable)? Again, the proposal may involve a one-time fixed cost, but if the product or service is to be delivered more than once, and extended financial plan noting costs across time is required.
Conclusion	Like a speech or essay, restate your main points clearly. Tie them together with a common them and make your proposal memorable.

Ethos, Pathos, and Logos

Ethos refers to credibility, pathos to passion and enthusiasm, and logos to logic or reason. All three elements are integral parts of your business proposal that require your attention. Who are you and why should we do business with you? Your credibility may be unknown to the potential client and it is your job to reference previous clients, demonstrate order fulfillment, and clearly show that your product or service is offered by a credible organization. By association, if your organization is credible the product or service is often thought to be more credible.

In the same way, if you are not enthusiastic about the product or service, why should the potential client get excited? How does your solution stand out in the marketplace? Why should they consider you? Why should they continue reading? Passion and enthusiasm are not only communicated through “!” exclamation points. Your thorough understanding, and your demonstration of that understanding, communicates dedication and interest.

Each assertion requires substantiation, each point clear support. It is not enough to make baseless claims about your product or service—you have to show why the claims you make are true, relevant, and support your central assertion that your product or service is right for this client. Make sure you cite sources and indicate “according to” when you support your points. Be detailed and specific.

Professional

A professional document is a base requirement. If it is less than professional, you can count on its prompt dismissal. There should be no errors in spelling or grammar, and all information should be concise, accurate, and clearly referenced when appropriate. Information that pertains to credibility should be easy to find and clearly relevant, including contact information. If the document exists in a hard copy form, it should be printed on a letterhead. If the document is submitted in an electronic form, it should be in a file format that presents your document as you intended. Word processing files may have their formatting changed or adjusted based on factors you cannot control—like screen size—and information can shift out of place, making it difficult to understand. In this case, a portable document format (PDF)—a format for electronic documents—may be used to preserve content location and avoid any inadvertent format changes when it is displayed.

Effective, persuasive proposals are often brief, even limited to one page. “The one-page proposal has been one of the keys to my business success, and it can be invaluable to you too. Few decision-makers can ever afford to read more than one page when deciding if they are interested in a deal or not. This is even more true for people of a different culture or language,” said Adnan Khashoggi, a successful multibillionaire. [1] Clear and concise proposals serve the audience well and limit the range of information to prevent confusion.

Two Types of Business Proposals

If you have been asked to submit a proposal it is considered solicited. The solicitation may come in the form of a direct verbal or written request, but normally solicitations are indirect, open-bid to the public, and formally published for everyone to see. A request for proposal (RFP), request for quotation (RFQ), and invitation for bid (IFB) are common ways to solicit business proposals for business, industry, and the government.

RFPs typically specify the product or service, guidelines for submission, and evaluation criteria. RFQs emphasize cost, though service and maintenance may be part of the solicitation. IRBs are often job-specific in that they encompass a project that requires a timeline, labor, and materials. For example, if a local school district announces the construction of a new elementary school, they normally have the architect and engineering plans on file, but need a licensed contractor to build it.

Unsolicited

Unsolicited proposals are the “cold calls” of business writing. They require a thorough understanding of the market, product and/or service, and their presentation is typically general rather than customer-specific. They can, however, be tailored to specific businesses with time and effort, and the demonstrated knowledge of specific needs or requirement can transform an otherwise generic, brochure-like proposal into an effective sales message. Getting your tailored message to your target audience, however, is often a significant challenge if it has not been directly or indirectly solicited. Unsolicited proposals are often regarded as marketing materials, intended more to stimulate interest for a follow-up contact than make direct sales. Sue Baugh and Robert Hamper encourage you to resist the temptation to “shoot at every target and hope you hit at least one.” [2] A targeted proposal is your most effective approach, but recognize the importance of gaining company, service, or brand awareness as well as its limitations.

Sample Business Proposal

The Writing Help Tools Center is a commercial enterprise, and offers a clear (and free) example of a business proposal here:

https://www.writinghelptools.com/proposal-sample.html

Click on this link to see a sample request for proposal from the American Institute of Public Accounts.

https://www.aicpa.org/interestareas/businessindustryandgovernment/resources/notforprofitresourcecenter/downloadabledocuments/16-samplerequest.dot

Prepare a business proposal in no more than two pages. Follow the guidelines provided in the sample letter for CPA services on the American Institute of Public Accountants Web site. Do not include actual contact information. Just as the example has employees named after colors, your (imaginary) company should have contact information that does not directly link to real businesses or you as an individual. Do not respond to point 12.
Search for an RFP (request for proposal) or similar call to bid, and post it to your class. Compare the results with your classmates, focusing on what is required to apply or bid.
Identify a product or service you would like to produce or offer. List three companies that you would like to sell your product or service to and learn more about them. Post your findings, making the link between your product or service and company needs.

[1] Riley, P. G. (2002). The one-page proposal: How to get your business pitch onto one persuasive page (p. 2). New York, NY: HarperCollins.

[2] Baugh, L. S., & Hamper, R. J. (1995). Handbook for writing proposals (p. 3). New York, NY: McGraw-Hill.

Video: Business Proposals

https://youtube.com/watch?v=aBAvSumpgx8%3Frel%3D0%26showinfo%3D0%26wmode%3Dtransparent

Saylor.org BUS210: Business Proposals. Authored by : The Saylor Academy. Located at : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aBAvSumpgx8 . License : All Rights Reserved . License Terms : Standard YouTube license

Making An Argument

By the end of this section, you will be able to:

Demonstrate how to form a clear argument with appropriate support to persuade your audience.
Recognize and understand inherent weaknesses in fallacies.

According to the famous satirist Jonathan Swift, “Argument is the worst sort of conversation.” You may be inclined to agree. When people argue, they are engaged in conflict and it’s usually not pretty. It sometimes appears that way because people resort to fallacious arguments or false statements, or they simply do not treat each other with respect. They get defensive, try to prove their own points, and fail to listen to each other.

But this should not be what happens in written argument. Instead, when you make an argument in your writing, you will want to present your position with logical points, supporting each point with appropriate sources. You will want to give your audience every reason to perceive you as ethical and trustworthy. Your audience will expect you to treat them with respect, and to present your argument in a way that does not make them defensive. Contribute to your credibility by building sound arguments and using strategic arguments with skill and planning.

In this section we will briefly discuss the classic form of an argument, a more modern interpretation, and finally seven basic arguments you may choose to use. Imagine that these are tools in your toolbox and that you want to know how each is effectively used. Know that the people who try to persuade you—from telemarketers to politicians—usually have these tools at hand.

Let’s start with a classical rhetorical strategy. It asks the rhetorician, speaker, or author to frame arguments in the following steps:

Table 3 Classical Rhetorical Strategy

1. Exordium	Prepares the audience to consider your argument
2. Narration	Provides the audience with the necessary background or context for your argument
3. Proposition	Introduces your claim being argued in the document
4. Confirmation	Offers the audience evidence to support your argument
5. Refutation	Introduces to the audience and then discounts or refutes the counterarguments or objections
6. Peroration	Your conclusion of your argument

This is a standard pattern in rhetoric and you will probably see it in both speech and English courses. The pattern is useful to guide you in preparing your document and can serve as a valuable checklist to insure you are prepared. While this formal pattern has distinct advantages, you may not see it used exactly as indicated here on a daily basis. What may be more familiar to you is Stephen Toulmin’s rhetorical strategy (1958), which focuses on three main elements (see Table 11.8 “Toulmin’s Three-Part Rhetorical Strategy”).

Table 4 Toulmin’s Three-Part Rhetorical Strategy

Element	Description	Example
1. Claim	Your statement of belief or truth	It is important to spay or neuter your pet.
2. Data	Your supporting reasons for the claim	Millions of unwanted pets are euthanized every year.
3. Warrant	You create the connection between the claim and the supporting reasons	Pets that are spayed or neutered do not reproduce, preventing the production of unwanted animals.

Toulmin’s rhetorical strategy is useful in that it makes the claim explicit, clearly illustrates the relationship between the claim and the data, and allows the reader to follow the writer’s reasoning. You may have a good idea or point, but your audience will want to know how you arrived at that claim or viewpoint. The warrant addresses the inherent and often unsaid question, “Why is this data so important to your topic?” In so doing, it helps you to illustrate relationships between information for your audience.

Effective Argumentation Strategies: GASCAP/T

Here is a useful way of organizing and remembering seven key argumentative strategies:

Argument by G eneralization
Argument by A nalogy
Argument by S ign
Argument by C onsequence
Argument by A uthority
Argument by P rinciple
Argument by T estimony

Richard Fulkerson notes that a single strategy is sufficient to make an argument some of the time, but it is often better to combine several strategies to make an effective argument (In Emmel, Resch, & Tenney, 1996). He organized the argumentative strategies in this way to compare the differences, highlight the similarities, and allow for their discussion. This model, often called by its acronym GASCAP, is a useful strategy to summarize six key arguments and is easy to remember. Here we have adapted it, adding one argument that is often used in today’s speeches and presentations, the argument by testimony. Table 11.9 “GASCAP/T Strategies” presents each argument, provides a definition of the strategy and an example, and examines ways to evaluate each approach.

Table 5 GASCAP/T Strategies

	Argument by	Claim	Example	Evaluation
G	Generalization	Whatever is true of a good example or sample will be true of everything like it or the population it came from.	If you can vote, drive, and die for your country, you should also be allowed to buy alcohol.	STAR System: For it to be reliable, we need a (S) sufficient number of (T) typical, (A) accurate, and (R) reliable examples.
A	Analogy	Two situations, things or ideas are alike in observable ways and will tend to be alike in many other ways	Alcohol is a drug. So is tobacco. They alter perceptions, have an impact physiological and psychological systems, and are federally regulated substances.	Watch for adverbs that end in “ly,” as they qualify, or lessen the relationship between the examples. Words like “probably,” “maybe,” “could, “may,” or “usually” all weaken the relationship.
S	Sign	Statistics, facts, or cases indicate meaning, much like a stop sign means “stop.”	Motor vehicle accidents involving alcohol occur at significant rates among adults of all ages in the United States.	Evaluate the relationship between the sign and look for correlation, where the presenter says what the facts “mean.” Does the sign say that? Does it say more? What is not said? Is it relevant?
C	Cause	If two conditions always appear together, they are causally related.	The U.S. insurance industry has been significantly involved in state and national legislation requiring proof of insurance, changes in graduated driver’s licenses, and the national change in the drinking age from age 18 to age 21.	Watch out for “after the fact, therefore because of the fact” ( ) thinking. There might not be a clear connection, and it might not be the whole picture. Mothers Against Drunk Driving might have also been involved with each example of legislation.
A	Authority	What a credible source indicates is probably true.	According to the National Transportation Safety Board, older drivers are increasingly involved in motor vehicle accidents.	Is the source legitimate and is their information trustworthy? Institutes, boards, and people often have agendas and distinct points of view.
P	Principle	An accepted or proper truth	The change in the drinking age was never put to a vote. It’s not about alcohol, it’s about our freedom of speech in a democratic society.	Is the principle being invoked generally accepted? Is the claim, data or warrant actually related to the principle stated? Are there common exceptions to the principle? What are the practical consequences of following the principle in this case?
T	Testimony	Personal experience	I’ve lost friends from age 18 to 67 to alcohol. It impacts all ages, and its effects are cumulative. Let me tell you about two friends in particular.	Is the testimony authentic? Is it relevant? Is it representative of other’s experiences? Use the STAR system to help evaluate the use of testimony.

Now that we’ve clearly outlined several argument strategies, how do you support your position with evidence or warrants? If your premise or the background from which you start is valid, and your claim is clear and clearly related, the audience will naturally turn their attention to “prove it.” This is where the relevance of evidence becomes particularly important. Here are three guidelines to consider in order to insure your evidence passes the “so what?” test of relevance in relation to your claim. Make sure your evidence has the following traits:

Supportive . Examples are clearly representative, statistics are accurate, testimony is authoritative, and information is reliable.
Relevant . Examples clearly relate to the claim or topic, and you are not comparing “apples to oranges.”
Effective . Examples are clearly the best available to support the claim, quality is preferred to quantity, there are only a few well-chosen statistics, facts, or data.

Appealing to Emotions

While we’ve highlighted several points to consider when selecting information to support your claim, know that Aristotle strongly preferred an argument based in logic over emotion. Can the same be said for your audience, and to what degree is emotion and your appeal to it in your audience a part of modern life?

Emotions are a psychological and physical reaction, such as fear or anger, to stimuli that we experience as a feeling. Our feelings or emotions directly impact our own point of view and readiness to communicate, but also influence how, why, and when we say things. Emotions influence not only how you say or what you say, but also how you hear or what you hear. At times, emotions can be challenging to control. Emotions will move your audience, and possibly even move you, to change or act in certain ways.

Aristotle thought the best and most preferable way to persuade an audience was through the use of logic, free of emotion. He also recognized that people are often motivated, even manipulated, by the exploitation of their emotions. In a business context, we still engage in this debate, demanding to know the facts separate from personal opinion or agenda, but see the use of emotional appeal to sell products.

Marketing experts are famous for creating a need or associating an emotion with a brand or label in order to sell it. You will speak the language of your audience in your document, and may choose to appeal to emotion, but you need to consider how the strategy works, as it may be considered a tool that has two edges.

If we think of the appeal to emotion as a knife, we can see it has two edges. One edge can cut your audience, and the other can cut you. If you advance an appeal to emotion in your document on spaying and neutering pets, and discuss the millions of unwanted pets that are killed each year, you may elicit an emotional response. If you use this approach repeatedly, your audience may grow weary of this approach, and it will lose its effectiveness. If you change your topic to the use of animals in research, the same strategy may apply, but repeated attempts to elicit an emotional response may backfire (i.e., in essence “cutting” you) and produce a negative response called “emotional resistance.”

Emotional resistance involves getting tired, often to the point of rejection, of hearing messages that attempt to elicit an emotional response. Emotional appeals can wear out the audience’s capacity to receive the message. As Aristotle outlined, ethos (credibility), logos (logic), and pathos (passion, enthusiasm, and emotional response) constitute the building blocks of any document. It’s up to you to create a balanced document, where you may appeal to emotion, but choose to use it judiciously.

On a related point, the use of an emotional appeal may also impair your ability to write persuasively or effectively. For example, if you choose to present an article about suicide to persuade people against committing it and you start showing a photo of your brother or sister that you lost to suicide, your emotional response may cloud your judgment and get in the way of your thinking. Never use a personal story, or even a story of someone you do not know, if the inclusion of that story causes you to lose control. While it’s important to discuss relevant topics, you need to assess your relationship to the message. Your documents should not be an exercise in therapy. Otherwise, you will sacrifice ethos and credibility, even your effectiveness, if you “lose it” because you are really not ready to discuss the issue.

Recognizing Fallacies

“Fallacy” is another way of saying false logic. Fallacies or rhetorical tricks deceive your audience with their style, drama, or pattern, but add little to your document in terms of substance. They are best avoided because they can actually detract from your effectiveness. There are several techniques or “tricks” that allow the writer to rely on style without offering substantive argument, to obscure the central message, or twist the facts to their own gain. Table 11.10 “Fallacies” examines the eight classical fallacies. Learn to recognize them so they can’t be used against you, and learn to avoid using them with your audience.

Table 6 Fallacies

Fallacy	Definition	Example
1. Red Herring	Any diversion intended to distract attention from the main issue, particularly by relating the issue to a common fear.	It’s not just about the death penalty; it’s about the victims and their rights. You wouldn’t want to be a victim, but if you were, you’d want justice.
2. Straw Man	A weak argument set up to easily refute and distract attention from stronger arguments.	Look at the idea that criminals who commit murder should be released after a few years of rehabilitation. Think of how unsafe our streets would be then!
3. Begging the Question	Claiming the truth of the very matter in question, as if it were already an obvious conclusion.	We know that they will be released and unleashed on society to repeat their crimes again and again.
4. Circular Argument	The proposition is used to prove itself. Assumes the very thing it aims to prove. Related to begging the question.	Once a killer, always a killer.
5. Ad Populum	Appeals to a common belief of some people, often prejudicial, and states everyone holds this belief. Also called the bandwagon fallacy, as people “jump on the bandwagon” of a perceived popular view.	Most people would prefer to get rid of a few “bad apples” and keep our streets safe.
6. Ad Hominem or “Argument against the Man”	Argument against the man instead of his message. Stating that someone’s argument is wrong solely because of something about the person rather than about the argument itself.	Our representative is a drunk and philanderer. How can we trust him on the issues of safety and family?
7. Non Sequitur or “It Does Not Follow”	The conclusion does not follow from the premises. They are not related.	Since the liberal 1960s, we’ve seen an increase in convicts who got let off death row.
8. Post Hoc Ergo Propter Hoc or “After This, Therefore because of This”	It is also called a coincidental correlation.	Violent death rates went down once they started publicizing executions.

Ethical Considerations in Persuasion

In his book Ethics in Human Communication , Richard Johannesen (1996) offers eleven points to consider when communicating. Although they are related to public speaking, they are also useful in business writing. You may note that many of his cautions are clearly related to the fallacies we’ve discussed. His main points reiterate many of the points across this chapter and should be kept in mind as you prepare, and present, your persuasive message.

use false, fabricated, misrepresented, distorted, or irrelevant evidence to support arguments or claims;
intentionally use unsupported, misleading, or illogical reasoning;
represent yourself as informed or an “expert” on a subject when you are not;
use irrelevant appeals to divert attention from the issue at hand;
ask your audience to link your idea or proposal to emotion-laden values, motives, or goals to which it is actually not related;
deceive your audience by concealing your real purpose, your self-interest, the group you represent, or your position as an advocate of a viewpoint;
distort, hide, or misrepresent the number, scope, intensity, or undesirable features of consequences or effects;
use emotional appeals that lack a supporting basis of evidence or reasoning;
oversimplify complex, gradation-laden situations into simplistic, two-valued, either-or, polar views or choices;
pretend certainty where tentativeness and degrees of probability would be more accurate;
advocate something that you yourself do not believe in.

Aristotle said the mark of a good person, well spoken, was a clear command of the faculty of observing in any given case the available means of persuasion. He discussed the idea of perceiving the various points of view related to a topic and their thoughtful consideration. While it’s important to be able to perceive the complexity of a case, you are not asked to be a lawyer and defend a client.

In your message to persuade, consider honesty and integrity as you assemble your arguments. Your audience will appreciate your thoughtful consideration of more than one view and your understanding of the complexity of the issue, thus building your ethos, or credibility, as you present your document. Be careful not to stretch the facts, or assemble them only to prove your point; instead, prove the argument on its own merits. Deception, coercion, intentional bias, manipulation and bribery should have no place in your message to persuade.

1. Select a piece of persuasive writing such as a newspaper op-ed essay, a magazine article, or a blog post. Examine the argument, the main points, and how the writer supports them. Which strategies from the foregoing section does the writer use? Does the writer use any fallacies or violate any ethical principles? Discuss your results with your classmates.

2. Find one slogan or logo that you perceive as persuasive and share it with your classmates.

3. Find an example of a piece of writing that appears to want to be persuasive, but doesn’t get the job done. Write a brief review and share it with classmates.

4. In what ways might the choice of how to organize a document involve ethics? Explain your response and discuss it with your class.

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The Research Process and an Example

Objective fact-finding provides the means to address informational needs and accumulate new knowledge. Much knowledge is acquired through processes internal to the firm, drawing liberally from the accumulated experience and insights of its own employees. But knowledge can also be obtained by careful investigation of market conditions and competitors’ behavior. The character and complexity of research is a function of the experience of the firm and the nature of its international activities. Beginner firms investigate a range of issues, while firms with existing foreign operations investigate specific and complex issues, such as where to locate new manufacturing or research and development (R&D) facilities ...

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Market research: Key steps, methods, and use cases

Ever wonder why some products fly off the shelves while others just sit there, all lonely and ignored? Or why your last marketing campaign was a massive hit while some of your others have felt like a total flop? Maybe you’re just dying to know what your customers actually want (spoiler alert: it’s not always what you think).

To answer these above questions, you’re going to need to tap into the best resource around: your customers.

That’s where market research comes in. In this complete guide, we’ll give you the 411 into the key steps, methods, and use cases so you can make smarter, data-driven decisions.

What’s Market Research?

Market research is all about getting information on your target market and customers. It helps you figure out if a new product will be a success, make tweaks to what you’ve already got, or understand how people see your brand so you can communicate your company’s value better.

Let’s take a look at a real-world example:

If you’re into TikTok (and who isn’t?), you’ve probably seen those quick surveys while scrolling your ‘For You’ feed. TikTok uses them to learn what users like and how they feel about ads.

One survey asks for your opinion on a video or ad you just watched. Another might ask if you’ve seen a specific brand’s sponsored content recently, like “Did you catch any Dove ads in the last few days?”

TikTok uses this feedback to fine-tune what pops up in your feed.

Why’s it Important?

Image Sourced from statista.com

The global market research industry hit a record high of around $84.3 billion in 2023 . Over the last decade, it’s grown steadily, even when the economy was shaky. It just goes to show how important this stuff is becoming. But why?

Well, market research helps you meet your buyers where they are (not where you wish they were). In a world that’s getting louder and more distracting by the day, that’s pretty much gold. When you really get your buyers’ problems, pain points, and what they’re dreaming of, you can design your product or service in a way that just clicks with them.

Types of Market Research

You now know what market research is and why it’s important to carry out! Next up, we’re going to teach you all the different types you can use:

Interviews: Sit down with people one-on-one either in person or via video call . Have a chat and let the conversation flow naturally using open ended questions. This’ll help you learn more about your buyers and shape your marketing strategy.
Focus groups: Another form of market research here.This one’s all about gathering a small group of people to test your product and share their thoughts.
Customer surveys: Customer surveys could be quantitative or qualitative, done online, over-the-phone or via SMS.
Product/service use research: Find out how and why people use your product or service. This tells you if it’s easy to use and how it fits their needs.
Observation-based research: Watch how your target audience interacts with your product or service. You get to see what’s working well and what needs fixing.
Market segmentation research: To do this one, simply break your audience into different groups based on specific traits (like age, interests or how much they like to spend) This’ll help you figure out the best ways to meet their needs.
Pricing research: Look at some of the products out there similar to yours. How much are they charging for their products or services? How many people are willing to actually pay that? This research helps you set the right price.
Customer satisfaction surveys and loyalty research: See how happy your current customers are, and what makes them come back. This could be anything from loyalty programs to great digital customer service .

How to Do Market Research

Alright, It’s time to get practical! Here’s our step-by-step plan on market research:

Step 1: Define Your Buyer Persona

Free to use image sourced from Stockvault

First up, you’re going to need to know who your potential customers are and how they’re making buying decisions. Now, you can do this by creating buyer personas.

Buyer personas (AKA as marketing personas or customer personas FYI) are basically fictional profiles of your ideal customers. They help you understand what your best customers look like and how to reach them. Here’s what you should include in your buyer persona:

Job title(s)
Family size
Major challenges

Think of your persona as a way of connecting with real customers in your industry. If you can, back up your persona with real data from your existing audience. For example, using phone analytics tools from your business phone service , you can check out phone patterns, customers inquiries and communications preferences to share in your persona.

Step 2: Find a Persona Group to Engage With

Now that you’ve got your buyer personas figured out, it’s time to pick a group of people to look into for your market research. You want a sample that truly represents your target customers so you can get a clear picture of their traits, challenges, and buying habits.

So, if you’re an IT company that helps businesses put together an enterprise architecture strategy , for example, you’ll want to select people who either recently interacted with your company, bought similar services, and/or even those who chose a competitor.

How to pick the right people for market research

Aim for 10 participants per persona
Pick people who’ve interacted with you in the last six months (or at least up to a year)
Include people who’ve bought from you, from your competitors, and those who decided not to buy at all.
Get people excited to spend 30-45 minutes helping you out. On a tight budget? Give them something like exclusive content as a reward instead of cash. This way, you’ll get the feedback you need to truly understand your audience.

Step 3: Collect Your Data

Start by setting up a solid plan for collecting information. Make sure your customer surveys or interview questions are clear and cover everything you need. If people skip questions or don’t fill them out properly, your research could be off.

Step 4: Analyze the Results

Now comes the fun part. It’s time to analyze all that data you’ve collected. Look beyond the numbers to find the real insights.

You’ll get some basic info like age and job titles, but the important data helps you understand their feelings and experiences. Tools like empathy maps can help you get into your customers’ heads (imagine being a mind reader, but more scientific). With good planning and a solid approach, figuring out what your data means should be super simple.

Step 5: Create the Research Report

When writing up your report, think about what you want to achieve with the report and try to tell a story with your findings.Tips for a great report:

Use the inverted pyramid style: start with the big conclusions, and then add the details. No one has time for a novel!
Kick off with key insights that your audience would be most interested in
Make it easy to read so people can get to the main points quickly

Step #6: Make Decisions

Market research helps you understand things like customer buying habits, market trends, and pricing strategies. So go ahead, make those decisions and put your findings into action! Your research wasn’t just for fun, after all.

Final Thoughts

So there you have it. Our complete market research guide, packed with everything you need to know about conducting it at your company.

Market research isn’t a one-time thing. It’s an ongoing process to keep you in tune with what your customers want and how your market’s shifting. keep it relevant, and don’t be afraid to dive back in whenever you need to adjust your game plan.

Happy researching! And remember, the more you know, the better you can do.

What can you learn by carrying out market research?

Market research can give you:

Where your target audience and current customers are doing their research
Which of your competitors your audience is turning to for advice, options, or straight-up buying
What’s trending in your industry and what your buyers are buzzing about
Who’s in your market, what their struggles are, and how you can help
What really influences your audience’s buying decisions and conversions
Consumer attitudes about specific topics, pains, products, or brands (including yours)
If there’s actually a demand for those big business ideas you’re pouring money into
Unmet or underserved needs that you could turn into a selling opportunity
How your audience feels about pricing for a particular product or service

Are there any downsides of market research?

While market research can answer big questions about your industry, it’s not a magic crystal ball. It takes time to get a clear picture of what’s really going on with your target audience. But even if you only research a small piece of the puzzle, you’ll start to get a better sense of who your buyers are and how you can offer something unique that they can’t find elsewhere.

Originally published Aug 30, 2024

Cold calling scripts: 7 examples and tips to close more sales

Cold calling gets a bad reputation sometimes, but it’s still regularly used by many sales teams. And while achieving good response rates through cold calling can be a challenge, it can be done. In this article, we take a look at seven examples of cold calling scripts that will lead you in the right direction. ...

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Corporate Social Responsibility in the Supermarket Sector: Evidence from Vietnam

First Online: 30 August 2024

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Loan Thi-Hong Van 4 &
Thao Hoang-Minh Nguyen 4

This research is to identify the relationship amongst corporate social responsibility (CSR), satisfaction and loyalty of customers in the Vietnamese supermarket industry. The methods utilized are qualitative and quantitative ones. The authors used in-depth interviews of 10 managers in supermarkets to correct the research scales and model. Online surveys were used through asking 330 customers who often go to supermarkets in Vietnam. The data was analyzed and interpreted by using SPSS and AMOS software. The results of study indicate that CSR positively influences customer satisfaction and loyalty. However, factors of community and ethical responsibility do not impact them—this is different compared to other research, and can be explained as because of customers’ awareness and understanding of CSR. This research contributes to understanding the CSR of Vietnam especially in supermarkets where knowledge is little. This also helps to strengthen the stakeholder theory and provides knowledge of CSR in developing countries.

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Van, L.TH., Nguyen, T.HM. (2024). Corporate Social Responsibility in the Supermarket Sector: Evidence from Vietnam. In: Tung, L.T., Sinh, N.H., Ha, P. (eds) Disruptive Technology and Business Continuity. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-97-5452-6_2

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When birds build nests, they’re also building a culture

A white-browed sparrow weaver inspects a roost under construction, after just receiving some grass brought by another member of its group.

Maria Cristina Tello-Ramos

Neighboring groups of birds within the same species can create very different-looking nests — showing that their nest-building choices aren’t solely controlled by instinct and the environment.

Instead, these birds seem to learn rules for nest-making that get passed down within a family group from generation to generation.

That’s the conclusion of researchers who studied nearly 450 grassy structures built over two years by white-browed sparrow weavers living in the Kalahari Desert in South Africa.

These small, brown-and-white birds live communally, and it turns out that groups of birds that lived quite near to each other nonetheless built distinctive architectural forms, according to a new report in Science .

The finding suggests that when people look up and see a nest in a tree, it might not be the product of innate behavior alone.

"It might be that we're seeing a tradition," says Maria Cristina Tello-Ramos , a researcher who did this study while working at the University of St. Andrews.

Learning by example

Scientists already knew that groups of animals, including birds, can form their own cultures , in the sense that important information gets transmitted through social learning rather than just genetics.

Birdsongs, for example, can have regional “accents,” and birds also look to their elders to learn about foraging and migration, says Tello-Ramos.

Lab studies have suggested that the same can be true for nest-building.

Experiments show that inexperienced male zebra finches will watch familiar males choosing nest-building materials and then use that information to modify their own choices, says Tello-Ramos.

“If before they preferred a pink ribbon, rather than an orange one, then they will prefer the orange one if they see others using the orange,” she says.

She wanted to see how social learning might affect the nest building of white-browed sparrow weavers. These highly social birds live in extended families of two to 14 individuals.

“They do everything together. They forage together. They defend the territories together,” says Tello-Ramos.

Intriguingly, she and her colleagues noticed that trees that were home to one extended family often had nests that looked quite different from the nests that belonged to their neighbors in another tree.

The long and short of it

This bird species builds grass structures that serve two purposes: They can be turned into a safe spot to incubate eggs, but they’re also shelters where a single bird can safely roost inside at night. One tree will be dotted with many such structures.

Building each one is a communal activity. The birds weave grass into a tube, which ends up being shaped basically like an upside-down letter “U.”

When it’s used to incubate eggs, one end of the tube gets sealed up to form a cup. But when it’s used as a nighttime roost, the tube has an entrance at one end and an exit at the other.

“And what we saw is that in some of the families, the birds build roosts with very long tubes,” says Tello-Ramos.

Other families, meanwhile, build short tubes.

“They do it consistently,” she says. “Families that are maybe ten meters apart are building different things.”

To learn more, she and her coworkers measured every single structure built by 43 family groups over two seasons. They analyzed everything from the length of the tube to the tube’s width to the angle between the U-shaped tube’s “arms.”

Then they checked to see what might account for the observed differences, carefully considering factors like temperatures, wind speed, and the number of birds in each family.

They couldn’t find any explanation for why the birds were building such different structures.

And since it’s known that these birds are highly social, says Tello-Ramos, it seems probable that family members are just copying each other, creating a culture of nest-building that gets passed down again and again and again.

Family is everything

Sometimes a family will take an outsider under their wing and let it join the group. These outsiders seem to adopt the ways of their new home.

Researchers know this because bird families that incorporated a lot of outsiders nonetheless maintained consistent nest-building traditions.

"What I found most fascinating was the fact that when a new sparrow weaver joins the group, it doesn't bring the cultural transmissions of its old group," says Catherine Sheard , an evolutionary biologist at the University of Aberdeen in Scotland, who studies diversity in bird nests but wasn't part of the research team. "That wouldn't have been what I predicted."

Humans transmit a lot of information to each other through social learning, notes Sheard, “but there's sort of this old-fashioned belief that animals don't do that at all and it's purely genetic, or you build things out of whatever's laying around.”

As this study shows, that’s just not true, she says. And in addition to learning from other birds, birds can learn from their own experiences.

Lab studies show that if they build a nest and fail to successfully raise a chick, says Sheard, they'll try a different nest-building material the next time. Birds that enjoy reproductive success, however, will stick with the nest-making materials that worked.

All of this may be part of why, even within a single species, individual birds can construct nests that look quite different — a kind of architectural diversity that often goes unrecognized, says Sheard.

“I feel like when we draw illustrations and show nests to kids, we show the most beautiful, sort of prototypical nest,” Sheard says. “But actually birds will do a lot of very strange things.”

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Required Qualifications: *Minimum of 1-year research experience in "Micro-/nano-scale characterization and evaluation of materials processed by cold spray deposition and field-assisted sintering technologies". *Experience in the theory and operation of equipment for cold spray materials deposition and field-assisted sintering technology. *Experience as an independent user in transmission electron microscopy (TEM), including focused ion beam (FIB) lift-out TEM sample preparation, electron backscattered diffraction (EBSD, nanoindentation, and Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET) methods. *Experience collecting, interpreting and analyzing complex research data from above-mentioned equipment and methods. Preferred Qualifications: *Experience assisting writing grant proposals for funding. *Experience contributing to research progress reports to funding agencies. *Experience establishing safety and training procedures for students. *Prior experience participating in research group meetings with group members, external collaborators, and grant sponsors.

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This position is being posted at multiple Researcher levels. Final level and corresponding compensation will be determined based on the final applicant's depth of knowledge and expertise in the above listed areas, publications, participation in conference presentations.

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To apply, please upload a cover letter that summarizes your interest in the position along with your resume that highlights relevant work experience, education and interests in a single pdf document.

Dina Christenson [email protected] 608-263-5966 Relay Access (WTRS): 7-1-1. See RELAY_SERVICE for further information.

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GCSE results day 2024: Everything you need to know including the number grading system

Thousands of students across the country will soon be finding out their GCSE results and thinking about the next steps in their education.

Here we explain everything you need to know about the big day, from when results day is, to the current 9-1 grading scale, to what your options are if your results aren’t what you’re expecting.

When is GCSE results day 2024?

GCSE results day will be taking place on Thursday the 22 August.

The results will be made available to schools on Wednesday and available to pick up from your school by 8am on Thursday morning.

Schools will issue their own instructions on how and when to collect your results.

When did we change to a number grading scale?

The shift to the numerical grading system was introduced in England in 2017 firstly in English language, English literature, and maths.

By 2020 all subjects were shifted to number grades. This means anyone with GCSE results from 2017-2020 will have a combination of both letters and numbers.

The numerical grading system was to signal more challenging GCSEs and to better differentiate between students’ abilities - particularly at higher grades between the A *-C grades. There only used to be 4 grades between A* and C, now with the numerical grading scale there are 6.

What do the number grades mean?

The grades are ranked from 1, the lowest, to 9, the highest.

The grades don’t exactly translate, but the two grading scales meet at three points as illustrated below.

The bottom of grade 7 is aligned with the bottom of grade A, while the bottom of grade 4 is aligned to the bottom of grade C.

Meanwhile, the bottom of grade 1 is aligned to the bottom of grade G.

What to do if your results weren’t what you were expecting?

If your results weren’t what you were expecting, firstly don’t panic. You have options.

First things first, speak to your school or college – they could be flexible on entry requirements if you’ve just missed your grades.

They’ll also be able to give you the best tailored advice on whether re-sitting while studying for your next qualifications is a possibility.

If you’re really unhappy with your results you can enter to resit all GCSE subjects in summer 2025. You can also take autumn exams in GCSE English language and maths.

Speak to your sixth form or college to decide when it’s the best time for you to resit a GCSE exam.

Look for other courses with different grade requirements

Entry requirements vary depending on the college and course. Ask your school for advice, and call your college or another one in your area to see if there’s a space on a course you’re interested in.

Consider an apprenticeship

Apprenticeships combine a practical training job with study too. They’re open to you if you’re 16 or over, living in England, and not in full time education.

As an apprentice you’ll be a paid employee, have the opportunity to work alongside experienced staff, gain job-specific skills, and get time set aside for training and study related to your role.

You can find out more about how to apply here .

Talk to a National Careers Service (NCS) adviser

The National Career Service is a free resource that can help you with your career planning. Give them a call to discuss potential routes into higher education, further education, or the workplace.

Whatever your results, if you want to find out more about all your education and training options, as well as get practical advice about your exam results, visit the  National Careers Service page  and Skills for Careers to explore your study and work choices.

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replication. independent variable. dependent variable. population. sample. random selection. experimental group. control group. these flashcards cover pages 51 to 64 in the 5 steps to a 5 AP Psychology prep book Learn with flashcards, games, and more — for free.
Chapter 6: Experimental Research Flashcards
a carryover effect in which participants perform worse on a task in later conditions because they have become tired or bored. field experiment. an experiment that is conducted outside the laboratory. between-subjects experiment. an experiment in which each participant is tested in one condition. extraneous variable.
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Chapter 6: Research Study

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Vocabulary List

6.1 Writing the Final Research Paper

6.1.1 Title Page

6.1.2 Abstract

6.1.3 Introduction

6.1.4 Methods

6.1.5 Results

6.1.6 Discussion

6.1.7 References

Chapter 6. Reflexivity

Reflexivity: What It Is and Why It Is Important

Examples of Reflexivity in Practice

How to Do It

Internal Validity

Advanced: Bourdieu on Reflexivity

Further Readings

Introduction to Educational Research

Doing Research in the Real World

6 Chapter 6 (Audience)

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How To Write The Discussion Chapter

Overview: The Discussion Chapter

What (exactly) is the discussion chapter?

What should I include in the discussion chapter?

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How to write the discussion chapter

Tips and tricks for an A-grade discussion chapter

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Organizing Your Social Sciences Research Paper

Introduction

General Structure and Writing Style

Action Research Design

Case Study Design

Causal Design

Cohort Design

Cross-Sectional Design

Descriptive Design

Experimental Design

Exploratory Design

Field Research Design

Historical Design

Longitudinal Design

Meta-Analysis Design

Mixed-Method Design

Observational Design

Philosophical Design

Sequential Design

Systematic Review

Chapter 6: Experimental Research

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Chapter 6: Proposals

Diverse Rhetorical Situations

Rhetorical Analysis of Online Readings

What Are Proposals?

Key Features of Proposals

Development

Define the Problem(s)

Define Method(s)

Present Your Solution(s)

Appeal to Character/Persona

Appeal to Emotion

Appeal to Logic

Consider Counterarguments

Use Visuals

Chunk Your Contents

Organization

Business Proposal

Common Proposal Elements

Traditional Categories

Ethos, Pathos, and Logos

Professional

Two Types of Business Proposals

Sample Business Proposal

Video: Business Proposals

Making An Argument