EDPSY 505

August 27, 2007

Mayer (2000)

The Big Picture

• There are many different research processes • Each has its own: – Philosophy of inquiry – Methods of inquiry – Purposes for doing research – Processes and “rules” • Quantitative research has its own • Here is

one

process:

Review Literature

A Scientific Process

Research Question Defining the Problem Articulate Theory Define Hypothesis     Subject sampling Instrumentation Research design Piloting Testing the Hypothesis    Collecting Data Choosing analyses Conducting analyses Results or Findings Conclusions

Scientific Thinking Vs. Everyday Thinking

• Everyday thinking – Biased questions • Do you really support the war?

– Limited sampling • Your friends and family are different from my friends and family – Selective attention • Confirmation bias – Inaccurate generalization • Stereotypes

Scientific Thinking Vs. Everyday Thinking (Cont.)

• Scientific thinking.

– Empirical observations.

• Empirical: capable of being confirmed, verified, or disproved by observation or experiment.

– Systematic.

– Objective.

• Less dependent on emotion or personal prejudices.

– Replicable.

Purposes of Scientific Research

• Exploratory – What is out there?

• Descriptive – What does this group look like?

• Explanatory – Why and how are these constructs related?

• Evaluation – Does this program work?

• Prediction – Who will become depressed?

The Research Problem

• Research Problem – An area of general concern • Research Questions – The problem posed as a question • How can a principal improve faculty morale?

• Does behavioral therapy improve children’s behavior?

• Do flow charts improve scientific understanding?

• Some questions are not researchable – Is god good?

– What is the meaning of life?

Characteristics of Good Research Questions

• Feasible • Clear – Constitutive definition – By Example – Operational definition • Significant – Worth investigating – Strong rationale • Ethical

Variables

On the Theory of Scales of Measurement (Stevens, 1946)

• Measurement – Is the assignment of numerals to objects.

• Nominal – Examples: Gender, party affiliation, and place of birth • Ordinal – Examples: SES, Student rank, and Place in race • Interval – Examples: Test scores, personality and attitude scales.

• Ratio – Examples: Weight, length, reaction time, and number of responses

Understanding Variables and Hypotheses (Charters, 1992)

• Objects – Things that one does research on.

• People, districts, nations, etc.

• Properties of objects – Give us a way to talk about how objects are alike and how they differ.

• Scores – Values on the property of interest • Must be at least two.

Values

• Exhaustive – Must be able to assign a value to all objects.

• Mutually Exclusive – Each object can only be assigned one of a set of values.

• A variable with only one value is not a variable.

– It is a constant.

How variables are used

• Two major piles – Descriptive and Verificational (cause-effect) • Descriptive – Describes a population in relation to one or more variables.

• Sex bias in textbooks • Trends in dropout rates • Verificational – Does A cause B – Associations between A and B • Is the observed relationship greater than would be expected by chance?

Hypothesis

• A proposed explanation for a phenomenon.

– Two types • Casual order - 'A causes B' • Correlational – ‘A is related to B’

Sorting Out Variables in a Study

• Purpose of most empirical studies in behavioral research is to identify causal relationships.

– Independent variables (IV) • Causes, determinants, predictors, factors.

– Dependent variables (DV) • Consequences, outcomes, effects – Moderator variables • Variables that change the relationship between the IV and DV.

• Aptitude by treatment interactions

Dissecting Hypotheses

1. Identify the two variables and sort them into IV and DV.

2. Describe each variable.

• Object, property, mode of variation, elaborate on mode of variation.

3. Specify the relationship expected between the two variables.

4. Note the unit of analysis implied or actually used.

Additional comments

• Simple Hypotheses have only two variables--bivariate relations.

– H.1: Authoritarian principals are more effective than non-authoritarian principals • What are the names of the two variables?

• How do they vary?

• Complex Hypotheses have more than two variables and sometimes contain a moderating variable.

– H.1: Authoritarian principals are more effective than non-authoritarian principals when goals are clear, but non-authoritarian principals are more effective when goals are ambiguous.

• What are the names of the three variables?

• How do they vary?

Practice

• H.1: The greater the weight of a five-year old, the taller the child.

– What is the object?

– What are the variables?

– What are the names of the variables?

– How do they vary-categorical or continuous?

– What is the moderating variable?

– What is the independent variable?

– What is the dependent variable?

Practice

• H.2: Authoritarian principals command more loyalty than non-authoritarian ones when they have influence, but non-authoritarian principals command greater loyalty when principals lack influence. – What is the object?

– What are the variables?

– What are the names of the variables?

– How do they vary-categorical or continuous?

– What is the moderating variable?

– What is the independent variable?

– What is the dependent variable?

• H.3. Secondary teachers are more custodial in pupil control ideology than elementary teachers.

– What is the object?

– What are the variables?

– What are the names of the variables?

– How do they vary-categorical or continuous?

– What is the moderating variable?

– What is the independent variable?

– What is the dependent variable?

H. 4. Academic achievement will be greater among students taught by autocratic teachers than those taught by permissive teachers.

– What is the object?

– What are the variables?

– What are the names of the variables?

– How do they vary-categorical or continuous?

– What is the moderating variable?

– What is the independent variable?

– What is the dependent variable?

• H. 5. The larger the size of a community college’s instructional faculty the greater the degree of administrative centralization.

– What is the object?

– What are the variables?

– What are the names of the variables?

– How do they vary-categorical or continuous?

– What is the moderating variable?

– What is the independent variable?

– What is the dependent variable?

• H. 6. Democratic supervisors have teachers who demonstrate more creativity in teaching methods than autocratic supervisors.

– What is the object?

– What are the variables?

– What are the names of the variables?

– How do they vary-categorical or continuous?

– What is the moderating variable?

– What is the independent variable?

– What is the dependent variable?

• H. 7. When administrators have influence with their superiors, authoritarian administrators command more loyalty from subordinates than non-authoritarian ones, but when administrators have little influence, then non authoritarian administrators command more loyalty than authoritarian ones .

– What is the object?

– What are the variables?

– What are the names of the variables?

– How do they vary-categorical or continuous?

– What is the moderating variable?

– What is the independent variable?

– What is the dependent variable?

• H. 8. The stronger the collective efficacy of a school, the higher the level of level of student achievement.

– What is the object?

– What are the variables?

– What are the names of the variables?

– How do they vary-categorical or continuous?

– What is the moderating variable?

– What is the independent variable?

– What is the dependent variable?

Now try it with your proposal topic

• What is the object?

• What are the variables?

• What are the names of the variables?

• How do they vary-categorical or continuous?

• What is the moderating variable?

• What is the independent variable?

• What is the dependent variable?

• State how you expect them to be related to one another.

Literature reviews

• Purpose – Place each work in the context of its contribution to the understanding of the subject under review – Describe the relationship of each work to the others under consideration – Identify new ways to interpret, and shed light on any gaps in, previous research – Resolve conflicts amongst seemingly contradictory previous studies – Identify areas of prior scholarship to prevent duplication of effort – Point the way forward for further research – Determine where your work will fit

Literature Reviews

• Hopefully by the end of this class you will become a more critical consumer.

• Questions you should ask when reading a report – What were the research questions?

– Who or what was studied?

• How were they sampled?

– What are the variables?

• How were they measured?

– What design was used?

– What statistics were used?

– Do the conclusions follow from the statistics?

Writing Literature Reviews

• Avoid summarizing a body of literature – Attempt to identify shortcomings – Provide analysis • Design problems • Problems with measures • Unique subsets of the population not included • Be very very careful – Plagiarism can sneak up on you

Finding Articles and Questionnaires

• Search engines – Be careful much of what is on the internet is of low quality.

– However, you can find peer reviewed articles using Yahoo.

– Google Scholar • http://www.google.com/

Finding Articles and Questionnaires

• Research Databases and Indexes http://www.unm.edu/ – General • EBSCOhost • Expanded Academic ASAP – Specialized • JSTOR – Linked to the articles • SportDiscus • Pscyinfo • Pubmed – I frequently use • Web of Science

Next Class

• Bring three hypotheses and a rationale for each.

– Also, address the following when applicable • What is the object?

• What are the variables?

• What are the names of the variables?

• How do they vary-categorical or continuous?

• What is the moderating variable?

• What is the independent variable?

• What is the dependent variable?

• State how you expect them to be related to one another.