Not only were these chapters informative on who, what, when, where, why, and how of the research process, but they also took a big weight off my shoulders. I was reminded of when I did quantitative research for an international advertising class. I followed each step to locate reliable and valid research that would show the different types of demographic our group was trying to reach. I remember reading through thousands of government data analysis documents on everything from age to what they watched on TV. I learned the importance of designing a advertising strategy and which resources I could use and present as reliable.
When reading the quantitative procedures, I realized that there is more to it than just having a strategy or reliability. What really stood out to me though was what to watch out for when giving definitions and proving that my data is valid. I know that in this class I will not be doing any quantitative research, but there is something that I am working on that will require a mixed methods approach, so this information is very useful to me.
About the qualitative procedures, I really liked the checklist at the beginning of the chapter. Even though it is kind of like a script, I find it helpful ( I am a big checklist person). Also the detailed descriptions on the different roles and analysis were very informative, especially in the data analysis and collection sections. For my qualitative portion of my research, I have been having trouble trying to pin down exactly what type of data I want to collect. These sections, I feel have helped narrow my ideas down and given me some sort of direction.
That's probably really helpful that you have such a good frame of reference! I was wishing for one of those myself. I was trying to remember all my old roommate's psych research projects!
ReplyDeleteI think I am having the same issue with trying to pick exactly what I would collect, or visualize an actual experiment. So far, to make sense, I have been trying to picture doing this with several different scenarios. The example in the book are sometimes helpful, but of course, I can't always see myself doing that research.