Академический Документы
Профессиональный Документы
Культура Документы
Designing research
Suggested solutions to questions and exercises
1. What is research design?
Research design is often confused with choice of research method the decision to use
qualitative or quantitative methods, for example, or to use face-to-face interviews rather
than telephone, or an omnibus survey rather than a tailor-made one. All these decisions
are part of the research design process but they are not the whole of it. It is easiest to
think of research design as having two levels. At the first level, research design is about
the logic of the research, its framework or structure. It is at this level, given what we
know about the nature of the research enquiry (exploratory, descriptive or explanatory)
that we make decisions about whether to use a cross-sectional, a longitudinal, an
experimental design or a case study or a combination of these. At the second level it is
about the mechanics of the research what type of data (primary or secondary,
qualitative or quantitative or a combination), what method of data collection, what
sampling strategy, and so on. The first level is about designing the overall structure of
the research so that it delivers the evidence needed to answer the research problem; the
second level concerns decisions about how to collect that evidence.
Q. What is involved in:
(a) first level of research design?
Defining the research problem
Thinking about the end use of the data
Deciding on the sort of evidence you need
Deciding on the logic and structure of the research
Choosing the research design that will deliver the evidence you need
(b) second level of research design?
Deciding on the type of data and the method of data collection:
Primary or secondary or both
Quantitative or qualitative or both
Face-to-face, telephone, groups, in-depth interviews and so on
Designing a sampling strategy:
Identifying the target population
Identifying the sampling units and the sample elements
Choosing a sampling approach
Choosing a sample size
A and not brand B or why some people are in favour of capital punishment and others are
not. It can be used to rule out rival explanations and come to a conclusion.
6. To make sound causal inferences what sort of evidence must a research design
provide?
In order to make sound inferences about cause, we must make sure that the research
design allows us to:
look for the presence of association, covariance or correlation
look for an appropriate time sequence
rule out other variables as the cause
come to plausible or common sense conclusions.
7. Describe:
(a) what is involved in a cross-sectional research design; give examples.
Cross-sectional research design allows you to collect data from a cross-section of a
population at one point in time. A single cross-sectional design involves only one wave
or round of data collection data are collected from a sample on one occasion only. A
repeated cross-sectional design involves conducting more than one wave of (more or
less) the same research with an independent or fresh sample each time. The use of an
independent sample at each round of data collection is what distinguishes repeated crosssectional design from longitudinal research. In longitudinal research, data are collected
from the same sample on more than one occasion.
A cross-sectional design can be used to provide data for an exploratory or descriptive
research enquiry to understand the health information needs of older people, for
example. It can also be used to look for and examine relationships between variables; to
test out ideas and hypotheses; to help decide which explanation or theory best fits with
the data; and to help establish causal direction but not to prove cause. For example, it
might be used to determine what factors are involved in the decision to take out critical
illness benefit insurance, and the relationship between the factors.
(b) what is involved in a longitudinal research design; give examples.
Longitudinal research involves collecting data from the same sample (of individuals or
organisations, for example) on more than one occasion. The number and frequency of the
snapshots or data collection points depends largely on the research objectives. For
example, if the purpose of the research is to look at the immediate, short-term impact of
an advertising campaign, a relatively small number of data collection points, fairly
closely spaced in time, may suffice; to examine the longer term impact of advertising on
a brand may require a relatively large number of data collection points over many years.
The main application of longitudinal design is to monitor changes in the marketing or
social environment, changes that occur in the normal course of things and events that are
planned, for example, changes as a result of an advertising campaign, a new product
launch or an election. Longitudinal design can be used to provide data for descriptive
research enquiry. Although it cannot be used to prove cause, it can be used to:
3