DR RICHY COOK
Inventor of the 'Ethnogram'
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Cook, R. (2022). Research Designs. [online] Available at: http://www.r-cook.co.uk [Accessed: Enter the date].
Research Designs
I lecture/teach on several Masters Level 'Methods' modules across 3 Universities in the UK. I am involved with students at Undergrad through to PhD and common questions I get asked are...
- What is a research aim?
- What is a research objective?
- What is a research question
Research aim - the broad high level view of your research and what ultimately you want to achieve at the end. A statement that gives the big picture of your research's purpose/intent
Research objectives - these are statements that are specific and have a clear intention or outcome connected to parts of the aim. They are the aim broken down.
Research questions - these are questions based on the objectives that are answerable, that your research will provide knowledge (to some extent) about. You can answer the RQs in your discussion chapter.
A quick and dirty (far from perfect) example to separate them out (hopefully!).
The aim of my research is explore students' perceptions of anxiety in group work and the role that technology might play.
RObj1: Explore anxiety in group work
RQ1: What do students self-report as anxiety
RObj2: Provide examples of a range of group work
RQ2: What features of group work cause anxiety
RObj3: List the technology used in group work
RQ3: What technologies are useful for group work/anxiety reduction
It becomes quite clear that given the RObjs and RQs (and overall aim) there is some clues or assumptions we can make methodologically speaking. Some options open up to us and others are perhaps closed off.
For example, we might discount a survey in favour of interviews as we are seeking 'self-reported' data. We might turn to phenomenology to interpret individual's perspectives about the things they interact with.
Literature Reviews
So what are you supposed to do in a 'critical review of the literature'?. Firstly, what you should avoid. Listing and summarising paper after paper telling the reader what the abstract already tells you.
Secondly, avoid a long prose absent of a logical structure which is poorly (or not) organised.
Finally, fall into the trap of criticising features of the research design. E.g. not much info about ethical approval. Or, 'small' sample sizes. These are common pitfalls for students. Taking small sample size as an example, the authors may be seeking thickness or depth of description so a small sample is fine.
The literature review has to have a connection to your aim and objectives. Literature selected should be therefore related.
Here are key things I look for when marking literature reviews...
Scope
Briefly tell the readers what literature you are reviewing to demonstrate a connection with your research aim and research objectives. Otherwise you are not defining your area and thus open yourself to a reader asking you why you did not consider the paper by leading author X. They may also ask you why you did not look at literature in the area of Y.
Funnelling
Start broad by laying out the knowledge in the wider field. Example, your aim is to explore student stress during the run up to GCSE exams in the UK education system. You don't need to talk about Education as a whole but lay out knowledge from secondary, just in eurpoean school system perhaps. Then focus in to a section on UK then Finland then France and Germany. You may then drill down into literature more closely related to your aim (perhaps UK GCSE examinations and student stress).
Focus
This is where you take your aim (GCSE stress) and dig deep into the literature drawing out key arguments, perpsectives and draw from highly cited or influential and key papers. You can demonstrate criticality and present your own academic voice.
Gap
Here, the final part of your lit review is where you begin to summarise what you have found out about knowledge in your area and present an area where further knowledge is need. It might be from a methodolgoical perspective, it might be to extend current thinking about a concept or it might be to apply a new method to gain further or new data. It might also be that there is a methodological gap.
Becoming Analytic
This involves connecting the data you have collected (and analysed) to theory and concepts. For example, if you have data from interviews about student anxiety and leaving school for University or employment you might draw from Markus' 'possible selves' theory or concepts of 'what I want to be'. You might draw from Jenkins theories on identity. What your aim should be is to begin to conceptualise YOUR data using others theories or concepts.
Too often I see the presentation of data that has seemingly been 'analysed' but this is where it ends. The analysis has been limited and there is little connection with theory or concepts.
Planning to Write
In literature reviews, students might form some methodological assumptions which need to be outlined in a Methodology chapter. Here is where the struggle for some students starts.
- What is a methodology?
- What are the connections between lit review and Methodology?
- What is IN a Methdology chapter?
- What is epistemology and ontology?
Question 1
Methodology can broadly be thought of as the process (or the how) of your research. It would lay out key elements that gives a reader the overview of your study in practice. To provide an example, I am specifying a qualitative research study, that uses an interpretivist paradigm, and will subjectively determine (to build towards theory inductively) thoughts and feelings about workplace stress. I will conduct an auto-ethnography that will collect data and via ethnomethodology, thematically analyse the data collected over a year long period of fieldwork in the workplace. Ethical approval will gained and gatekeepers of the workplace will be informed and consent will be gained. All the data stored will be kept under GDPR guidelines. It is a low risk study with minimum potential for harm. Inside this example you can spot METHODS.. instruments to collect the data.
A common mistake Masters students make is to overly focus on methods. e.g. Methodology chapters often start as "I will use interviews..." Something also often overlooked is philosophical assumptions and positionality (which is connected to reflexivity) more on this later.
Question 2
Your literature review can be used to foreground your methodology chapter by highlighting where further knowledge is needed. What I mean is that during your review you may outline that studies have been mostly quantitative. There is a need for a qualitative perspective therefore. Prior research has looked at one stakeholders views and through survey presented results of this. Perhaps now interviews or participant observations might surface new knowledge. What becomes evident then is that your literature review (along with your research aim and research questions) will signpost the direction you take in the form of methodological assumptions.
Question 3
See question 1! And refer back to research aim, objectives and questions at the top.
Question 4...
Common across all the courses, modules and Universities I work for are the struggle that students sometimes have with philosophical assumptions.
Epistemology, one’s theory of knowledge. One can have epistemologies about various things.
In academia, we generally take the stance that there is Interpretivism or Positivism.
Epistemology for Education as a system, or a philosophical idea. One of its main tenets would be ‘Education is a good thing’ simply put, productive for humans.
These are 'beliefs' (what we think is right or the truth) and each person has an individual perspective. Some may believe that knowledge is measurable and one truth can be accounted for. Another may believe that all reality is once-removed and thus an interpretation of multiple points of view or there are many realities (and these are socially constructed).
Take for example a teacher's belief about sanctions that can be given for 'bad' behaviour - what bad behaviour IS is a personal perspective in essence. (bad behaviour is also on ontological claim... as is sanctions)
Ontology, can be thought of as claims or theories about what is possible in the world, in existence. NB: As above, we saw that each epistemology contains numerous ontological claims (bad behaviour, sanctions).
Thus Religion: one claim would be there are certain objects in the world which are ‘relics’ = bones of the Saints etc.
Ontology, the nature of things or what is in existence, is a philosophical notion.
Take for example the DfE, Vygotsky or Mickey Mouse. The DfE is an organisation, part of a Government, Vygotsky is a person and Mickey Mouse is a cartoon character. Mickey Mouse 'exists' in a different way to Vygotsky who existed in the past and neither exist in the same way as an organisation like the DfE. Our understandings of existence, the nature of things, are then somewhat different given what they are (or were) and what they mean or meant to us. In school an ontological claim would be ‘time-tables’ exist. Or ‘learning’ is ongoing. You might theorise that timetables facilitate order and control that facilitates learning as episodic.
Conclusion Chapters
These are often asked about. Often students ask how can I write up to 2000 words? My take on this chapter is as follows.
You should not begin to talk about 'new' ideas, introduce new arguments nor enter into detailed discussion. Think abut this chapter as firstly being the summing up of each chapter. For example, you might structure your conclusion chapter around your dissertation / thesis structure: introduction, literature, methdology, findings, discussion.
So, you might begin by writing what your overall research aim was and the objectives you had. You might then talk about the literature and the gap you identified. You may write about your methodological decisions (perhaps even talk about limitations you have indentified).
Then you can state your main findings and key contribution(s) to knowledge. You can then recap on the key thrust of your discussion - what were you arguing for and mention the theoretical framework or theory you drew from. You may finish with providing your thoughts on to what extent you answered each of the research questions and then hint at where perhaps further research might be needed.
If you think this page has been useful and your module lecturers are open to an external speaker (I am for my modules as other perspectives are always valued) then I am happy to guest speak. Email me here
What is Masters level writing?
It requires you to demonstrate 3 things: criticality, breadth of knowledge and depth of knowledge.
Along with this you are supposed to learn the 'craft' skills of designing and conducting a piece of empirical research (something that collects primary data). If given the chance to do desktop research, personally, I would advise against, it's more fun to do data collection.
Criticality in short - prsenting and considering arguments from opposing perpsectives and providing your argument / opinion on these.
Breadth - a wide range of academic sources consulted with demonstration of synthesis of arguments, debates, themes and categories.
Depth - a high level of knowledge about a very specific topic or area that critically considers knowledge in this area.
Common errors
"it is clear that all teachers talk too much" - this is a claim and this type of claim makes me wince. It is extreme and definitive. So really what you are saying is that every teacher in the world talks too much. Well can you empirically say every teacher? What is too much? Isn't it context specific? Every claim really should have some sort of empirical basis and be contextual.
If the research studied 30 teachers and the sample of 6 students reported that teachers talked for 99% of the Maths lesson then you might still say...
In the sample of 30 teachers in this school in the Maths lesson observed in this instance SOME students asked reported very high levels of talk.
Citing works
It's simple really...
Jones (2020) said this
It is assumed this is true (Jones, 2020)
Jones (2020, p.1) said "Gosh, it's true".
Authors usually found it to be true (Jones, 2020; Smith, 2021, Wang, 2022).
Dr Richy Cook (PhD, MEd, PGCAP, PGCE, BSC)
How I like to allocate my time
Research Methodologies
75%
Creative Research Methods
50%
Ethnography & Ethnomethodology
50%
Doctoral & Master's Supervision
25%
Education and/or Technology
100%
Teaching & Scholarly
75%