Research Operationalization 13/08/5811

Research design – operationalization of variables –Chapter 6 in Babbie & Mouton (2001) The construction of actual, concrete measurement techniques; the creation of “operations” that will result in the desired measurements. The development or choice of specific research procedures (operations) that will result in representing the concepts of interest. 13/08/5821

Conceptualization and operationalization From any particular topic X, keep two questions in mind: "What is meant by X in this research?" "How was X measured?" The first one is conceptual definition The second one is operational definition 13/08/5831

EXAMPLE 1. CONCEPTUAL DEFINITION - Length of table is the distance from one end to the other. OPERATIONAL DEFINITION - Place a yardstick along one edge of the table, place additional yardsticks end to end until one extends over the other edge. Read the numeric marking for inches on the final yardstick at the point where it is exactly over the other edge of the table (call this X inches). Count the number of yardsticks you have used (call this N). Compute (N-1) * 36 + X. Repeat this process on the edge perpendicular to this one. The length of the table in inches is the larger of these two numbers. 13/08/5841

EXAMPLE 2. CONCEPTUAL DEFINITION - Age- the number of years that have passed since a person's date of birth. OPERATIONAL DEFINITION - A. Ask an individual for his name, place of birth (county and state), and names of both parents. Go to the county records office for the given county and find the record for the person with the given name. If there are more than one such records, check for names of parents. Identify the date of birth from this record. Subtract the year of birth from If the month and day of birth has not yet been reached in the current year, subtract 1. 13/08/5851

Let’s see your conceptual definitions 13/08/5861

Operationalization An operational definition is a procedure for classifying, ordering, or quantifying something –Classifying - crowded or not crowded –Ordering - uncrowded, mildly crowded, severely crowded –Quantifying - measure crowdedness in terms of the number of residents per square kilometre Focus on questionnaires 13/08/5871

Choices to be made about operationalization The range of variation – how large should your categories be? –Depends on the purpose of your study – pragmatic considerations ( e.g. income) Variation between the extremes – how fine are the disctinctions you want to make in your study? e.g. age –Again, depends on the purpose of your study –(Why research is such a challenging task – very few recipes) Single or multiple indicators of variables –Some straightforward, such as gender –But others benefit from multiple indicators 13/08/5881

Research Process Define Problem, Research Objectives HOW? Overall Method Survey Experiment Case Study Secondary Data What? Concepts Variables Measures Who? Population Sampling Data Gathering Analysis Application 13/08/5891

Developing the conceptual framework 13/08/58101

What inputs go into developing a conceptual framework? Experiential knowledge of student and supervisor: –Technical knowledge. –Research background. –Personal experience. –Data (particularly for qualitative). Literature review: –Prior ‘related’ theory – concepts and relationships that are used to represent the world, what is happening and why. –Prior ‘related’ research – how people have tackled ‘similar’ problems and what they have learned. –Other theory and research - approaches, lines of investigation and theory that are not obviously relevant/previously used. 13/08/58111

How might a conceptual framework be developed? The pieces of the conceptual framework are borrowed but the researcher provides the structure. To develop the structure you could: –Identify the key words used in the subject area of your study. –Draw out the key things within something you have already written about the subject area – literature review. –Take one key concept, idea or term at a time and brainstorm all the other things that might be related and then go back and select those that seem most relevant. Whichever is used it will take time and a number of iterations and the focus is both on the content and the inter-relationships. 13/08/58121

Examples of relationship X YX Z X Y Z X Y Z W 13/08/58131

Operationalization Conceptual definition Conceptual framework Operational definition Measurement Population and samples Data need Questionnaire design Pretest and revision Survey 13/08/58141