Chapter 10 Presenting Results, Making Conclusions, and Writing Reports
Points of Emphasis Using a ‘scientific method’ does not guarantee you the truth Limitations… know them, list them, and address them Generalizability… most of the time you can only ‘safely’ discuss those you surveyed Just report the statistics… be careful with leading words or flamboyant adjectives
Research Questions When reporting the results, let the research questions guide you If you speculate, make sure your readers know that is what you are doing Should you make adjustments along the way, you need to let readers know
Correlation does not mean causation Do not imply causation if the study was not set up to do so Correlations allow you to discuss strength of relationship (only) Explanatory analysis is needed to speculate about cause and effect
Audience Matters! General Public Academic Journal Reader Attendant at Conference Presentation Dissertation/Thesis Committee Employer Funding Agency
Basic Research Report Abstract Literature Review Methods Results Conclusions and Summary References