1. Research questions and methods
Research Methods
Research questions and methods

2. Overview Introduction, aims & outcomes
Recap on the research process and the approaches
Thinking about your approach
The range of research methods
Thinking about your methods for data collection
Looking at other pieces of research and how they’ve collected their data
Look forward to next week

3. Aim
To look at research methods and their use in the research process.

4. Intended outcomes
By the end of the session, you will have: a) Revisited a range of research approaches and identified the approach you will use in your research plan; b) Looked at the 5 research methods we can use and explain how you can use them in your piece of research; c) Considered the value of triangulating your data and made links back to your data collection and d) analysed 5 pieces of research and identified the approach and methods of data collection for each.

5. The Research Cycle
Research question
Theoretical perspective
Strategy or methodology
Conclusions and recommendations
Methods of data collection
Analysis of data

6. Deciding on a method before a topic
You must decide on your research topic and the question you are curious about first, and only then consider how best to answer them. Don’t fit your proposed study to your favourite approach, and then disguise this as a philosophical, rather than a methodological decision. (Gorard, 2001, p8)

7. Choosing your methods – ‘horses for courses’
Whilst there is a strong relationship between some strategies and methods, you still have plenty of choice about which methods to use.
Two factors will influence your choice:
Preferences – type of data you want
Practical considerations – time, money, access to sources

8. 5 main methods identified by Bell (2005)
Documents
Questionnaires (aka Surveys)
Interviews
Diary log and critical incidents
Observation

9. Documents
Primary: Observations, interviews, questionnaires and focus groups
Secondary: Data produced by someone else which you then use, for example, Minutes of meetings, inspectors reports, government publications, the internet

10. Wellington (2000, p110)
Thus documentary analysis can be the main focus or an adjunct in educational research.
Historical pieces of research, such as books, will use archive material.

11. Assessing documentary sources
Wellington (2000) cites Scott’s work (1990) who identified 4 criteria for ‘assessing’ the ‘quality’ of documents:
Authenticity
Credibility
Representativeness
Meaning

12. Questionnaires
It requires discipline in the selection of questions, in question writing, in the design, piloting, distribution and return of questionnaires. What is more, thought has to be given to how responses will be analysed at the design stage, not after questionnaires have been returned. (Bell, 2005, p136-7)

13. Questionnaires
“The more structured a question, the easier it will be to analyse.” (Bell, 2005, p137) All data-gathering instruments should be piloted to test how long it takes recipients to complete them, to check all questions and instructions are clear and to enable you to remove all items which do not yield usable data. (Bell, 2005, p147)

14. Interviews
Interviews are an attractive proposition for the project researcher. At first glance, they do not involve much technical paraphernalia in order to collect the information…the reality, though, is not quite so simple. (Denscombe,2003, p163)

15. Diary log and critical incidents
In research, diaries are not personal records of engagements or journals of thought and activities, but records or logs of professional activities. They can provide valuable information about work patterns and activities, provided diary keepers are clear about what they are being asked to do, and why. (Bell, 2005, p173)

16. Observations (case studies of organisations often use them)
The key phrase often associated with ‘ethnography’ is ‘participant observation’…(thought it) is difficult to achieve. (Wellington, 2000, p93)

17. Observation spectrum Complete participant Participant as observer
Observer as participant
Complete observer
(Wellington, 2000, p93 adaptation of Hamersley and Atkinson, 1983)

18. The value of using more than one method
Multi-method research or triangulation as it is called ‘enables the researcher to see things from different perspectives and to understand the topic in a more rounded and complete fashion than would be the case had the data been drawn from just one method’. (Denscombe, 2005, p132)

19. Triangulation
Allowing ‘findings to be corroborated or questioned by comparing the data produced by different methods’ (Denscombe, 2005, p133) can do two things:
Give you another perspective to look at your other data from
Can enhance the validity of your data

20. Methodological triangulation being applied to research on disruptive behaviour by pupils
Method 1: observation
Method 2: interviews
Method 4: questionnaires
Method 3: documents
(After Denscombe, 2005, p133)

21. Next week
Considering in detail the 5 methods of data collection, sampling and how we analyse the data we’ve collected.