1. PRESENTATION ON RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
JOHN SIMWINGA (PHD)
ASSISTANT DIRECTOR (RESEARCH) DIRECTORATE OF RESEARCH AND GRADUATE STUDIES
UNIVERSITY OF ZAMBIA

2. De-mystification of Research
Personal experiences with research
On what basis do people draw conclusions about us?
On what basis do we draw conclusions about other people?
How do we ensure accuracy of the conclusions we make about other people?

3. Definition of Research
The Reader’s Digest Universal Dictionary (1986:1302) defines research as an “investigation or inquiry in order to gather new information or collate what is already known about a subject...” Research involves investigating aspects of reality or aspects of existence. Research has both philosophical and scientific dimensions.

4. Philosophical dimension
Ontology:
Nature of existence or nature of reality. What constitutes reality?
External world: physical reality and social reality.
Internal world: Experiential reality. Can both types be investigated in the same way?

5. Philosophical dimension
Epistemology: The nature of knowledge. What does it mean to know something? How do we prove/justify what we claim to know? How do we know physical reality? How do we know social reality? How do we know experiential reality? Experimental approach and non-experimental approach

6. Philosophical dimension
Axiology: The nature of values. The question is what constitutes values? Whose values? Does something have value in itself? Or it only has as much value as we attach to it?

7. Philosophical dimension
Methodology:
How can we investigate aspects of reality? How can we understand the various aspects of physical reality? Social reality? Experiential reality?
Quantitative approach
Qualitative approach
Mixed methods approach

8. Philosophical dimension
The four philosophical dimensions of ontology, epistemology, axiology and methodology constitute the key pillars or foundations for research, provide the framework for research and relate directly to what are known as research paradigms.

9. Research paradigms
These are ways of explaining reality in relation to the four philosophical dimensions of ontology, epistemology, axiology and methodology.

10. Research paradigms
Hebert (1990) considers a paradigm as “a conceptual framework or a body of assumptions, beliefs and related methods and techniques shared by a large group of scientists/ practitioners at the same time.” There are specific paradigms for experimental as well as for non-experimental studies and paradigms for quantitative and qualitative studies.

11. Research paradigms
Positivism – associated with quantitative research. Involves hypothesis testing to obtain “objective” truth. Also used to predict what may happen at a future date.

12. Positivism
Assumes that the social world exists as a system of distinct, observable variables, independent of the individual and relies heavily on the generation and analysis of numerical and technical information in the form of laws and theories to explain studied social behaviour.

13. Research paradigms
Critical realism is a subtype of positivism that incorporates some value assumptions on the part of the researcher. It involves looking at power in society. Researchers primarily rely on quantitative data to do this.

14. Research paradigms
Interpretivism –associated with qualitative research. Used to obtain an understanding of the world from an individual (or community) perspective.
Critical Humanism is a subtype of the Interpretive paradigm. The critical humanism approach is one in which the researcher involves people studied in the research process. Data is used for social change.

15. Ethnographic paradigm
The ethnographic paradigm views reality from a social-cultural perspective on the basis that interpretation of reality depends on social and cultural factors.

16. Phenomenological paradigm
Views reality as constructed by individuals from their lived experiences in relation to a particular phenomenon “the core of the phenomenological methodology is to fully enter into the experience of another. It requires being intuitively present and aware of the inner meaning for the other. In this way, one can arrive at the structure behind the content. Because of its reflective and descriptive approach, it is sometimes referred to as descriptive phenomenology.”

17. Feminist paradigm
presents a vision of the world from women’s perspective
promotes research which may act as a process of empowerment by raising the awareness and consciousness of women in their particular situations.

18. Quantitative research approach
Involves use of standardized measures, numbers, statistics.
Initially characteristic of experimental studies but now also used in non-experimental studies as in Economics, Demography, Mass Communication, Linguistics, Psychology, Education and others, allows greater precision in reporting results.

19. Qualitative research approach
qualitative research produces findings by non-statistical procedures
concerned with how the world is interpreted, understood, experienced by real human beings

20. Qualitative research approach
concerned with individuals’ own accounts of their attitudes, motivations and behaviour
allows a researcher to view behaviour in a natural setting thereby increasing the researcher’s depth of understanding of the phenomenon being investigated.

21. Research Design
Research design is the framework within which a given research exercise is to be undertaken and provides the basis for the selection of appropriate research methods to be used in investigating a given phenomenon.

22. Research Design in Experimental Research
Research variables
The Independent Variable
Stimulus, input, causal or influencing variable which is measured, manipulated or selected by the researcher to determine its effect on or its relationship to an observed phenomenon, the dependent variable.

23. Research variables
The Dependent Variable
Response, output, observed aspect of the behaviour of a subject that has been stimulated. It is that factor which is observed and measured to determine the effect of the independent variable, the factor which appears, disappears or varies as the experiment introduces, removes or varies the independent variable.

24. Research variables The Moderator Variable
Special type of independent variable, secondary independent variable which is measured, manipulated or selected by the researcher to discover or to determine whether it affects, modifies or mediates the relationship between the primary independent variable and the observed phenomenon, the dependent variable.

25. Research variables The Control Variable
This is a variable which may affect the outcome of the research and must be controlled or neutralised so that it does not affect the dependent variable, the independent variable or the moderator variable.

26. Research variables
The Intervening Variable Theoretically affects the observed phenomenon but cannot be precisely seen, measured or manipulated and yet it may explain the relationship between the dependent and the independent variable. It is a conceptual variable which is being affected by the independent, moderator and control variables and, in turn, affects the dependent variable. Its effect must be inferred from the effects of the independent and the moderator variables on the observed phenomenon, the dependent variable.

27. Design in Experimental Research
Full Experimental
All variables under control except those being investigated eg. experiments done under laboratory conditions
Quasi-experimental
Some variables under control eg. in applied linguistics, sociolinguistics and psychology

28. Research Design in Non-Experimental Research
Historical
Outlines past events
Descriptive research designs. One of the most common methods used at postgraduate level because it does not have many design limitations and is more structured than explorative research design)

29. Research Design in Non-Experimental Research
Co-relational: Makes comparisons, trends. Attempts to show relationships.
Causal-comparative: Seeks to establish cause-effect relationships
Document analysis: Focuses on textual information and identifies regularity of patterns in terms of structure, vocabulary items etc.

30. Research Design in Non-Experimental Research
Ethnography: Focuses on sociology of meaning as culturally constructed
Case study: Focuses on a particular phenomenon as it manifests itself in a particular locality or in an individual or in a particular set of individuals
Interpretivist/phenomenological

31. Research Design in Non-Experimental Research
Analytical: Identification and interpretation of existing written or recorded material with focus on the meaning of the events, concepts, ideas or artefacts. This is the case in literature, bible studies and law as examples

32. Research Design in Non-Experimental Research
Longitudinal Research (Trend studies, Cohort studies, Panel studies) The main limitation of this design is time.

33. Research Design in Non-Experimental Research
Ethnographies: The main limitation of this design is time.
Cross-sectional
Grounded theory: focuses on theory-building from the data

34. Methods of data collection in non-experimental research
Direct or Simple observation
Participant observation
Interviews
Questionnaires
Document analysis
Introspection
Focus group discussions

35. Sampling Population Sample, sample size Sampling frame
Random sampling, simple? Stratified?
Purposive sampling

36. Type of data to be collected
Clear categorization of type of data to be collected: qualitative? quantitative? or mixed methods? In line with research design, in line with research objectives, in line with title, etc.

37. Data Collection Administration of data collection instruments
when? and why?
Where? and why?
How? and why?
How many? and why?

38. Data Analysis

39. ZIKOMO KWAMBIRI In the familiar language of Lusaka, we say: ZIKOMO KWAMBIRI