The Social Scientific Process Or How We Go

The Social Scientific Process (Or: How We Go About Studying People)

• As part of your term assessment, you will have the opportunity to conduct an original study for your research paper • This requires a lot of background knowledge on the research process and the different studies you could do… • You will be responsible for finding and providing that background knowledge to your classmates… • This is what the entire process looks like from a broad view: Preparing for Your Research Paper…

Outline of the Research Process

• You are already familiar with the pre-process and what goes into generating an original research question • But… let’s review! • Pre-process: The process before the process! Pre-process • What is the main purpose of the pre-process? • Generating a viable research question! • The strength of the study depends upon the strength of the RQ! Review!

• You begin with an IDEA… but how to get ideas? IDEA • Existing Background Knowledge • Non-participant Observation • Review Existing Research • Personal Interests • Current Events • Unexpectedly! (In your sleep, for example!) • http: //www. npr. org/blogs/13. 7/2014/02/04/271093289/eureka-first-life-in-the-universe • From there, you get more and more specific: • Idea Broad Subject Specific Topic Research Question Generating Ideas for an RQ

• What makes a good research question? üRelevant and Meaningful! üSpecific and Well-defined! üResearchable and/or Testable! üSimple and Manageable! üContributes to New Knowledge! Review

• After you have generated a viable RQ, you must ask two very important questions: • Has this RQ been posed before? • Requires archival research to find the answer! • If so, to what results? Can it be re-tested? • How can I test (or re-test) this question? • The answer to this question takes you to the first step in the process…Study Design! Design • You will (soon) be assigned a task to explain the basic types of studies in the social sciences Research Question

For this task…

By the end of this task, we hope…

When you start your research…

After you collect your results…

After you consider your results…

When you report your findings…

• Here is a list of the basic research categories: • Review • Descriptive • Correlational • Semi-experimental • Experimental • The type of study you will do depends on your research question… Study Design

• Your team will be randomly assigned one of the five major research categories for the social sciences • Your job is to explain to us, in as much detail as we need to know, what is involved with the particular study approach • You have a great responsibility to ensure the information is correct and accurate so that all the students in class have the proper tools to conduct a good study and achieve well • Include real world examples of the types of studies available under your category • Make your presentation interesting, interactive, and engaging interesting interactive Your Team Task

• Submit your original research question and a draft research plan by the first class of next week • Research Plan should include: • Research Question that meets RQ requirements • Which Study Type you will undertake and why • How you plan to conduct the study • A brief explanation of how your study will contribute to new knowledge Your Individual Task