MNG10720
Associate Professor Martin Young
Unit Assesso
XXXXXXXXXX
Assignment 4: Research Project Report
Due: Week 12 – Wednesday 23rd May 2018
Length: 1500 words (+/- 10%)
Weighing: 50%
Format: Report
Covers:
Mainly Topics 4-9, but also includes some elements
discussed in Topic 2 (ethical considerations and
problem statement/objectives)
Late submissions
Late submission will lose 5% per day
Assignment extensions need to be applied for via
special consideration procedures
These are now eforms submitted via ‘My Enrolment’
For details on special consideration visit
http:
scu.edu.au/students/index.php/30
http:
scu.edu.au/students/index.php/30
Assignment overview
You are required to prepare a report that will set out how you
will go about answering the research question developed in
Assignment 2.
The report will map out a research design - techniques you
will use to convincingly address the research question.
Your report will describe and justify the decisions you have
made for your research design, data collection methods,
sample selection, ethical considerations and data analysis
techniques.
The proposal report also involves the development of a
Qualtrics survey which you need to design and include
whether you choose to develop a qualitative, quantitative, or
mixed method of survey and/or interview questions.
Assignment text
Instructions
Your research proposal should address the
following criteria (and use these headings in
your Research Project Report):
1. Problem Statement and Research Objectives –
state your problem statement and research
objectives at the start of your research proposal
eport so your lecturer can refer to these when
eviewing your proposal.
Use the feedback from assignment 2 to improve
these
➢ A problem statement is a concise statement of the
purpose of your study – be specific
➢ Grammar and expression heavily scrutinised here
➢ To find the sub objectives you need to identify the steps
equired to fulfill your problem statement
➢ Use instruction words like describe, examine, explore…
➢ Should reflect the scope of the project – geographic,
temporal, demographic
➢ Make sure that the sub objectives are relevant to solve
the overall ‘problem’
Tips for problem statement and research objectives
Assignment text
2. Research design – explain and justify the
methodological approach you propose to guide your
esearch proposal using relevant literature.
Tips for the research design section
Provide a
ief discussion of research design at the
3 levels
Core function (pure vs applied research)
Information requirements (exploratory, descriptive,
explanatory research etc)
Methodology (quantitative, qualitative or mixed
methods research)
Good papers do justify their design choices with
appropriate academic references
Assignment text
3. Data Collection Methods – explain and
justify the methods you propose for data
collection and data management using relevant
literature.
Tips for the data collection methods section
You may compare/contrast your selected methods with other
methods that you did not select for your research project
(explain why) by discussing the advantages and
disadvantages of the different methods available
Based on this discussion, explain and justify the particular
data collection methods/techniques that you selected to
apply in your research project
Make sure to support your explanation/justification with
evidence from the academic literature using appropriate
academic references (e.g. research methodology books
and/or academic journal articles)
Remember, if your choose a mixed methods approach for A3
and use Qualtrics you can use other methods in addition to
this, if you wish, and it fits with your problem
statement/objectives, e.g. observation)
Tips for the data collection methods section
Methods commonly used for quantitative research include:
Surveys (household, street/intercept, telephone, mail, on-site,
we
e-surveys, captive group, organisation)
Structured interviews
Longitudinal studies
Observation
Case studies
Methods commonly used for qualitative research include:
In-depth interviews
Participant observation
Focus groups
Case studies
Content Analysis
Assignment text
4. Qualtrics Survey – design and include your
Qualtrics survey and/or interview format and
explain and justify the questions and style of
questions you use with respect to collecting
appropriate data to address your objectives.
Tips for the Qualtrics survey section
Include your Qualtrics questionnaire as an Appendix in your
Assignment 3 (export it into Word from Qualtrics)
In this section in the body of your assignment, you need to explain
and justify why you use particular types of questions in order to
address your problem statement and objectives, such as:
Open-ended vs closed/pre-coded questions
Poll questions
Multiple choice questions
Checklists
Ranking questions
Fill in the blanks
Rating scales
Filter questions
Justify your choice with reference to the levels of measurement (i.e.
nominal, ordinal, interval and ration)
Assignment text
5. Sample Selection – explain and justify the
sample selection process relevant to your
esearch proposal.
Tips for the sample selection section
In the sampling section you must:
State whether you are using probability or non-probability
sampling
Justify this choice using appropriate references
You should explain explicitly why your selected sampling
techniques are suitable for your study
Good idea to include a paragraph on the sampling procedures that
could be applied to your study – noting their advantages and
disadvantages
Then na
ow down to the ones you have selected and justify your
choice with a reference or two
E.g. Neuman XXXXXXXXXXstated that stratified sampling was appropriate
under such and such circumstances, therefore stratified sampling
has been selected for the present study…
Tips for the sample selection section
Specifically, you need to address:
What is your research population
What is your target population
What is your sampling procedure (simple random,
stratified, convenience, purposive etc.)
How big will your sample be?
For your quantitative sample, I will expect a number
ased on, for example, Neuman’s guidelines (see Power
Point slides from Topic 7)
For your qualitative sample, while you can estimate an
approximate number, it is sufficient to justify your sample
size here refe
ing to the point of saturation
Assignment text
6. Data Analysis Techniques – explain and
justify how you would propose to analyse and
present the data collected.
Tips for the data analysis techniques section
You should discuss:
What forms of analysis you will apply to your data (univariate,
ivariate – frequency counts, central tendency, scatterplots etc.)
You are advised to explain which variables will be subject of
univariate analysis and which will be bivariate.
How you will present your analysed data (e.g. frequency tables, bar
graphs, pie charts etc.)
Justify your choices – e.g. ‘frequency tables are suitable for
presenting nominal data’ (Smith, 1999, p. 45)
Remember to explain/justify data analysis of both your survey and
your interviews
Assignment text
7. Ethical Considerations – explain how you
would consider the ethical issues associated with
the research proposal.
Tips for the Ethical Considerations Section
Briefly outline how your project will be ethically
conducted:
How you will obtain informed consent
The risks to participants in your study, and how you will
protect them from those risks (mostly to do with privacy)
How the anonymity of participants will be maintained
How will collected data be reported and stored?
Assignment Text
8. Provide a reference list (Harvard) for any reference
sources you use to justify your final research proposal.
Good papers include a variety of academic
eferences to justify decisions made in relation to the
esearch proposal (A3 required 5 references, so I would
propose that 5 is the minimum for A4 as well –
however, HDs and Ds may require more references than
this)
Marking Criteria
Your Assignment 3 will be marked based on the following
criteria
Criteria Marks %
Research design 20
Data collection methods 20
Qualtrics survey 10
Sample selection 10
Ethical considerations 10
Proposed data analysis techniques 10
Presentation and clarity of the report 10
Referencing quality and list 10
Total % marks 100
Format of Assignment 3
Cover page
Title Page
Problem Statement and Research Objectives
Research Design
Data Collection Methods
Qualtrics Survey explanation
Sample Selection
Ethical Considerations
Data Analysis Techniques
Reference List
Appendices
Qualtrics Questionnaire
Word limit and assignment sections
The cover sheet, title page, reference list, and
appendices are not included in the 1500 word limit
The following 7 sections are included in the 1500
word limit: Problem Statement and Research
Objectives, Research Design, Data Collection Methods,
Qualtrics Survey, Sample Selection, Ethical
Considerations, and Data Analysis Techniques
Use headings co
esponding with the required
sections above within your assignment
It is up to you whether you would like to number your
sections or not (1, 2, 3 etc. – 1.1, 1.2, 1.3 etc. if you use
subsections) but it is a useful tool
Physical presentation
Double spaced
At least 2.5 cm margins
Insert page numbers
Use 3rd person (instead of writing ‘I’, refer to yourself
as ‘the researcher’ or similar term)
More details of in UIG
Reference Style: Harvard
The required reference style for this unit is the
Harvard style
Click on the ‘Topic 3’ folder and upload the
eferencing chapter from Summers and Smith’s
(2006) Communication Skills Handbook
It provides you with examples and everything you
need to know about the Harvard referencing style
Make sure that your referencing is consistent
Final notes
Focus on the marking criteria of the assignment –
this is your guide to ensure that you have included all
necessary elements into the assignment that you will
e marked on
Start early – last minute assignments written the
night before the due date seldom obtain a high grade