Introduction to Research

1
Introduction to Research Scientific Inquiry
2
What is Research?

• research is an unusually stubborn and persisting
  effort to think straight which involves the
  gathering and the intelligent use of relevant
  data

H. M. Hamlin, What is Research? American
Vocational Journal, September 1966.
3
Origin of the Word Research

• From the French word "recherche" which means to
  travel through or survey

4
How do we know what we know and why do we do
what we do?

• Personal Experience (Sensory Experience)
• Our personal experiences are limited
• We may be mistaken in our observations
• We may fail to see things clearly because of our
  biases

5
The Fallacy of Personal Experience

• You might have eaten some type of food and got
  sick. Therefore, you never eat this food again
  because it makes you sick.

6
Example The Case Against Bread

• More than 98 of convicted felons are bread
  users.
• Fully half of all children who grow up in bread
  consuming households score below average on
  standardized tests.
• In the 18th century, when virtually all bread was
  baked in the home, the average life expectancy
  was less than 50 years.
• More than 90 of all violent crimes are committed
  within 24 hours of eating bread.
• Primitive tribal societies that have no bread
  exhibit a low incidence of cancer, Alzheimer's,
  and Parkinson's disease.

7
Is it True?

• Do women make nicer bosses?
• How would you know?
• How could you test this idea?

8
How do we know what we know and why do we do
what we do?

• Tradition (Agreement with Others)
• Advice, rules, and approaches to handling
  problems are passed from year to year and
  accepted as truth
• Reliance on tradition eliminates the need to
  search for knowledge, makes accepting new
  knowledge difficult, and mitigates our desire to
  question existing practice.

9
Example The Fallacy of Tradition

• Trees for building purposes should be felled in
  December.
• When transplanting a tree, be careful to have the
  same side facing the south.
• Wood from a tree struck by lightning should never
  be used in the construction of a house, or barn,
  or they in turn may also be struck by lightning.
• Rain drops on a child under a year will cause
  freckles.

10
How do we know what we know and why do we do
what we do?

• Authority (Expert Opinion)
• Authorities can be wrong, and the public has a
  tendency to accept as fact what are actually
  opinions.

11
Example The Fallacy of Authority

• In 1992 the Catholic Church reversed their
  decision charging Galileo with heresy. He had
  claimed the earth was round and revolved around
  the sun, which went against the teachings of
  the church.

12
Logic

• All human beings are mortal
• Sally is a human being
• Therefore, Sally is mortal

13
Research (The Scientific Method)

• In contrast to sources of knowledge that are
  primarily idiosyncratic, informal, and influenced
  heavily by subjective interpretations, research
  involves a systematic process of gathering,
  interpreting, and reporting information.

14
The Scientific Method

• Testing ideas in the public arena by formulating
  a hypothesis (a tentative, testable assertion
  about certain behaviors, phenomena, or events)
  within a rigorous format.
• Must be reproducible and described in sufficient
  detail through 5 distinct steps
• State the problem
• Define the purpose of the study
• How to gather the information
• How to organize and analyze the information
  obtained
• How the information is interpreted

15
Ways of Knowing
16
Two Approaches to Research

• Quantitative
• Emphasizes numbers, measurements, control, and
  experimentation
• This is the traditional approach in AEE research

• Qualitative
• Emphasizes natural settings, observations, verbal
  narratives, and interpretations
• Emerged in the mid-1970s as an approach to
  educational research

17
Goals

• Quantitative
• Test theory
• Establish facts
• Show relationships
• Predict
• Statistically describe

• Qualitative
• Understand theory
• Develop understanding
• Describe multiple realities
• Capture naturally occurring behavior

18
Which Approach is Best?

• The problem you are studying determines which
  approach to take.
• One is not better than the other.
• However, some researchers tend to look down their
  nose at the qualitative researcher!

19
Mixed Methods

• Some researchers used both qualitative and
  quantitative methods in a single study. This is
  known as a mixed method approach.

20
Which Would You Select?

• Pillbugs are taking over parts of my garden and
  are becoming a problem!
• Get with a group of 4 and quickly design a study
  to investigate this problem.
• Decide whether to approach this problem
  quantitatively or qualitatively (or mixed)
• Tell what you would do and why
• What are the advantages and disadvantages of your
  approach

21
The QUESTION you are attempting to answer

• Why are pillbugs found in such high quantities in
  parts of my garden?
• Design your experiment to test something about
  what pillbugs like/dont like

22
Pillbug Inquiry Lab

• You and your partner are to take the ideas you
  just generated and turn it into a TESTBALE
  hypothesis (define the purpose).
• Take a look at the available supplies for ideas
• Is there something else you need?

23
Pillbug lab cont.

• What are you going to test? What is your
  control?
• What data are you collecting? Which type and how
  is it organized?
• What will you be able to conclude? How certain
  can you be?