Ethnography Essentials. Designing, Conducting, and Presenting Your Research

The industry standard guide, updated with new ideas and SPSS analysis techniques Designing and Conducting Survey Research: A Comprehensive Guide Fourth Edition is the industry standard resource that covers all major components of the survey process, updated to include new data analysis techniques and SPSS procedures with sample data sets online. The book offers practical, actionable guidance on constructing the instrument, administrating the process, and analyzing and reporting the results, providing extensive examples and worksheets that demonstrate the appropriate use of survey and data techniques. By clarifying complex statistical concepts and modern analysis methods, this guide enables readers to conduct a survey research project from initial focus concept to the final report. Public and nonprofit managers with survey research responsibilities need to stay up-to-date on the latest methods, techniques, and best practices for optimal data collection, analysis, and reporting. Designing and Conducting Survey Research is a complete resource, answering the «what», «why», and «how» every step of the way, and providing the latest information about technological advancements in data analysis. The updated fourth edition contains step-by-step SPSS data entry and analysis procedures, as well as SPSS examples throughout the text, using real data sets from real-world studies. Other new information includes topics like: Nonresponse error/bias Ethical concerns and special populations Cell phone samples in telephone surveys Subsample screening and complex skip patterns The fourth edition also contains new information on the growing importance of focus groups, and places a special emphasis on data quality including size and variability. Those who employ survey research methods will find that Designing and Conducting Survey Research contains all the information needed to better design, conduct, and analyze a more effective survey.

Designing and Conducting Research in Health and Human Performance shows students how to become effective producers and consumers of health and human performance research. The book provides comprehensive coverage of both quantitative and qualitative research methods and includes step-by-step guidance for writing effective research proposals and theses. In addition, the authors show how to read, assess, interpret, and apply published research and how to conduct basic studies in health, physical education, exercise science, athletic training, and recreation. Designing and Conducting Research in Health and Human Performance is filled with illustrative examples that emphasize the real-world applications of research methods. Throughout, the authors draw on a variety of examples that were selected because they provide a context to further the understanding of health and human performance research. Research to Practice examples and Tips are included by the authors to help students better appreciate the book's content. These study aids provide suggestions and additional resources to assist students in understanding the research process. Key Terms, defined and highlighted, enrich each chapter. Chapter Review Questions, designed to help students comprehend and follow best practices in research methods, close each chapter. Online resources and guides developed by the authors to support and enhance students' learning of important research concepts are available.

Designing and Conducting Your First Interview Project Using a clear, easily followed approach, Designing and Conducting Your First Interview Project helps anyone new to the process develop the skills to conduct the most essential part of social research data collection: the interview. The book also shows how to organize, analyze, and interpret the data. This workbook provides a step-by-step template for a collaborative class experience in social science. Organized according to the steps of the deductive scientific method, it includes essential activities to take place during class after the appropriate chapter has been read. The book begins with the process of choosing a topic and proceeds through hypothesis development, interview data collection, data entry using SPSS, and elementary data analysis. The final chapter includes the formal assignment and instructions to students on how to write about their experiences in a way that will produce an excellent final paper. By selecting the hypothesis, gathering the data, and analyzing the results, students will gain an appreciation for the strengths and potential weaknesses of «knowing» things through doing quantitative social science.

Master the essential skills for designing and conducting a successful research project Essentials of Research Design and Methodology contains practical information on how to design and conduct scientific research in the behavioral and social sciences. This accessible guide covers basic to advanced concepts in a clear, concrete, and readable style. The text offers students and practitioners in the behavioral sciences and related disciplines important insights into identifying research topics, variables, and methodological approaches. Data collection and assessment strategies, interpretation methods, and important ethical considerations also receive significant coverage in this user-friendly guide. Essentials of Research Design and Methodology is the only available resource to condense the wide-ranging topics of the field into a concise, accessible format for handy and quick reference. As part of the Essentials of Behavioral Science series, this book offers a thorough review of the most relevant topics in research design and methodology. Each concise chapter features numerous callout boxes highlighting key concepts, bulleted points, and extensive illustrative material, as well as «Test Yourself» questions that help you gauge and reinforce your grasp of the information covered.

Written in easy-to-understand language, this important text provides a systematic and commonsense approach to developing instruments for data collection and analysis. This book can be used by both those who are developing instruments for the first time and those who want to hone their skills, including students, agency personnel, program managers, and researchers. This book provides a thorough presentation of instrument construction, from conception to development and pre-testing of items, formatting the instrument, administration, and, finally, data management and presentation of the findings. Throughout the book, the authors emphasize how to create an instrument that will produce trustworthy and accurate data. To that end they have included guidelines for reviewing and revising the questionnaire to enhance validity and reliability. They also show how to work effectively with stakeholders such as instruments designers, decision-makers, agency personnel, clients, and raters or respondents.

Designing Solutions for Your Business Problems is an essential resource for managers and consultants who help organizations resolve ambiguous problems and develop new opportunities. Taking a hands-on, practical approach, Betty Vandenbosch—a leading management consultant and educator—outlines the details on how to conduct a proven process for designing solutions. Designing Solutions for Your Business Problems will teach you how to curtail investigation and generate and justify ideas without sacrificing thoroughness, creativity, persuasiveness, and fit. You will be able to capitalize on more opportunities, and your problem-solving skills will become more efficient and your solutions more compelling. This book will help you design better solutions and design them faster. Betty Vandenbosch offers a variety of useful techniques such as the «scooping diagram,» which provides a framework for action, and the «logic diagram,» which tests the validity of a potential solution. In addition, the book contains illustrative real-life examples of the Designing Solutions approach from a variety of organizations.

Designing and Assessing Courses and Curricula reflects the most current knowledge and practice in course and curriculum design and connects this knowledge with the critical task of assessing learning outcomes at both course and curricular levels. This thoroughly revised and expanded third edition of the best-selling book positions course design as a tool for educational change and contains a wealth of new material including new chapters, case examples, and resources.

A clear easy-to-read guide to presenting your message using statistical data Poor presentation of data is everywhere; basic principles are forgotten or ignored. As a result, audiences are presented with confusing tables and charts that do not make immediate sense. This book is intended to be read by all who present data in any form. The author, a chartered statistician who has run many courses on the subject of data presentation, presents numerous examples alongside an explanation of how improvements can be made and basic principles to adopt. He advocates following four key ‘C’ words in all messages: Clear, Concise, Correct and Consistent. Following the principles in the book will lead to clearer, simpler and easier to understand messages which can then be assimilated faster. Anyone from student to researcher, journalist to policy adviser, charity worker to government statistician, will benefit from reading this book. More importantly, it will also benefit the recipients of the presented data. ‘Ed Swires-Hennessy, a recognised expert in the presentation of statistics, explains and clearly describes a set of “principles” of clear and objective statistical communication. This book should be required reading for all those who present statistics.’ Richard Laux, UK Statistics Authority ‘I think this is a fantastic book and hope everyone who presents data or statistics makes time to read it first.’ David Marder, Chief Media Adviser, Office for National Statistics, UK ‘Ed’s book makes his tried-and-tested material widely available to anyone concerned with understanding and presenting data. It is full of interesting insights, is highly practical and packed with sensible suggestions and nice ideas that you immediately want to try out.’ Dr Shirley Coleman, Principal Statistician, Industrial Statistics Research Unit, School of Mathematics and Statistics, Newcastle University, UK

Because site visits are used so extensively in evaluation and because the consequences of poorly planned and conducted site visits are dire for so many evaluation constituents, it is essential to get it right. This issue discusses and defines site visits and what it means to get it right in planning, conducting, and using site visits in program evaluation. Learn about: strategies for a wide range of evaluation constituents who commission, plan, conduct, and use site visits implications of rigor, ethics, and quality of site visits challenges and possible solutions to problems linked to the high cost of commissioning site visits the potentially devastating consequences of poorly designed or implemented site visits. This is the 156th issue in the New Directions for Evaluation series from Jossey-Bass. It is an official publication of the American Evaluation Association.

Getting involved in medical and biomedical research through necessity or personal choice can be a testing experience. Each step of the process brings its own challenges, from liaising with supervisors, to the lack of opportunities to promote completed research. This brand new How to provides a complete guide to the process: from the planning stages, to execution, write-up, preparation for the viva examination, and how to maximise the impact of your research. It ensures you get the most out of the experience, both in terms of personal development and academic achievement, and even provides guidance on what to do when things don’t quite go to plan. An ideal companion, written by an experienced postgraduate tutor, this concise and user-friendly manual is full of practical exercises, key points, and hints and tips, which will give you the edge when dealing with the more elusive realities of medical and healthcare research.