Research Methods Planning the Research Project

1. Research MethodsPlanning the Research Project BIM2313 Lesson 8 BIM2313 Research Methods Zainudin Johari

2. Planning the Research Project • Successful research is a planned research • Fail because plunged into activity with only a partially thought-out plan & inconclusive design • Research requires a conceptualisation of overall organization and detailed plan • Should be no less totally visualized and precisely detailed

3. Planning the Research Project • A general strategy = research design (RD) • RD provides • Overall structure for the procedures • The data the researcher collects • The data analyses the researcher conducts • Must plan the overall design carefully to be successful • Wasted effort if half-prepared (vague ideas) • Must identify RESOURCES, PROCEDURES, and DATA always with the goal from the very beginning

4. All Research has a Basic Format • No matter what the academic discipline • Software engineer may be compelled to stray far from the field of SE in pursuing a research problem in user interface design • The ramifications of problem may lead into fields far from that of the original problem • Err in thinking too narrowly, in restricting problems for research to one academic area

5. The Basic Format of the Research Process • 1. A question is posed. In the mind of the researcher, a question arises that has no known resolution • 2. It’s a matter of words. The researcher converts the question to a clearly stated research problem. • 3. It’s worth a guess! The researcher poses a temporary hypothesis or series of hypotheses. • 4. The search is on! The researcher searches the literature for ideas that shed light on the problem and for strategies that may help to address it.

6. The Basic Format of the Research Process • 5. Data! Hard Data! And nothing BUT the data. The researcher collects data that potentially relate to the problem. • 6. How do the data fit together? The researcher arranges the data into a logical organizational structure. • 7. The data speak! The researcher analyzes and interprets the data to determine their meaning • 8. It’s either … or … Either the data seemingly resolve the research problem or they do not. Either they support the hypotheses or they do not.

7. All Research has a Basic Format • Might do better to think of problems as arising out of broad generic areas within whose boundaries all research falls: • People– research problems relating to individuals, groups, populations, nationalities, families, ... • Things – biological life, matter, … • Records – letters, legal documents, lists, journals, …

8. All Research has a Basic Format • Thoughts and ideas – opinions, reactions, concepts, theories, … • Dynamics and energy – human energy and activity, metabolism, gravity, hydrologic cycles, … • Above suggestions are not all-inclusive, merely suggest the broad ramification of research possibilities • Substratum (an underlying layer or foundation) of research principles is all-inclusive

9. Research Planning Versus Research Methodology • Many people are confused between the two • Example, statement “research in physics is different from research in philosophy or history” • Confusion between research as a process and the methodology employed by separate academic disciplines in collecting and processing data • Genuine research follows the scientific method and exhibits the EIGHT characteristics

10. Research Planning Versus Research Methodology • Who are willing to participate? • Do we have the equipment? • If so, do we have the technical skills to use it? • Are we able to interpret the tracings? • Do we know how to draw conclusion? • It must be a practical research – something that we must be able to handle

11. Data: Their Relationship to Design and Methodology • Without facts (data), inductive reasoning vanishes and scientific method collapses • The lifeblood of research • Data is a Latin verb dare, meaning “to give” – give information, impression or other factual data to an observer • Facts from Latin word facere, meaning “to make” – what the situation makes or manifests to the observer

12. What is Data? • Data are manifestation of the truth rather than the truth itself – no one has ever look upon truth itself – pure, undisguised, naked Truth • Data are merely representative, intermediate, elusive surrogate of Truth – reflects Truth as a mirror which reflects sunlight • Researchers are like those who live in dungeon seeing a beam of sunlight passes across the floor and get the idea of what the sun must be like

13. What are Data? • Factual dungeon – never be able to see the original source of the data – see what other people do – the behaviours they exhibit, the things they create, and the effects of their actions on others. But the actual people “inside” – those individuals we shall never know! • Research seeks, through data, what is true absolutely – the complete meaning of the data • Experienced researchers are constantly aware that the ultimate goal of research (Truth) is forever just beyond what is represented by the data, and, hence, just beyond human grasp

14. ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? The Realm of the Inquisitive Mind of the Researcher o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o The Barrier of the Human Senses Skills of Reading and Writing, Language Capability, and the Channels of Communication The Region of the Secondary Data The Realm of the Data The Dividing Line Between Primary and Secondary Data      The Region of the Primary Data The Impenetrable Barrier Beyond Which Lies the Absolute Truth THE REALM OF ABSOLUTE TRUTH

15. Data are Transient and Ever Changing • Data are not only elusive but also transient – exist in a split second • Example, an opinion survey on a population – tomorrow’s result will not be the same as now, people move out, move in, died, …. • Pretest and posttest conducted by a teacher in a class may not be the same class at all in six weeks, they have been growing, learning, maturing, changing

16. Data are Transient and Ever Changing • Example, asking people about their interests – can we be sure what they tell us is true? • They may answer honestly that represents the truth as they perceived it at that instant • May change because of factors: age, maturity, newscast, or items in newspaper • Researcher should recognize that even the most reliable, refined, carefully controlled data may have elusive (hard to find, describe or remember) quality – very volatile, evaporate

17. Primary Data • Lie closest to the source of The Absolute Truth underlying the phenomenon • Reflect truth more faithfully than any other approach – most valid, most illuminating, the most truth-manifesting • Impenetrable barrier exists between the Realm of Absolute Truth and the region of primary data • A beam of sunlight does not compare with seeing the sun itself

18. Car Accident • I witnessed the full occurrence of a car veer off the highway and careen into the ditch • The driver told me that he had no awareness of the possibility of an accident • Neither of us will ever be able to determine the absolute truth underlying the accident • What are the factors? Momentary seizure? Mechanism imperfections? • Answers lie beyond an impenetrable barrier, may never be known

19. Secondary Data • Beyond the region of primary data lies the region of secondary data • In the dungeon – not a direct beam of sunlight but simmering light upon the wall, reflected by mirror, distorted by imperfections • In the case of the car accident, I wrote an account stating precisely what I observed and confirmed by the driver – readers of the next day’s newspaper get the similar “reflection of the sunlight”

20. The End • Zainudin Johari B Sc. (Hons) Computer Science, UPM M Sc. Computer Science (Information Systems) UPM Pending Doctoral in Education IT , Open University Malaysia. BIM2313 Research Methods Zainudin Johari