Martha Menard, PhD, Sigma Applied Research Jan Schwartz, MA, Education & Training Solutions

Basic, applied, and developmental research conducted to advance knowledge in the field of education or bearing on educational problems… So what does that mean?

 A systematic attempt to define and investigate significant questions related to teaching and learning  Research = a systematic approach to answering questions

Psychological (neuropsychological):  Includes learning theories, factors affecting learning, memory, cognition, motivation, maturation, child, adolescent, and adult development and growth, neuroscience  Example: How do adult learners differ in motivation compared to children or adolescents?

Philosophical:  Includes the analysis of concepts, values, and worthiness or quality in education or educational goals; moral judgments; methods of reasoning; the meaning, nature and sources of knowledge  Example: How do we define evidence-based practice? Does it differ from evidence- informed practice?

Evaluation:  Includes assessment, tests, instruments such as those that measure constructs, examinations (both internal and external), item analysis, job task analysis, grading  Example: Does portfolio assessment measure entry-level competency as well as a multiple-choice examination?

Methodological:  Includes methods of teaching, a comparison of these methods, teaching styles, teacher effectiveness, teaching practice, uses of instructional media and educational technology  Example: Do some teaching methods work better than others for adult learners?

Administrative:  Includes issues around school financing, student financial aid, discipline, school records, classroom management, leadership styles, recruitment and deployment of staff  Example: Does increasing teacher autonomy promote employee satisfaction and reduce turnover?

Sociological:  Includes school-community relationships, teacher-student relationships, interpersonal relations within the school, classroom behavior of students, student protest, social media use analysis  Example: How do patterns of relationship between students change during the course of a professional training program?

Historical:  Includes the history of disciplines or professions, institutions, programs, places or persons of educational interest  Example: How did the first Flexner Report affect medical education in the US? Are there parallels to massage therapy education?

A recent search on PubMed using the terms ‘educational research massage’ returned 67 studies.  Only 3 were actually relevant and qualified as educational research in massage therapy;  All were written by the same author (P. Finch);  All were conducted outside the United States.

Educational research in massage therapy is virtually unlimited at this point, with many areas of inquiry, and LOTS of unanswered questions to investigate

 What would it look like—in process, the end result, concrete examples of both  What infrastructure is necessary  What do students need to bring to the table  What do teachers need—support and skills  What else?

 Martha:  Jan: American Educational Research Assoc.