1. WRITING THE RESEARCH REPORT & CITING RESOURCES BUSN 364 – Week 15 Özge Can

2. Non-Reactive Research  Type of social research in which people are not directly studied  Examples:  Physical traces  Existing statistics/ secondary data  Content analysis of documents

3. Content Analysis  You gather and analyze the content of a text  Text is analything written, visual or spoken as a communication source:  Books, newspaper and magazine articles, advertisements, speeches, official documents, films or videotapes, tv programs, musical lyrics, photographs, websites...

4. Content Analysis  After you gather the data, you analyze them with statistics in the same way that an experimenter or survey researcher  Coding system => A set of instructions or rules used in content analysis to explain how the symbolic content from text is systematically converted into quantitative data  What we measure? Frequency, direction, intensity, connections

5. Writing the Research Report  A research is not complete until you share the results with others  After designing your study, gathering data and analyzing the data; => it is time to communicate the findings to others through a research report

6. Research Report  It is a written document that communicates the methods and findings of a research project to others.  It is more than a summary of findings: It is a detailed record of the whole research process  It tells others what you, as the researcher, did and what you discovered

7. Research Report  In addition to findings, it also includes:  The reasons for initiating the project  A description of the steps of the research  A presentation of data  A discussion of how the data relate to the research question/ topic

8. The Writing Process  Your audience  You must always know for whom you are writing  Communication is most effective when it is tailored to a specific audience  Style and tone  Communicate the research clearly, directly and honestly  The style should be formal; you should be “to the point”  The tone should be a little bit distant and professional

9. The Writing Process  Organizing your thoughts  Writing is hard work and requires diligence  Follows a sequence of steps that ultimately result in a final product: Something to write about: research question/ topic Composing an outline Revise this outline whenever needed

10. The Writing Process  Back to library  You will need to return to the literature after completing data collection and analysis. Because:  New studies might be published  You may now have new questions in mind  Properly citing references; it also helps to avoid plagiarism

11. Plagiarism  Stealing another person’s ideas without properly citing the original source  One should cite the sources of both directly quoted words and paraphrased ideas.  Take careful notes and identify the exact sources of ideas, phrases to avoid unintentional plagiarism

12. “The way to learn to write is by writing”

13. How to Write? Writing process has three major steps:  Prewriting => prepare to write by arranging notes on the literature, making lists of ideas, outlining, completing citations and organizing comments on data analysis  Composing => get your ideas onto paper; work on the complete report from beginning to end  Rewriting => evaluate the report by improving coherence, proof-reading, checking citations and etc.

14. How to Write?  Rewriting involves two processes: revising and editing A) Revising => Correction process in which a writer adds ideas or evidence and deletes, rearranges or changes them to improve clarity and better communicate meaning B) Editing => Clearing up the more mechanical aspects of writing, such as spelling, grammar, usage, verb arrangement, tense, sentence length and paragraph organization

15. Suggestions for Ending Writer’s Block:  Begin writing as early as possible  Take a break and then return  Begin in the middle  Motivate yourself to write; use mental triggers  Break the writing into small parts  Do not expect perfection

16. Sections of a Research Report The sections of a research report roughly follow the sequence of steps of a research project:  Abstract/executive summary  Presentation of the problem  Description of the methods  Results and tables  Discussion  Conclusions

17. Sections of a Research Report  Abstract or Executive Summary  It gives information on the topic, the research problem, the basic findings and any unusual research design or data collection features  Reports of applied research that are written for practitioners have a longer summary called “executie summary”.

18. Sections of a Research Report  Presentation of the Problem  The first section of the report defined the research problem.  It can be placed in one or more sections with titles such as: “Introduction”, “Problem Definition”, “Literature Review”, “Hypotheses”, “Background Assumptions”  Should include a statement of the research problem and a rationale for what is being examined

19. Sections of a Research Report  Description of the Methods  This section of the report describes how you designed the study and collected the data.  It goes by several names: “Methods”, “Research Design” or “Data”.  Maybe subdivided into other parts such as “Sampling”, “Measures” or “Research Setting”

20. Sections of a Research Report  Description of the Methods This section answers several questions: 1.What type of study (e.g. experiment, survey) was conducted? 2. Exactly how were data collected (e.g. study design, type of survey, time and location of data collection, experimental design used)? 3. How were variables measured? Are the measures reliable and valid? 4. What is the sample? How many participants are involved in the study?How were they selected?

21. Sections of a Research Report  Results and Tables  After describing methods of data collection, sampling and measurement, you present the data  It only represents the data; does not discuss, analyze or interpret it  One should make choices about how to present the data (e.g. proper statistics, tables and charts)

22. Sections of a Research Report  Discussion  It gives the reader a concise, unambigious interpretation of its meaning  It is separated from “Results” so that a reader can examine the data and arrive different interpretations

23. Sections of a Research Report  Conclusions  Restating the research question and summarizing the report (sometimes titled “Summary”)  Last part of the report. After conclusion, there are the references and appendixes  References should contain only the resources that you referred in the text/report  Appendixes: additional info that might be useful for understanding the study and study results

24. Citing Resources – Some Useful Links  APA style in general:  http://www.apastyle.org/ http://www.apastyle.org/  APA style tutorial: “Citation in text” & “Reference list”  http://www.apastyle.org/learn/tutorials/basics- tutorial.aspx http://www.apastyle.org/learn/tutorials/basics- tutorial.aspx  Other examples of APA style:  http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/instruct/guides/citations.html http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/instruct/guides/citations.html  http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/section/2/ http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/section/2/  http://www.westerntc.edu/library/citationstyles.asp http://www.westerntc.edu/library/citationstyles.asp