Research Methods 2

• Credit value: 15 credits at Level 5
• Convenor: Professor Tim Smith
• Prerequisite: Research Methods 1
• Assessment: a 1.5-hour examination (50%) and a 3500-word mini-project report (50%)

The module aims to:

• provide you with a working knowledge of a variety of statistical methods and how to implement them by hand and in SPSS
• allow you to differentiate between statistical techniques and use these techniques for various research designs and research questions
• allow you to understand the theoretical rationale behind different statistical techniques
• introduce qualitative research methods and give you practical experience with them
• allow you to understand how to design, execution, analyse and report a novel experimental project.

Indicative module content

• Advanced experimental methodology and statistics, with special emphasis upon data coding techniques, multivariate analysis, and post hoc and a priori tests related to the analysis of variance
• Qualitative methods
• Multiple regression
• Factor analysis
• Computer-based statistical analysis
• The research process in context: design, analysis and interpretation
• Conduct of experiments
• Data collection, analysis, and report writing

By the end of this module, you should be able to:

• identify an appropriate method of analysis for a range of experiments
• competently use SPSS
• perform analysis of variance involving both within and between-subjects designs, and interpret the results
• perform appropriate planned and post hoc comparisons by computer
• perform simple and multiple regression analyses, and interpret the results
• show familiarity with factor analysis and be able to interpret a simple factor analysis
• understand qualitative methodology
• carry out a piece of research in a small group setting
• prepare a short presentation on a piece of research.