Artifact Reflection-Pillar 3 The third pillar of Communication at Carroll University has to showcase a students work that shows the

ability to conduct systematic inquiry skillfully. To fulfill this requirement, I selected a research paper that I wrote for the class COM150-Research Methodology. This paper is one that I am most proud of during my experience at Carroll, and I feel that the systematic and detailed contents of the paper show how systemic inquiry was captured during our experiment and the results that accompanied it. Research Methodology was a class where the main objective was learning about the research process used in the social sciences. Types of research, the difference between qualitative and quantitative research and citing research through APA style were just some of the main topics covered in the course. I took this class during the fall semester of my sophomore year. This class was essential to succeeding in the Communication department at Carroll because research is used in almost every class and its important to know how to accurately and professionally engage in research methods and reports. This experiment has shown that I met the departments requirement for pillar three because the step by step project to achieve the final result showed the capability of conducting systematic inquiry skillfully. This was done just by the nature of our project: we researched the topic of music and study habits, conducted an experiment, created a survey and examined the results. This process follows the idea of acquiring information systematically which is the requirement for the third pillar. It did require a certain amount of skill, as Audrey and I had to make intelligent decisions as to what type of research methods would be best applicable to our research question. The overall compilation of our research, experiment, findings and discussion are in a systematic order that is approved and used in the social sciences.

If I were to do this paper right now I would make sure to choose only one method to execute during the study. Doing multiple studies gives you an overwhelming amount of results to look at and compare to the literature. It really could have skewed the results of the study and I feel like it could have been more accurate with just one study. I would also devote more time to researching the topic for the literature review. You can never have too much of a basis in your subject and its important to make sure that your sources are scholarly and reliable-otherwise your study may not be easier. These are mistakes that I have taken with me and have considered when engaging in my current research project for Communication Capstone. I have engaged the skills from this paper in every class that Ive had since. Almost every paper that I have written in college has required APA citation style and this paper was done in that style and much time was devoted to learning it during this experiment. I have also applied the research skills to my current project for Capstone. I remembered the resources in the Learning Commons that I used for help in the initial experiment and was able to return to these resources for my current research project. I also have applied the research methods project on other papers that required extensive research, as the research process is essential for succeeding in communication. I will use these skills in the future for research that may need to be done on the job or in graduate school. Research always has to be used to back up your claim and reinforce your findings from experiments and questions. Being a solid researcher always allows you to find the answers (or at least have an idea where to start.) Understanding proper and legal research ramifications can help you become more successful on the job, in your personal life and can ensure that you are engaging in the correct and ethical form of research.