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Acknowledgement
First of all, I would like to express my gratitude to my supervisor, Ms.
Nguyen Thanh Ha, whose consultancy and encouragement were an endless
source of support and an indispensable factor in the success story of this
research.
Besides, I want to take this chance to thank Ms. Nguyen Thi Phuong Hoa
for her respectable reminders about Research Ethics and her valuable reference
materials. Also, I hope to send my best regards to teachers of Fast Track
Program, especially Mr. Dang Ngoc Sinh, Ms. Vu Thi Thanh Van and Ms.
Nguyen Thi Minh Hue, who did create the best conditions for me to pursue my
personal interest.
Last but not least, I want to thank all of my beloveds, without whom I
could not have completed this project. Thank my classmates, namely Pham
Thuy Linh and Nguyen Thanh Thuy, for their timely help and deep sympathy.
Thank my friend, Nguyen Minh, for his knowledgeable suggestions and
inspiring consolation. Thank my family members, for their unconditional care
and love.
ABSTRACT
In the current era of knowledge industry, research is a key factor for any country
to develop sustainably and independently. On realizing this fact, Vietnam has paid
more attention to this activity during the past decade, with special focus on training
researchers in colleges and universities. However, the overall performance of this
activity has not met the regionally and internationally standardized quality. At the same
time, students as insiders are not highly motivated and encounter many difficulties in
the practice of doing research.
For this reason, this research is designed to investigate the context of Student
Research Activity in ULIS, VNU through finding out students’ motivation for doing
research and their perceived difficulties during the process. After carrying out a
multiple-case study on first-time practitioners of student researchers, academic year
2008 – 2009, the researcher found out that the most common motivation for these
subjects was the intrinsic one; furthermore, their most noticeable difficulties include a
lack of research culture, insufficient sources of materials and problems in inter-
personal relationships. Finally, from the suggestions of these students as the main
subjects of this practice, together with the researcher’s study on theories, this research
offers implications to improve Student Research Activity in the future in terms of both
quality and quantity.
i
TABLE OF CONTENT Pages
Acknowledgement i
Abstract ii
Table of content iii
List of tables and figures v
List of abbreviations v
1. Introduction 1
1.1. Statement of the problem and the rationale for the study 1
1.2. Aims of the study and research questions 3
1.3. Scope of the study 3
1.4. Methodology 4
1.5. Overview of the paper 4
2. Literature Review 5
2.1. Definitions of the terms 5
2.1.1. Research 5
2.1.2. Undergraduate research 6
2.1.3. Basic steps of doing a research project 7
2.2. Benefits of and requirements for student research 8
2.2.1. Benefits of student research activity 8
2.2.2. Requirements for student research activity 11
2.3. Learner motivation 12
2.3.1. Definition of motivation 12
2.3.2. Types of motivation 12
2.4. Difficulties in Student research activity 14
2.4.1. Difficulties recorded on worldwide universities 14
2.4.2. Difficulties recorded in Vietnam’s context 15
3. Methodology 18
3.1. Research design 18
3.2. Research instruments 19
3.3. Settings 20
3.4. Sampling 22
3.5. Procedures 24
3.5.1. Data collection 25
3.5.2. Data analysis 26
ii
Both students
4.1.1.4. Self-assessment 39
4.1.1.5. Suggestions for the Student Research Activity at ULIS, 42
VNU
4.1.2. Case 2: An individual researcher, Student C 44
4.1.2.1. Basic information 44
4.1.2.2. Motivation 45
4.1.2.3. Difficulties 47
4.1.2.4. Self-assessment 50
4.1.2.5. The subject’s suggestions for the Student Research 52
Activity in ULIS, VNU
5. Conclusion 54
5.1. Summary of findings 54
5.2. Implications 55
5.2.1. Implications for higher motivation 55
5.2.2. Implications for fewer difficulties 56
5.3. Limitations of the study 60
5.4. Suggestions for further studies 61
REFERENCE 62
APPENDICES 64
iii
LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS
iv
CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION
1
http://opa.yale.edu/president/message.aspx?id=91
1
communication technology, when knowledge is the irreplaceable key to join
the global evolution.
2
http://mingo.info-science.uiowa.edu/~stevens/critped/definitions.htm
2
hoped to be achieved from this project, “Motivation, difficulties and self-
assessment of first time practitioners in Student Research Activity: a
multiple case study on sophomores of English Department, ULIS,
VNU”.
3
experience prior to this activity, and they worked in groups rather than
individually.
1.4. Methodology
4
CHAPTER II: LITERATURE REVIEW
For the convenience of clarity, the key terms used in the current study
will be defined as follows.
2.1.1. Research
5
2.1.2. Undergraduate Research
6
and major reform in contemporary American undergraduate education and
scholarship’.
7
Issaac and Michael (1995, as cited in Nguyen Thi Thuy Minh et al.,
2008) have listed 10 steps in planning and conducting research, as the
following:
8
knowledge economy, and that university-based research is the most effective
driver of scientific discovery and of economically relevant new technologies
(Levin, 20103). Therefore, undergraduate research can be recognized as the
stepping stone activity in a holistic process of building a country’s research
capacity.
The National Student Research Center [NSRC] has clearly stated the
objectives of this activity in their instructional approach, which are
comprised and rearranged by the researcher in the following summary:
3
http://opa.yale.edu/president/message.aspx?id=91 last retrieved Feb 5th
9
6. Students can both utilize scientific methods throughout
ongoing scientific research projects and explore concepts, topics, issues,
themes and problems in the school year.
10
f. Academic writing skills in order for scientific research
papers and abstracts to become grammatically correct, spelling-
mistake free, and scientifically sound.
11
In general, undergraduate researchers have more freedom in choosing
their topic of interest, without considering a range of controlling factors as
their postgraduate counterparts.
2. 3. Learner Motivation
12
In general, intrinsic motivation refers to the fact of doing an activity
for itself, and deriving the pleasure and satisfaction from participation (Deci,
1975; Deci & Rian, 1985). This type of motivation ‘stems from the innate
psychological needs of competence and self-determination’ (p. 4).
13
IM to experience Engage in an Identification Behavior
stimulation activity to becomes valued
experience and judged as
stimulating important for the
sensations individual,
(sensory, aesthetic, especially
fun, exciting perceived as
experience) chosen by
oneself.
(Adapted and compiled from Vallerand, Pelletier, Blais, Brière, Senécal &
Vallières, 1992)
Difficulties with other life demands and crises: these are obstacles
that do not allow students enough time to develop the research.
14
Limited access to research subjects, contacts and contexts: often
this seems guaranteed at the outset of the work, but situations change.
Sometimes the people, information, scenarios, and so on, disappear, or
students are no longer in a situation to access them.
15
Throughout his report about Research Activity in Sociology in the
year 2001, Bui The Cuong pinpointed the dilematic situation when an
increased number of articles, seminars and sociology construction was
hardly in direct ratio with their quality and professionalism. Another
systematic intricacy was that a majority of social researchers were ‘lazy
readers, doing plain experiments while showing indifference to literature,
easily satisfied with finishing few steps in the research process, turning
themselves into workmen of questionnaires and surveys, lacking
awareness and skills of doing team work’ (Bui The Cuong, pp. 227)
16
There has not been any systematic program either for compulsory
or voluntary involvement of students (as well as lecturers) in doing research.
17
CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY
Case studies are used primarily when researchers wish to obtain an in-
depth understanding of a relatively small number of individuals, problems,
or situations (Patton, 1990). Weick (1979) emphasized that this method is
applied to ensure the three primary goals of research: generality, accuracy,
and simplicity – in other words, the understandability of the results. While a
broad study may produce results that can be applied at a general level to a
large number of organizations, the results are unlikely to present an accurate
description of any one organization.
18
of a preliminary theory that describes the phenomena (Eisenhardt, 1989).
From then on, readers can make generalizations based on their own situation
and make possible applications as well as transference. Besides, this would
be a rich contextualization for such a new and complex issue as the one
being discussed. Another important factor is that multiple – case study
would cast light on the perspective of the insiders, also known as the ‘emic
perspective’ (Mackey & Gass, 2005), one of the researcher’s primary
concerns.
For all these reasons, the main method being used in this study will be
qualitative multiple-case study. It is hoped that this attempt will contribute
valuable findings to the database of research resources in the long term use.
19
This interview was designed in form of a semi-structure one, with a
flexible framework of general questions, allowing the researcher to elaborate
on specific points brought up by the interviewees (Wikipedia, 2009). It
should also be mentioned that the researcher had grouped the questions into
correlating aspects in such a manner that these could be expressed in
different ways for different participants, as suggested by Lindlof & Taylor
(2002, cited in Wikipedia, 2009). All the response from interviewees would
be recorded and transcribed to serve the purpose of meticulous and accurate
analysis.
3.3. Setting
For this reason, Student Research Activity is held annually for all
interested contemporary students of ULIS, VNU. Participation is not
confined by the candidates’ expertise; therefore a majority of student
researchers would take part without official fulfillment of any research
methodology course.
Accompanied with these criteria are the rights that those who do
research can benefit from, which are publicly known to all students:
20
research individually. In case of doing in group, each
member will have additional points in their final paper.
2. Student researchers can increase their accumulated scores
for Obeying regulations according to the university’s
policy.
3. Student researchers are introduced to Research
Methodology and academic writing skill, get ready for the
Graduation Thesis.
4. About financial supports:
a. Each winning project at the level of Course Group
is given VND 50,000
b. Each project being promoted to the level of
Department is given VND 100,000
c. Excellent projects at the level of Department
receive extra supports as below:
First Prize: VND 200,000
Second Prize: VND 150,000
Third Prize: VND 100,000
5. 15 projects being promoted to the level of University is
given VND 100,000
(School’s policy for students doing research, academic year
2008 – 2009, ULIS, VNU)
21
minutes in their mother tongue, Vietnamese, for the sake of natural and
convenient expressions. Before this, the informants were guaranteed that
their answers would be treated with the strictest confidence and they were
entitled to be informed about the findings of this research.
3.4. Sampling
First, they are now third year students. That means in the time of
doing research, they were second-year students and were finishing three
semesters at university. The subjects they had covered included Marxist –
Leninist Philosophy, Political Socio Statistics, Scientific Socialism,
Introduction to Linguistics, Basic Vietnamese Culture, General Psychology,
Basic Informatics, General Geography, Music, apart from the four linguistic
skills of English, namely Speaking, Reading, Listening and Writing. As can
be seen, these subjects could widen students’ background knowledge on a
22
large scale, though would not systematically provide needed skills for doing
research.
Fourth, the two cases varied in many aspects from each other’s,
which promised to contribute rich and diverse data. The students were from
different classes and worked in different forms, one in group and the other
individually.
Last but not least, these students were voluntary to take part in the
research and showed commitment in providing reliable as well as detailed
information about the targeted issues raised by the researcher.
23
studying number training
English of
present
academic
year
Student 21 >11 3rd Fast Track University lecturer
A
Student 21 13 3rd Fast Track Media related
B
Student 32 9 3rd Main Stream Teacher
C
3.5. Procedures
Based on the list of student researchers from the previous year, the
researcher found out those who matched the generically described features
of participants and contacted them.
24
The questionnaire was designed to find out specific information about
the subjects and orient them towards the main issues in discussion.
Step 4: Interview and record all the interviews with the participants.
25
Information provided by the interviewees was grouped into different
categories according to different issues and was reported in a systematic
order as drawn out by the research questions.
26
CHAPTER 4: RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS
Both of them have studied English for more than ten years, with
Student B specifying the number of 13 years in this language. On being
asked, they both claimed to be very confident with their English competence
and thought it was adequate to do research.
27
The career orientations of these students were quite different. While
Student A would continue her chosen field of English Language Teaching
(ELT), student B did not consider teaching as a high possibility, and
intended to go on with Journalism instead. As a result, Student A thought
that she would have to do research quite often in the future career, i.e. to be a
lecturer at university; whereas her partner, Student B thought that she
“would not have anything to do with research at all”, as a news reporter or
journalist.
The subjects originally chose to cooperate with each other for some
reasons. First, they had been partners in class’s assignments and projects for
nearly two years, having got used to each other’s style and characters, so
they thought they were capable of cooperating in “something hard and big”,
said student A. Second, as reasoned by Student B, she believed in her
partner’s knowledge and responsibility, which ensured her of a successful
product. Third, they both shared an interest about one problem area, and
determined to look deeper into that topic “with a view to improving or
suggesting some change for later courses of students”.
Last academic year was the first time these two students implemented
a research project. Student A said that she did not study any research
handbook; she just read the thesis of juniors from previous years or directly
emailed to ask them some questions and went on with her topic. Meanwhile,
student B did study some methodology materials provided by her supervisor,
“but I didn’t read them all, just enough to know the most important
concepts”.
28
None of them regularly attended the research workshops held by
teachers of the Department, with Student A attending one, and Student B
none, per the total number of five. Student A said that the time schedule for
such events were “too changeable”, and she could not manage to change
hers accordingly in order not to miss them. “That is not to mention they were
timed to take place too far away from each other, for example one about
Literature Review began first, but one about Methodology came one month
later – if we had just waited to attend all of these before doing, we would
never have met the deadline of submitting our research”, expressed Student
A about her confusion. As explained by Student B, she did not find these
workshops helpful, and she could read by herself all the information
presented.
4.1.1.2. Motivation
Apart from that, Student A emphasized that she did not want to “give
up easily” on doing a research with an excuse of time limitation “like what I
29
did when I was a first year student”. She said that in the beginning year at
university, she believed in the “rumors among students that doing research
was very complicated and difficult, as well as time-consuming”, therefore
she did not continue her topic, which she felt “bitterly regretful” soon later.
Then Student A also had an intrinsic motivation towards accomplishment,
attempting to finish what she thought should have been done in the past.
30
a graduation thesis. “I want to do it for the matter of liking research itself”,
said her.
4.1.1.3. Difficulties
Student A
31
most serious problem was that they did not know where to get start. “On
seeing our juniors delivering their questionnaires everywhere, we came up
with a short-sighted thought that we also need to make a list of questions
and give it to students around the department, without basing on any
theoretical foundation.” However, she added, their supervisor did not agree
with distributing the papers, asking them to review the literature before
doing anything else - and that was when another matter occurred: “We
turned out to be very confused, as to not knowing what ‘Literature Review’
is all about”, told Student A. So in general, she claimed that not
understanding the logic order of each basic step in doing research made
them come into a “hard time”. Furthermore, she confessed that “we hadn’t
known about research methodology before hand, and we carried out with
whatever knowledge we had, mostly through trial and error.” As can be
seen, they were unsure about their method, and could neither control the
accuracy of the information being given. “With hindsight, I now believe that
a lot of questionnaires we gathered back contained fallacies”, said student A
when she mentioned their data collection process.
32
who we could talk to and meet regularly, not someone experienced, with
high reputation but often get too busy with big projects and programs”. It
turned out that they did not have the chance they had expected, and resorted
to the “scattered help” of other teachers or senior students – anyone they
could come to, for each matter they came across.
When being asked about the cooperation between two members in the
group, Student A seemed quite contented. “It was generally very good”. She
thought that the work was divided quite equally, when she “pioneered in
studying the literature review” and later, they two sit together, discussing the
33
value of each idea being accumulated. Student A did mention a “small
quarrel”, when she disagreed with her partner’s expressions for the sake of
academic writing. “But we soon overcame, and it didn’t matter to the whole
process” – said Student A, to strengthen her claim that she had no problem
in cooperating with her partner.
Student B
The first difficulty that struck on Student B was that she could not
find good materials to build up the Literature Review. Two main sources of
reference for them could not prove usefulness. While books of the targeted
topic were not available in library, the resources online were either
unauthentic or inaccessible because they required users to have a bank
account. Without adequate theory, she did not know how to choose a good
method for the current research, and was afraid that their research would
come into a standstill.
Many things followed this first hindrance, and Student B said that
sometimes she suffered from stress and felt discouraged to carry on, when it
casted light on her that their instrument was not efficient to produce
meaningful outcomes, moreover, they had to reluctantly accept the
questionnaire that they gathered although not every informant was
cooperative in answering responsibly and critically. “It’s not easy to
continue doing something that you already know brings few contributions
and bears little meaningfulness.”
34
not being able to make her ideas understood by her partner. At the same
time, she found it hard to resist her partner’s suggestion, which she
considered “irrelevant and unnecessary for the topic”. “Unlike working on
one’s own”, she clarified, “an idea can’t just be omitted without objection,
and I simply failed to persuade my partner into doing that”.
Then she made an extra point, emphasizing that “the give-in thing is
just one part of the problem”. The other part, according to her, was the
division of work within the group. Sometimes she felt that she had to do
more work, although the work could not be “tangibly judged as unequal”.
As admitted by Student B, each of them got involved too deeply in every
single step and could not feel “peaceful” if leaving any part of such “an
important project” to the other without “closely checking”. Consequently,
they sit together doing every part – “we read, discussed over each point;
then one watched while the other typed into the computer”. As a “fast
typist”, Student B was in charge of formatting the final project, which was
considered by her as a trivial but meticulous and stressful mission. “And
35
once your partner does not even recognize that, blaming you for one thing
or another, you know, it’d make you ready to blow up”. A quarrel between
them before the submission date, when they did not agree with each other
over the writing style of the research, was the last straw. On judging the
seriousness of this incident, student B said: “At that time all the work had
been finished, so the quarrel did not affect the final result, but it did affect
my emotion a lot. The most dominant feeling was that of unfair, or
imbalance, you know…”
36
water, so even a single rain drop would already heighten my spirit”, she
confided.
Both students
All things considered, it can be seen that two students differed in their
perceived difficulties, as well as the extent to which they were affected by
such. In the following figures, the researcher is going to visualize these
subjects’ difficulties in correlation with each other (the order of importance
follows the downward trend of the pyramids).
37
Figure 3: Student A’s perceived difficulties
38
4.1.1.4. Self-assessment
Student A claimed that she “couldn’t do better”, even if she had been
allotted some extra time, and she was contented with the efforts put into
their research, giving a mark of 8.5 on the scale of 10. She even shared her
own feeling that “from the moment we handed in that project, we had
already born in mind it could never make way to the final round”, and that
“on seeing what had turned out, I suppose the judges must have
overestimated that full-of-mistakes-project”. However, she clearly called the
researcher’s attention to a thought about other peers’ researches: “anyway,
it’s not too bad in comparison with some other researches I knew”. Despite
some dissatisfaction raised by other students about other projects, she
strongly suggested that “projects should be grouped into suitable categories
before being compared with each other, for example I don’t want to put one
applied research and one basic research on the same scale, then start up
wonderings about each one’s method”. On saying that, she still mentioned a
basic research project that “is some strange combination and can’t be
considered secondary based on what I’ve read about types of research”.
39
she pointed out a contradiction lying in the fact that the “laborious efforts”
made by her partner and her did not necessarily prove the quality or
contribution of that product. “The more I read, the more I became aware of
our weakness in methodology, so it appeared clear to me that our research
carried not much applicability into the current context of our university. It’s
a sad feeling to know that you did not ‘chip in’ anything new despite a long
time seeking for its traces”. For all these reasons, Student B said that she had
to “reluctantly accept” the “honorable” second prize award, and marked a
7.5 on the ladder of 10 for her satisfaction.
Like her partner, Student B also felt that she had gained valuable
experience about research methodology; at the same time, she got a deeper
understanding about the topic of her research. Yet, she said that “I don’t
40
think it helps much with the academic writing style, because research
writing contains a lot of terminology, which mean I can’t apply that
vocabulary into writing for other purposes.” Moreover, Student B realized
that her computer skills in formatting a Microsoft Word document had been
improved, and she had gather “quite a few tricks” in analyzing and
visualizing the data productively and accurately.
On being interviewed about what they had gained for their personality
in particular, Student A emphasized the need to rely more on one’s own
while Student B’s opinions revolved around the matter of handling
relationships between people.
41
expected a bit more from my partner, in completing both content and format
of the research”, and except for the conflict towards the end of the process,
she did receive a lot of support from her partner. “Partners are all different
from person to person, you know, so I don’t think I can draw any
‘partnership lesson’ for other time in the future – just experience it, though”.
After that, she shared a reason for not going on another research with her
partner: “it’s mainly because of my personality, i.e. not feeling comfortable
with doing something similar with someone familiar for too long. I want
some change, trying other activities that make me enjoy ‘with all my heart
and soul’, and with less efforts”.
42
door after 8 a.m. without any notice about its closing reasons.” – shared
student A about a “typical story”.
43
motivated to take part in such activity, no matter how widely it is spread,
especially when the prizes couldn’t even cover their printing expenses”.
For her particular situation, Student C has been fixed in her career
orientation, which is to work as a teacher. She also plans to become a
lecturer at university in the long run, which means her work involves a lot of
research activity. In the past, she did make annual proposals for her
secondary school about the ways to improve study activities for children of
minority groups. However, she had not had any firsthand experience with
doing student research at ULIS, VNU.
Student C said that she had not been taught anything about doing
research during the years at college or even when she had entered ULIS,
44
VNU. She self-studied the methods and combined with her experiences of
teaching at secondary school. Student C did not attend any workshop for
student researcher “because of family business”, but she did receive and
study the research guides from such meetings. Her supervisor was the only
source of her consultancy, whenever she had queries about doing research.
4.1.2.2. Motivation
The first and foremost reason for Student C to choose this topic was
her personal interest. “I’m myself a married student with some experience of
my own, and my close friend got married to a British husband. So I wanted
to make comparisons between the two, simply because I like the marriage
topic”. Secondly, at that time she was having a course of General
Geography, which introduced the brief information about the US and the
UK, therefore she came across new knowledge that she found interesting
and became curious in “having a closer look at it”. As can be seen, her most
dominant motivation was an intrinsic motivation to know.
45
she did not have the partner’s motivation that Student A and Student B
shared for doing a research.
46
Figure 5: Levels of motivation from acknowledged Students’ rights in doing research
As can be seen, Student C had only one intrinsic motivation that drove
her into doing research. Extrinsic factors had little or no effect on her
decision and procedure of doing research.
4.1.2.3. Difficulties
Different from what the researcher has found out and presented in the
Literature Review, which listed many typical hindrances for an individual
researcher, Student C experienced almost no stressful moments during her
project.
47
to-face interviews, in order to ask their opinions about the reasons for the
differences between two cultures of Vietnam and Britain”. That was the only
difficulty regarding professional aspects of doing research mentioned by this
subject.
48
Generally, Student C had only one difficulty in common with Student
A and Student B. What seemed to bother the other two did not affect her
performance, as far as she could perceive it. Clearly illustrated in the chart
below is the difference between the difficulties shared by Student A and
Student B in case 1 and those of Student C in case 2, without mentioning
Limited Time Budget - the only common difficulty between two cases and
the factors are arranged in the order of decrease in seriousness.
49
4.1.2.4. Self-assessment
Student C did not compare her research with others, as she thought
that there was no principle for comparing between hers, i.e. a basic research,
with other students’, i.e. applied linguistic ones. However, she showed a
suspicion towards the applicability of such projects. “I’ve read some applied
research like that in the library, but find not everything they say is true.”
What’s more, she remarked that “such theory can’t help much if piled up in
the library after each season of research activity”, and questioned: “Why
don’t they apply it to improve our school’s context? It makes little sense to
implicate new things that would never be tested or come into effect”. In
general, therefore, she was content with doing basic research to enlarge her
common knowledge.
50
research revealed some weaknesses and problematic misconceptions about
research tools and research methodology.
On concerning her plan after doing that research, Student C said that
she did not determine to carry out another project in the following year,
because “I only continue once I’ve found a topic interesting enough.
Although my future career requires such thing about [research]
methodology, I’m quite bored with it so I don’t want to try hard right from
now on”. Also, she said she would prefer to work in group with someone
else, so that they could gather more ideas; moreover, other tasks, including
the manual ones, “for example you go do interviews and I give out the
questionnaires”, would be better shared among members. These can be
regarded as her practical experience in taking part in the research activity.
51
Figure 7: Perceived gaining as reported in case 1 versus case 2
52
through too many books “just in order to find out a piece of information
then put into the correct citation”. The biggest motivation that many of her
classmates found “attractive”, i.e. replacing the mark at the Final
Examination, was still not compatible to the hardships that they were
expected to overcome before getting it.
53
CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION
Firstly, the study pinpoints the fact that students’ motivation for doing
research is mostly intrinsic. Meanwhile, the extrinsic factors, especially the
benefits offered by school’s administration were not regarded as a
remarkable source of motivation.
Secondly, firsthand practitioners encountered many difficulties during the
process of research. In the context of ULIS, VNU, these difficulties belong
to the following categories:
Inadequate equipment of knowledge about basic steps
Inadequate support services and provision of equipment
Limited access to research subjects, contacts and contexts
Personality factors
Professional factors
Organizational factors
Thirdly, from the perspective of the insiders, the research puts forwards
some implications with a purpose of improving motivation for the majority
of student to do research in the future and suggesting solutions for the
difficulties likely to hinder students’ progress.
5.2. Implications
The later parts of the interviews with three subjects have provided a
variety of potentially beneficial suggestions from the angle of the insiders.
Together with her own study and analysis, the researcher hopes to
54
summarize all possible implications into the following categories, i.e.
implications for higher motivation and implications for fewer difficulties in
the Student Research Activity.
55
5.2.2. Implications for fewer difficulties during students’ doing
research
Professionally
56
Personally
57
- to be friendly, open and supportive
- to be constructively critical
- To know how to ask open questions, how to draw out ideas and
problems and how to elicit information, even if the student find
communication difficult
Last but not least, students need to ensure that they have clear
working relations with their supervisor, and should not intrude on their
personal lives. Moreover, they should manage to keep the balance between
friendship and a professional working relationship so that neither side “relax
too much and forget to concentrate on the timing and management of each
aspect of the research” (Wisker, 2004).
58
All things considered, a combination of sound research practices and
clear relationships with supervisor would result in autonomy, negotiation
and the development of shared responsibilities.
“Being able to manage a variety of roles and tasks at any one time is a
feat of flexibility and diversity” (Wisker, 2004, p. 69).
There are some ways to manage time effectively and reduce the stress
from research, according to Wisker. Here are the most outstanding steps:
- Negotiate with people at work place and explain the demands of your
research without bothering them or requesting special privileges
- Try and gain support of family members and friends – explain the
demands and negotiate the pressure and support needed
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- Do not spend too much time on research and forget about friends or
alienate with family. Researchers should balance between the
pleasures and demands rather than putting off social activities and
domestic responsibilities
(Wisker, 2004, p.71)
60
5.4. Suggestions for further studies
61
REFERENCE
Buffalo State. (n.d.). About Undergraduate Research. Retrieved 10 1, 2009, from About
Undergraduate research: http://www.buffalostate.edu/undergraduateresearch/x457.xml
ERC. (2008). Students' Needs in Doing Research. Retrieved 10 27, 2009, from
http://www.saga.vn/Giangduong/Phuongphapluankhoahoc/11653.saga
Eisenhardt, Kathleen M. (1989). Building Theories from case study research. Academy of
Management Review, Oct 1989
Fidel, R. (1984). The case study method: A case study. Library and Information Science
Research
Florian H. Müller & Johann Louw. (2004, 5 20). Conditions of university students’ motivation
and study interest. Retrieved 12 3, 2009, from Education online:
http://www.leeds.ac.uk/educol/documents/00003572.htm
Gardner, R. a. (1972). Attitudes and Motivation in Second Language Learning. Newbury House.
Harvard Kennedy School (2009). Vietnam Higher Education: Crisis and Response. Retrieved
from www.viet.net/.../2009.../014924.html
Marshall, C., & Rossman, G. B. (1999). Designing qualitative research (3rd ed.). Thousand
Oaks, CA: Sage.
Nguyen Thi Phuong Hoa (2001). Một vài suy nghĩ nhỏ về vấn đề tổ chức nghiên cứu khoa học ở
nhà trường đại học. Retrieved from http://www.phuonghoa.edu.vn/
Nguyen Van Van (2003). Mấy suy nghĩ về hoạt động nghiên cứu khoa học của
sinh viên Trường ĐH Luật TP HCM. Tạp chí khoa học pháp luật , 14.
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National Conference on Undergraduate Research. Undergraduate research. Retrieved 10 2009,
from http://www.ncur.org/ugresearch.htm
Patton, M. Q. (1990). Qualitative evaluation and research methods (2nd ed.). Newbury Park,
CA: Sage.
The National Academies Press (2003). Fostering Highschool Students' Motivation to Learn.
National Academies of Science.
Vietnam National University, University of Social Science & Humanity (2001). Kỉ yếu Hội nghị
các nhà khoa học trẻ ĐHQGHN lần thứ 2, 12.2002, p. 362-365
Vu Cao Dam (2008). Phương pháp luận nghiên cứu khoa học. Hà Nội: Nhà xuất bản Thế Giới.
Vu The Dung (2005). Nghiên cứu khoa học trong sinh viên - cách tiếp cận mới. Tuoi Tre Chu
Nhat , 32.
Weick, K. E. (1979). The social psychology of organizing (2nd ed.). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Wenzel, T. (2003). Definition of Undergraduate Research. Retrieved October 15, 2009, from
Bates College: http://www.bates.edu
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APPENDIX 1: FRAMEWORK FOR EVALUATING GRADUATION THESIS
Tiêu chí, thang điểm đánh giá NỘI DUNG khóa luận:
1. Tính cấp thiết của đề tài: Đề tài luận văn xuất phát từ 1 điểm
nhu cầu thực tế của giảng dạy và nghiên cứu
3. Sự phù hợp giữa tên đề tài, mục đích nghiên cứu và 1 điểm
nội dung khóa luận
4. Tính hợp lý và độ tin cậy của phương pháp nghiên 1.5 điểm
cứu
a. Giá trị khoa học: tổng hợp và phân tích 1.5 điểm
có đánh giá, phê phán tài liệu tham khảo có liên
quan và phù hợp với nhiệm vụ của đề tài
64
APPENDIX 2: QUESTIONNAIRE FOR STUDENT RESEARCHERS (2008 –
2009)
STUDENT RESEARCH
I am Vu Bao Chau from E1-K41, ULIS, VNU. I would like to ask you some information
so that some of you can help me further in my research about Motivation, difficulties and Self-
assessment of first-time practitioner students in doing research. Please give your answers
sincerely because it will determine the success of my study. Thank you very much for your help.
1. What major are you in now? ……………………………………………………….
4. Was it the first time you did research last year? Yes/ No (please circle)
5. Did you work alone with your research? Yes/ No (please circle)
6. Were you taught anything about doing research? Yes/ No (please circle)
7. Did you take part in the Workshops for student researchers? Yes/ No (please circle)
8. Did you study research guides before starting? Yes/ No (please circle)
9. Did you consult anyone about doing research? Yes/ No (please circle)
11. Did you have difficulties with doing research? Yes/ No (please circle)
1 2 3 4 5
Little Motivated Highly
motivated motivated
13. Circle the number that best describes the number of difficulties you had when doing
last year’s research
1 2 3 4 5
Few Many A lot
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Are you willing to participate in my study? Yes/ No (please circle)
Firstly, if you say Yes, it will be a big favor and I would really appreciate.
Secondly, it is a very good chance for you to reflect on your own performance when
you take part in the research activity. Particularly, your help in this study contributes
substantially to people’s understanding of first-time practitioners’ opinions and
feelings about this practice; besides, you would have a chance to raise your voice for
your own better condition in the future.
If yes, please let me know some of your personal information so that I can contact
you later.
Your name:
Class: Phone number: Email:
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APPENDIX 3: FRAMEWORK OF INTERVIEW QUESTIONS FOR
PARTICIPANTS
INTERVIEW QUESTIONS
Part I: Research question 1: “What was the subjects’ motivation in doing their
1st research?”
1. Student researchers can replace the score of their research with the
score in FINAL EXAMINATION of one subject among the four linguistic
skills (Speaking, Listening, Reading or Writing), on the condition that
they do the research individually. In case of doing in group, each member
will have additional points in their final paper.
2. Student researchers can increase their accumulated scores for
Obeying regulations according to the university’s policy.
3. Student researchers are introduced to Research Methodology and
academic writing skill, get ready for the Graduation Thesis.
4. About financial supports:
1. Each winning project at the level of Course Group is given
VND 50,000
2. Each project being promoted to the level of Department is
given VND 100,000
3. Excellent projects at the level of Department receive extra
supports as below:
67
5. 15 projects being promoted to the level of University is given VND
100,000
2) Is there any other factor/ reason that encouraged you to do research? Please
specify
1) Which steps of doing a research did you have the most difficulties?
D. Formulate research questions and define the basic concepts and variables
Part III – Research question 3: “What is their self-assessment after all the
process?”
2) Were you happy with your efforts put into the research?
4) (For group) Did your group plan to cooperate for another time? If no, why?
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Part IV – Research question 4: “What is the subjects’ opinions about the
present activity of Student Research?”
What is your opinion about the research activity in the context of ULIS, VNU?
[…]
Interviewer (I): Did you gain anything after doing research?
Interviewee (C): when I had to read many books about cultures, it improved my
knowledge about that topic, then I learnt the writing styles about such cultural topics.
I: Was the effect clearly seen?
C: Well, just a higher result for Academic Writing, no big deal.
I: Is that all?
C: Let’s see. About computer skills? – I knew before then already! And about such
things as APA, I had read all about it before doing research, as it was compulsory, right?
I: Well, yeah. So in one word, what was the best thing you’ve gained?
C: Vocabulary and background knowledge about cultural topics.
I: One last question, what is your opinion about the present Student Research
Activity at our university?
C: I think that such projects had better be applied into the context; otherwise piling
them up in the library would be really useless and wasteful.
69
I: From your own perspective, do you think it’s being actively welcomed by many
students?
C: it’s “advertised” quite often by the Student Union, however, as a monitor who
usually attends their meetings, I see that they “force” each class to submit at least one or
two projects; otherwise no one would do. For a simple example, at the time I did research
last year, hardly anyone was involved – only E1, E20 and only me from Main Stream.
I: Why do you think so few students took part?
C: I think they were not motivated and interested
I: Why not?
C: Although it was said that there were very big awards, many rewarding points for
Obeying Regulations, which was the most impressive, and I myself had to go persuading
them about all those things, I even promised not to make them do any class’s mission,
they still didn’t do.
I: What were their reasons?
C: They said that their writing skill was bad; and they simply needed to improve
their linguistic skills. Doing research means reading a lot of books to find suitable ideas
and put into correct quotations, so they couldn’t manage to do all such laborious task.
I: Do you have any suggestion for the betterment of this activity?
C: I think about the money or score awards, the more the better, especially for
students. The point is, whether students are enthusiastic to take part.
I: If allowed, what would you propose to the university to have products with better
quality?
C: If so, then the administrators themselves should only mark and store those with
high applicability. For example, when coming there I saw countless books of research,
how to improve this, how to solve that, blah blah, but I think there’s nothing being
applied into our context until now. The problems are still there. Books keep piling up,
nothing more. As I see it, that’s called “pseudo-science in the name of Science”. Then the
authors of such products still get mark 9, mark 10 and big applauses, no big deal.
Agree? If you read a lot and become familiar, you would find many things seemingly
sound but in fact are really dubious about validity and reliability or such. Isn’t it a kinda
“pseudo-science”?
I: Well, how about your research? How do you judge its practicability?
C: It’s another story, then. Mine was done just to find out about an issue, not to
apply into the practice of anything…
I: In short, the research activity should be done with practical purposes, isn’t it?
70
C: Exactly!
[…]
71