Sunteți pe pagina 1din 3

Practical Research I

CHAPTER 1

Components of Chapter 1

• Background
• Purpose of the study
• Research questions
• Theoretical framework
• Importance of the study
• Limitations of the study
• Definition of terms
• Organization of the study

INTRODUCTION
1. The first step in writing your research paper is to complete the background of the study.
2. The introduction/ background of the study includes the review of the area being researched, the
current information about the topic being researched and the relevant history of the topic.
3. The purpose of the background of the study is to help you prove the relevance of your study and your
thesis question.
Guidelines in writing the Introduction
1. Describe the problem-situation by considering the global, national and local situation. You can also try
a more narrative approach by establishing the gap in the status quo. This is done by stating an
“Expectation vs Reality” situation in your introduction.
2. The researcher may indicate what is wrong in the present and explain his/her desire to discover ways
of enriching or improving something, thus the study.
3. Justify the existence of the problem by citing data and authoritative sources which may help give body
to your identified gap.
4. The introduction is usually 3 pages long.
5. To facilitate the arrangement of details, you may make use of the deductive approach:
macroperspective to microperspective.
6. At the end of the introduction, the researcher must come up with a summative paragraph which will
help the audience to glean an encapsulated presentation of the introduction. Thus, a clinching
statement is used to relate the background to a research problem.

PURPOSE OF THE STUDY


- Purpose statement
Example: The purpose of this study is to explore how disability was perceived by the special education
teachers and parents/families with children with disabilities and how special education services were
provided in a primary school for children with special needs in east Africa.

- Rationale
Example: Students with learning disabilities plateau at the fourth reading level (cite research). If these students
are not taught explicit reading comprehension strategies, they will score poorly in state-wide assessments,
including the high school exit exam. In states where the students must pass the high school exit exam to receive
a high school diploma, poor reading comprehension skills will negatively affect the ability of students with
learning disabilities to proceed to postsecondary educational settings or obtain employment

- Description
Example: To improve the reading comprehension of high school students with learning disabilities, the
researcher will implement the see story strategy. This strategy teaches the students to use visual
imagery before, during and after they read. Fifteen students with learning disabilities (grades 9-10) will
be taught and will use the strategy in their English language arts class on a daily basis over a six-week
period. The students’ reading comprehension levels will be measured before and after the intervention
using a standardized reading assessment.

- Outcomes/Goals
Example: As a result of the see story strategy, the high school students with learning disabilities are expected to
increase their reading comprehension level. Another goal of the study was to determine whether the students’
attitudes toward reading would improve along with their reading abilities.

RESEARCH QUESTIONS
• A RESEARCH QUESTION IS RELATED TO THE PROBLEM IN A STUDY AND IS THE QUESTION THAT THE RESEARCHER
WISHES TO ANSWER USING HIS/HER STUDY
• GOOD RESEARCH QUESTIONS STEER THE TOPIC AND PROVIDE THE FOCAL POINT OF THE RESEARCH. They too
guide the researcher into deciding as to what data will be collected and how that data should be collected.
• There are two general types of research questions: the researchable (answerable) and the non-researchable.

Sample Questions:

• Q1: How do self-identified “religious” college students disclose their beliefs to non-religious students?
• Q1: Why do you prefer listening to rock music more than other music genres?
• Q1: Could you describe the most important factors in your life?

THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK

• A theoretical framework consists of concepts and, together with their definitions and reference to
relevant scholarly literature, existing theory that is used for your particular study. The theoretical
framework must demonstrate an understanding of theories and concepts that are relevant to the topic
of your research paper and that relate to the broader areas of knowledge being considered.
• The theoretical framework is most often not something readily found within the literature. You must
review course readings and pertinent research studies for theories and analytic models that are relevant
to the research problem you are investigating. The selection of a theory should depend on its
appropriateness, ease of application, and explanatory power (libguides.edu, 2018).

How to write the Theoretical Framework

- First and foremost, you should identify and describe your selected theory or theories. This information
should consist of the author(s) of the theory and details regarding the original study, such as the
population, purpose, and results. Providing this information will help you to highlight why the theory you
have selected is valid for use in your study, and will make it easier for you to demonstrate how the theory
relates to your own study.

- You then need to outline why the theory is relevant to your study and how you will use the information
from it to conduct and evaluate your research and findings. For example, if you conduct a study on
employee engagement and opt to use Maslow’s (1943) Hierarchy of Needs as your theoretical
foundation, discussing the fulfillment of needs as outlined in Maslow’s theory will help you to establish
what his theory is and why it is relevant to your research. Once that is done, you can discuss how the
fulfillment of needs (based on Maslow) relates to motivation in employees and how your study will use
Maslow’s theory to evaluate and address your identified problem.

SIGNIFICANCE/ IMPORTANCE OF THE STUDY


• Essentially, the section on significance of the study provides information to the reader on how the study
will contribute. It must be specifically stated, however, what the study will contribute and who will
benefit from it.
• In writing the significance of the study, you must write an introductory paragraph stating why the
conduct of the study is of great importance. This will give the readers the impression of great urgency in
terms of your research topic.
• The significance of the study contains two things: The beneficiaries and the benefits. Each beneficiary
must occupy one paragraph as the said paragraph will also contain the benefits that they will be receiving
from your study.
• The arrangement of the beneficiaries must be macro to micro (from the biggest institutions down to the
smallest stakeholder unit).

LIMITATIONS OF THE STUDY

• Limitations can be inherent to the research design, data analysis, time and resources or a condition that
was set by the researcher (bui, 204). Keep in mind that all studies have limitations and it is not
automatically detrimental to you as a researcher.
• The best way to deal with the limitations is to be up front about them and to explain how they affect the
results of the study.
• A limitation is a flaw or a weakness in the study that affects the internal validity and the results of the
study.

DEFINITION OF TERMS

• This is the part where the researcher defines the crucial keywords used in the study. Remember that
the use of consistent terms must be employed to avoid confusion.
• In selecting which terms to define, keep in mind these three guidelines:
• First, define the terms that a person outside your field would find difficult to comprehend (jargon,
technical terms, etc)
• Second, define terms which have been “coined” by their users. These refer to familiar terms
which may have been assigned with new meanings because of cultural contexts.
• Third, define all terms which are ambiguous to the readers.

ORGANIZATION OF THE STUDY

• In this section, you are going to describe the content of the individual chapters. It begins with a
paragraph explaining what the organization of the study is, followed by the explanation and
description of every chapter.
• Note: every chapter in the study must be explained in a paragraph (each).

S-ar putea să vă placă și