Overview
Overview of Assignment
In this part of the semester project, you will be working to design the study you would use to answer your research question. This study can be an observational study or an experiment; which one is best will depend on your research question. If you aren't sure which one is best for your research question, please reach out to your instructor for guidance.
Remember you are designing the study but will NOT be collecting data/conducting the study as we don't have enough time to go through the IRB process, collect data, and analyze the data in one semester (I wish we did!)
Assignment Details
For this part of the semester project, you need to determine specific details of your observational study or experiment (more details of what you should include are provided later in this assignment description) and write a paper (2-5 pages) describing the details.
To understand what information to include in the study, it may help to review the blank IRB application and consent form below along with the questions presented later based on the type of study you choose to do. Please note that you do not have to fill out our create these forms as part of your project. The forms are just for reference so you understand what would be required if you did decide to conduct your study!
- Blank IRB Application formDownload Blank IRB Application form
- Sample Completed IRB ApplicationDownload Sample Completed IRB Application
- Example Consent FormDownload Example Consent Form
If you are doing an observational study, the details of your study should include the following information:
- What is the population of interest?
- How many individuals or objects will be in the study?
- How will the individuals or objects in the study be selected? What type of sampling will you use?
- What are the potential sources of bias and will they have an impact on your results?
- What specific data/information will be collected from each participant in the study?
- How you will collect the data/information?
- If you are using a survey, you should include:
- A copy of all survey questions you plan to ask
- How will participants enter their answer to each question? (fill in a number, write a short word answer, multiple choice, check box, etc.)
- For any questions that will be multiple choice or check box, what options will you give participants as possible responses?
- How will you administer the survey? (online through a site like Google Forms, on paper, in person, etc.)
- What are some potential confounding variables to your questions or study overall?
- What statistics will you be able to calculate based on the data you plan to collect?
- What data do you plan to display visually and how will you present your final data in visual form? (histogram, box plot, pie chart, line graph, dot plot, frequency table, etc.)
- Will you be able to answer your research question at the end of the study?
If you are doing an experiment, the details of your experiment should include the answers to the following questions:
- What is the population of interest?
- How many individuals or objects will be in the study?
- How will the individuals or objects in the study be selected? What type of sampling will you use?
- What are the potential sources of bias and will they have an impact on your results?
- What is the explanatory variable?
- For the explanatory variable, how many different values are there and what are
they? (i.e. what are the treatments?) - What is your response variable?
- How will the response values be determined/measured?
- What are the extraneous or confounding variables?
- Which extraneous or confounding variables will your experiment control for and how will you control for them?
- How does your experiment design protect against the influence of extraneous variables?
- How will you use random assignment (if at all)?
- What statistic(s) will you be able to calculate based on the data you plan to collect?
- What data do you plan to display visually and how will you present your final data in visual form? (histogram, box plot, pie chart, line graph, dot plot, frequency table, etc.)
- Will you be able to answer your research question at the end of the experiment?
- If you are using a survey as part of your experiment, you should include:
- A copy of all survey questions you plan to ask
- How will participants enter their answer to each question? (fill in a number, write a short word answer, multiple choice, check box, etc.)
- For any questions that will be multiple choice or check box, what options will you give participants as possible responses?
- How will you administer the survey? (online through a site like Google Forms, on paper, in person, etc.)
Project Tips
Based on feedback I've given to students in previous semesters, here are some helpful tips/hints for this part of the project:
- Include an introduction that introduces your topic, why it’s important, and your research question (and even possibly some basic information about your study)
- Plan to collect basic demographic information (age, gender, ethnicity location/zip code) from your participants (whether it is an experiment or an observational study). This will help you know if your sample is representative of the population and can provide some interesting analysis (to see if there are similarities between or among groups).
- Be specific when defining your population. Think about the group you are trying to draw generalizations about. And remember to include location (US, World Wide, Arizona, Maricopa County, Estrella Mountain Community College, etc.)
- When coming up with your population and sample, remember that you should be sampling from your entire population. So if your population is adults in the United States, you should think about a method for collecting data where you will get participants from across the US. If you only plan to collect data from EMCC students, then your population really is EMCC students.
- Remember that you are NOT collecting data for this study, so while you should be somewhat mindful of the logistics of collecting data, you don’t need to worry about getting it done in the time-frame of this class
- Include the exact survey questions and answer choices you plan to use either in your paper or as an appendix/attachment
- Be specific when discussing what statistics you’ll calculate and what graphs you plan to use to display data. Instead of telling me you plan to calculate mean, median, and standard deviation, tell me that you’re calculating the mean number of hours spent on social media, or the median number of hours students spend studying each week, etc.
- Make sure to include a short conclusion
Assignment Submission
For this assignment, you should submit a typed paper that includes:
- An introduction that includes background information on your topic as well as your research question
- A detailed description of your study in paragraph form that addresses the answers to the appropriate questions based on your study type (see above)
- A copy of the survey you plan to use if applicable
Please note the following:
- This paper should be a formal written document (using paragraphs and complete sentences).
- Your paper should include specific details of your observational study or experiment (as outlined above).
- Don't include the actual questions just answer them in your description of your study as part of your paper.
- You should think about how to organize your paper so that it clearly communicates your research question and the design of your study.