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| Taking the Leap into the Research World | |
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| The challenge of tackling a research project | |
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| So what is this thing called research and why do it? | |
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| The need for research knowledge | |
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| The potential of research knowledge | |
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| Delving into the 'construct' of research | |
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| Ontology and epistemology | |
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| Competing positions | |
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| The position of the reflexive researcher | |
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| Getting help along the way | |
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| The structure of the book | |
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| How to get the most out of the book | |
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| Getting Started | |
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| On your mark, get set, go! | |
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| Navigating the process | |
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| Understanding your programme | |
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| Getting set up | |
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| Getting the right advice | |
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| Managing the workload | |
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| Staying on course | |
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| Finding a balance | |
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| Dealing with 'crisis' | |
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| Striving For Integrity in the Research Process | |
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| Power, politics, ethics and research integrity | |
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| Understanding the power game | |
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| Credibility: Integrity in the production of knowledge | |
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| Working with appropriate indicators | |
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| Managing subjectivities | |
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| Capturing 'truth' | |
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| Approaching methods with consistency | |
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| Making relevant and appropriate arguments | |
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| Providing accurate and verifiable research accounts | |
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| Ethics: Integrity and the 'researched' | |
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| Legal obligations | |
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| Moral obligations | |
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| Ethical obligations | |
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| Ethics approval processes | |
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| Integrity indicators and checklist | |
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| Developing Your Research Question | |
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| The importance of good questions | |
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| Defining your topic | |
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| Curiosity and creativity | |
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| Looking for inspiration | |
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| Practicalities | |
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| From interesting topics to researchable questions | |
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| Narrowing in | |
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| The need to redefine | |
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| The hypothesis dilemma | |
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| Hypothesis defined | |
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| Appropriateness | |
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| Characteristics of good questions | |
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| Crafting a Research Proposal | |
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| The role of the proposal | |
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| Demonstrating merits of the research question | |
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| Demonstrating merits of the proposed methods | |
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| Demonstrating merits of the researcher | |
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| Elements of the proposal | |
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| Writing a winning proposal | |
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| Following guidelines | |
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| Writing purposively | |
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| Drafting and redrafting | |
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| Obstacles and challenges | |
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| When your design doesn't fit proposal requirements | |
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| When your design is emergent | |
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| When want to or need to change direction/method | |
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| Working with Literature | |
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| The importance of literature | |
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| The role of literature | |
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| Sourcing relevant literature | |
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| Types of literature | |
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| Calling on 'experts' | |
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| Honing your search skills | |
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| Managing the literature | |
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| Assessing relevance | |
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| Being systematic | |
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| Annotating references | |
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| Writing a the formal 'literature review' | |
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| Purpose | |
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| Coverage | |
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| The writing process | |
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| Designing a Research Plan | |
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| Methodology, methods and tools | |
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| The relationship between methodology and methods | |
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| Moving from questions to answers | |
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| Finding a path | |
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| Hitting the target | |
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| Getting down to the nitty gritty | |
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| Fundamental questions | |
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| Emergent methodological design | |
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| Understanding Methodologies: Quantitative, Qualitative and 'mixed' Approaches | |
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| Understanding the quantitative/ qualitative divide | |
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| The quantitative tradition | |
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| Scientific/ hypothetico-deductive methods | |
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| Experimental design | |
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| Exploring a population | |
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| The qualitative tradition | |
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| Credibility in qualitative studies | |
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| Ethnography | |
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| Phenomenology | |
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| Ethnomethodology | |
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| Understanding feminist approaches | |
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| Mixed methodology | |
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| Arguments for mixed methodology | |
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| Perspectives and strategies | |
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| Challenges and obstacles | |
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| Understanding Methodologies: Evaluative, Action-Oriented and Emancipatory Strategies | |
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| Research that attempts to drive change | |
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| Evaluation research | |
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| Summative/outcome evaluation | |
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| Formative/process evaluation | |
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| The politics of evaluative research | |
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| Negotiating real-world challenges of evaluative research | |
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| Action research | |
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| The scope of action research | |
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| Key elements of action research | |
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| Challenges associated with action research | |
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| Emancipatory research | |
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| Participatory action research | |
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| Critical ethnography | |
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| Issues in emancipatory research | |
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| Seeking 'respondents' | |
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| Who holds the answer? | |
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| Samples: Selecting elements of a population | |
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| Opportunities in working with a 'sample' | |
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| Sample selection | |
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| Random samples | |
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| Non-random samples | |
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| Key informants: Working with experts and insiders | |
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| Opportunities in working with key informants | |
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| Informant selection | |
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| Cases: Delving into detail | |
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| Opportunities in working with cases | |
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| Case selection | |
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| Direct Data Collection - Surveys and Interviews | |
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| The challenge of getting data directly from the source | |
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| Surveying | |
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| Options and possibilities | |
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| Issues and complexities | |
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| The survey process | |
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| The survey instrument | |
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| Interviewing | |
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| Options and possibilities | |
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| Issues and complexities | |
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| The interview process | |
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| Conducting your interview | |
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| Indirect Data Collection: Working with Observations and Existing Text | |
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| The challenge of gathering indirect data | |
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| Observation | |
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| Options and possibilities | |
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| Issues and complexities | |
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| The observation process | |
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| Receiving, reflecting, recording, authenticating | |
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| Working with existing 'text' | |
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| Options and possibilities | |
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| Issues and complexities | |
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| The process of textual analysis | |
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| Delving into documents, history, artefacts, and secondary data | |
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| Analysing Quantitative Data | |
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| Moving from raw data to significant findings | |
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| Keeping a sense of the overall project | |
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| Doing statistical analysis | |
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| Managing data and defining variables | |
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| Data management | |
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| Understanding variables - cause and effect | |
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| Understanding variables - measurements scales | |
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| Descriptive statistics | |
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| Measuring central tendency | |
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| Measuring dispersion | |
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| Measuring the shape of the data | |
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| Inferential statistics | |
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| Questions suitable to inferential statistics | |
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| Statistical significance | |
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| Understanding and selecting the right statistical test | |
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| Presenting quantitative data | |
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| Analyzing Qualitative Data | |
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| The promise of qualitative analysis | |
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| Keeping the bigger picture in focus | |
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| From raw data to significant findings | |
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| QDA software | |
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| The logic of QDA | |
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| Balancing creativity and focus | |
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| Moving between inductive and deductive reasoning | |
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| The methods of QDA | |
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| Identifying biases/ noting impressions | |
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| Reducing and coding into themes | |
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| Looking for patterns and interconnections | |
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| Mapping and building themes | |
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| Developing theory | |
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| Drawing conclusions | |
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| Specific QDA strategies | |
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| Presenting quantitative data | |
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| The Challenge of Writing up | |
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| The writing challenge | |
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| Research as communication | |
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| Knowing and engaging your audience | |
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| Finding an appropriate structure and style | |
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| The writing process | |
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| Writing as analysis | |
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| Constructing your 'story' | |
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| Developing each section/ chapter | |
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| From first to final draft | |
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| The need for exposure | |
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| Attending conferences | |
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| Giving presentations | |
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| Writing and submitting articles | |
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| The final word | |