Posted: July 5th, 2015

The chapter discusses the methodology adopted for the research.

Research METHODOLOGY INSTECTIONS

1.1               Introduction

This should briefly explain what the chapter is all about. Usually you can say something like below:

The chapter discusses the methodology adopted for the research. Considering pros and cons of research methodologies and considering the objectives of the research, a qualitative methodology was chose for the study. The qualitative methodology was carried out using semi- structured interviews. The chapter discusses the justification behind the choices of qualitative and semi-structured interviews and also discusses the way the interviews were carried out.

Note: you can write this chapter in past tense or present participle (Ask the supervisor)

1.2               Research methodologies available

This is not a mandatory section – please ask your supervisor whether to include this or not (I usually prefer not to)

To write this section, you can use the reference list given on blackboard.

This section should be to introduce the available research methodologies, i.e. qualitative, quantitative and mixed methods.

1.3               Choice of research methodology

Very important section.

You need about 1 page discussions as to, not only what methodology you have chosen, but WHY you have chosen it.

When you are writing up the justification, the following can be taken into consideration:

• Literature evidence
• Relating the type of methodology chosen to research questions/aim/objectives
• Nature of your research and what you seek out to do

The more evidences you bring out, the better!!

1.4               Research method/s adopted

Here you have to highlight what method/s has/have been chosen as part of the methodology chosen in section 3.3 as before, you have to discuss in few paragraphs, why that chosen method/s is best for your research. Sometimes, highlighting the advantages of the chosen methodology (with literature evidence) will also be good to strengthen your discussion.

(Should be written within past sense)

You can write this in a step- by step approach. For example,

Step 1 – development of the research instrument

This section is about the development of the questionnaire or the questions for the interviews/case studies.

You can write the following to discuss this:

How did you develop the research instrument- e.g. based on the objectives, research and questions, Etc.

What type of questions did you ask – e.g.

• For a questionnaire, its close ended questions, the close ended questions can be in different from:
  1. binary scale (yes/no):
  2. options (e.g. level of agreement, a very satisfied, b. satisfied, c. neither satisfied nor dissatisfied, d. not satisfied) there are different likert-scale, e.g. 3 likert scales (Satisfied, medium, dissatisfied): 4 likert scales (very satisfied, satisfied, medium, not satisfied) 5; likert scales (higly agree, agree, neither agree nor disagree, disagree, highly disagree): or even likert scale upto 10. Explain what type of likert scale you used and why?

 

• For interviews/case studies- it’s open ended questions. That means there is no answer given for the question.

Finally you say that the developed questions/questionnaire (draft) is attached in an appendix (e.g. Appendix 1)

 

Step 2 – piloting

In this section, please write about how many people did you send the questionnaire/questions for piloting? Who are they? What were their main comments? And finally, say the questionnaire/questions were revised using the main comments, and the final questionnaire is attached is an appendix (e.g. appendix 2).

Step 3- choice of sample

Here we discuss who you interviewed/chose for the case studies/who you sent the questionnaire to? Why did you choose them (justification)? How did you choose them (sampling)? How many did you choose (final selection)?

E.g. the questionnaire developed were then sent to local authorities. They are the key authority or personnel responsible for making social housing sustainable. They are responsible for the implementation of sustainable development policies and also responsible for empowering the communities on driving the agenda towards sustainability. The local authorities were chosen within the North West area of England to reduce the scope of the study. The reasons for this is given in chapter 1.4(scope and limitations). There are about 135 local authorities in the North West area, and of them 50 local authorities were chosen randomly (Ade did this lecture on sampling) for the questionnaire survey, based on location.

Step 4- data collection and recording

• Mode of data collection?
  • For questionnaires there are several options: telephone survey, postal survey, e-mail survey, online survey, survey by hand delivery. Say what did you choose and why?
  • For interviews: face-to-face interview, telephone interviews, skype/online interviews, etc. say what you chose and why
  • For case studies: you can collect data using interviews, observations, etc. say what you chose and why.
• How long did it take?
  • For questionnaires can say: online questionnaire link was sent to the selected sample discussed above and they were given a period of 2 weeks to respond. At the end of 2^nd week, only 32 questionnaire were received, therefore, to increase the number of respondents, another reminder was sent to the respondents extending the deadline for further 02 weeks. At the end of the 4^th week, altogether 56 questionnaires were received for initially selected sample of 135, giving a response rate o 41.5%. the response rate is very good, considering the usual response rate for a social science research is about 10 – 15% (provide a reference if possible)
  • For the interviews you can say: face-to-face semi-structure interview were conducted within 10 mangers in local authorities in the North West. The interviews took place during June 2015. Duration of each interview was about 30 – 45mins.
• How did you record the data?
  • For questionnaires you can say: the questionnaire responses were recorded on SPSS version 12 (statistical package for social sciences).A sample pf the questionnaire received is given in an appendix (e.g. Appendix 3) the respondents were given codes (e.g. CONT, CONT 2, etc.) and their responses were recorded row by row. There were some missing information in some responses and they were recorded as ‘Nil’ so that it will not affect the final data analysis.
  • For interviews you can say: during the interviews, the discussions were recorded using a digital Dictaphone. Once the interview were over, they were transcribed moreover word to word, on word documents. A sample of the interview transcriptions is given is an appendix (e.g. Appendix 3)

Step 5- data analysis

In data analysis you have to describe what method did you use in a paragraph.

Write a small paragraph on unit analysis.

In a research, usually you try to analyse or focus on a particular element – it could be people’s perceptions, a process, an organisation, a sector or even a country (Very rarely)/

So you have to highlight what exactly you are looking at and why here. This makes it easier to present the findings in the next chapter.

For questionnaires: please use SPSS for data analysis. The main analysis methods used were descriptive and inferential statistics. Under descriptive analysis mainly mean analyses was used to derive main findings. Under inferential statistics Kruskal-Wallis test to identify variations in groups.

For qualitative: One of the easiest and most convenient methods to use for qualitative analysis ‘content analyses. This has many variations/forms. However, a simple analysis of the ‘content’ of the interview transcripts or case study data will be sufficient to derive findings of the study.

1.5               Data validity and reliability

In terms of data validity, you have to talk about the following things with regard to your ample and questionnaire/questions:

1. Expertise of the sample you used for the research e.g. they may have more than 10 years’ experience in the field of research, which may mean their opinions/view are very valid as they know the subject/area well.
2. Qualifications the respondents have- this may mean the respondents of the survey/interviews know the subject well – which means the answers they have given are valid and reliable.
3. Questions you have asked- try to avoid bias as much as possible. Also try to improve clarity and undertandability of the questionnaire, so that the respondents understand what you are asking, hence answer the questions without any confusion.
4. Piloting- to make sure the questions are clear and understandable to improve validity and reliability of answers
5. Choosing participants from a different group/categories- this may mean that the answers are not biased towards a particular category of people. Thus, it improves validity and reliability. However, this may not be suitable for all research studies

1.6               Summary

The research study adopted a qualitative approach to achieve the aim and objectives highlighted in chapter1. The main reason for that was the research questions developed at the end of chapter 2 were mainly exploratory in nature. The qualitative approach was carried out using 10 semi- structured interviews with construction managers in large contractors’ organisations. The data was analysed using qualitative content analysis. The findings derived from the analyses is presented in the next chapter.