When one is thinking about their thesis or dissertation topics, they also need to decide upon suitable methods. There are so many research methods, however, that a writer or student may easily get confused.
Fortunately, there are ways to decide upon the best kind of research method for your work. Some are discussed below, so you may start choosing:
Choosing A Research Method
Your research question, budget, time, and other requirements are the main deciding factors in choosing a research method. You may also have certain ethical and moral standards that bar you from utilizing certain methods. Of course, there are also physical, social, and academic limitations to consider.
For sciences, quantitative experiments and methods are the way to go. Anything else would probably take your writing in another direction altogether. Psychology, for example, needs a mixture of the quantitative and qualitative.
Experimental Research Methods
The most straightforward kind of research method is the experimental one. This involves using specific variables to get proper data one can work with.
This kind of method can be interval based or ratio based. The result would either be an acceptance or refusal of the null hypothesis. Hence, this method is one of the most difficult and expensive ones. However, it is also one of the most widely-accepted research methods.
Opinion Based Research
This kind of research method is mostly used in psychology dissertations and research. It involves designing a survey or experiment, but with arbitrary measurements. These may follow the interval type of measurement.
One of the most popular ways of quantifying data for opinion-based research is questionnaires. This is a technique through which one tried to project data using a sample group. It is cheaper than the experimental method since it works on scale basis.
One may also want to quantify behavior within opinion-based research. Researchers may, for instance, give a number in order to measure the intensity of a behavior. Since behavior and emotions cannot be accurately measured, the opinion method is the best way to extract measurable data.
Observational Research Methods
This is also a kind of research method with several subcategories. Basically, researchers using this method try to gather data through observation. They use control groups and try to maintain their aloofness. All this is so they can gather as much genuine data as possible.
One example or observational research is the case study. Here, the researcher looks at the case of a certain place, experiment, or event, and tries to draw conclusions. This method is very far removed from the scientific method, but it is sometimes the only way to move forward.
Wrap-Up…
When you choose your subject, you should already have some idea of how you want to conduct your research. However, a bit of background reading would open up new ways and methods to you. These may help in conducting more thorough research and hence writing a better dissertation.