Читать книгу Social Work Research Methods - Reginald O. York - Страница 84

The research study starts with a particular interest. You may want to know what causes client no-shows for appointments. Perhaps you want to know if women have better outcomes than men. Maybe your question is whether the clients of your program are satisfied with their services or have achieved the objectives of the intervention.

Here are some research questions you could examine:

1 Do those who engage in regular aerobic exercise have less of a tendency to experience minor illnesses (e.g., colds, flu) than those who do not?

2 What traits of a good work manager are viewed as more valuable than other traits?

3 Do those with higher scores for stressors have higher scores for stress?

4 Do those with higher scores for social support have lower scores for stress?

5 Do the clients of the New Horizons Program have lower scores for depression at the end of the treatment than before?

Can you characterize each of the above questions with regard to purpose? In other words, which ones are descriptive, explanatory, evaluative, or exploratory? Before you go further, give it a try. Select a label for each of these questions.

What about the first question? Is it descriptive? If so, it is a question that attempts only to describe one variable, even though it may have several variables that are to be described, such as age, income, race, or gender. You will notice that two variables are identified—exercise and illness. Does this question attempt to describe exercise by itself or examine the relationship of this variable with the other variable? Well, it requires the examination of the relationship between exercise and illness, so it is an explanatory study question. You cannot answer this question by reporting that 40% of your study subjects say that they engage in aerobic exercise. You must compare this rate with the rate for those who do not exercise.

What about the second question? Is it a descriptive question? Even though it lists traits, it is attempting to find out the rate at which the study subjects value a particular trait, so it is a descriptive study. The results may show that 34% favor Trait 1, 55% favor Trait 2, and so forth. It attempts to describe each trait one by one, not to examine the relationship between the traits and another variable.

Is the third question descriptive? It lists two variables (stressors and stress) and seeks to see if there is a relationship between the two in an attempt to examine whether one of these variables explains the other. So it is an explanatory research question. The same is true for the fourth question. It examines the relationship between stress and social support.

What about the last question? Is it descriptive, explanatory, evaluative, or exploratory? This study will examine two sets of scores (pretest and posttest) for the purpose of determining if an intervention has improved depression in the clients. This makes it an evaluative study. Whenever your intent is to evaluate an intervention, you are engaged in evaluative research.

The knowledge base for a research study has several functions. One is to define critical variables so that measurement is facilitated. Another function is to examine the relevant literature that will guide the analysis of the behavior or the theme of the research question. This clarification can assist with the identification of the variables to be measured. It can also assist with the identification of theories that suggest what kinds of relationships we would expect to find between the variables.