Читать книгу Social Work Research Methods - Reginald O. York - Страница 85

Your study methods indicate how you will examine your research question in your study. From whom will you collect data? How will you measure your study variables? What is your study design? These are all about the how of your study.

You will decide on the study population that is relevant to your study. This might be as broad as anybody or as narrow as persons with a certain type of eating disorder. If you are examining a very broad question, such as whether those who exercise are better off regarding health, you have a broad study population, because this question is relevant to everyone. But if you are evaluating a treatment program for those suffering from bulimia, you will have a small study population.

You will select a group of people from that study population from whom you will collect data. This is your study sample. The method you use to select the sample from the population determines how well you can generalize your study findings from the sample to your population. This will be discussed in more detail in a later chapter. To generalize means that you would expect similar results from another sample of people from the same population. So what you found in your study is relevant to other people in your study population.

You will select a means of measuring each of the variables in your study. This might be a scale for measuring self-esteem, school records on school absences, or agency records on whether a client followed the suggestions on the discharge plan.

If you are conducting an evaluative study, you will determine the research design. This design instructs you on the procedures for the collection of your data on client outcome. One design, for example, calls on you to measure a group of clients once before treatment begins and once at the end of treatment. This design measures client progress.