Business Research Introduction

Question 1

What is Business Research?

Answer 1

The systematic and objective process of collecting, recording, analysing and interpreting data for aid in solving managerial problems

Question 2

What is the problem definition?

Answer 2

Problem background and problem statement.

Question 3

What is the problem background?

Answer 3

• what is the problem?
• why is it a problem?
• for whom is it a problem?

Question 4

What is the problem statement?

Answer 4

• always a question
• does not include potential causes
• it is answered in the conclusions and recommendations

Question 5

What are the 4 types of variables?

Answer 5

1. Dependent
2. Independent
3. Intervening
4. Extraneous

Question 6

What is a dependent variable?

Answer 6

The problem

Question 7

What is an independent variable?

Answer 7

The cause

Question 8

What is the relationship between the dependent and independent variable?

Answer 8

We impact the independent variable to measure what happens to the dependent variable

Question 9

Types of research methodologies

Answer 9

• Experimental research
• Quasi-experimental research
• Phenomenological research
• Analytical surveys

Question 10

What is Experimental and Quasi-Experimental Research

Answer 10

• Highly structured ‘laboratorylike’ methods
• Generation of hypotheses
• Control of variables
• Accurate (quantitative) measures
• Generalization to population

Question 11

What are the characteristics of Experimental Research?

Answer 11

• Experimental and control group
• Subjects randomly assigned
• Manipulation of independent variable

Question 12

What is a control group?

Answer 12

The base line variable, the norm

Question 13

What are the characteristics of Quasi-Experimental Research?

Answer 13

• Subjects are not randomly assigned - you take two naturally occurring groups
• The independent variable is not manipulated but rather differences in the levels of the independent variable are observed.
• Does not eliminate the problem of confounding variables.

Question 14

What is Phenomenological Research?

Answer 14

Producing thick descriptions of people’s experiences and perspectives within their natural settings.
- Qualitative research

Question 15

What are Analytical Surveys?

Answer 15

• Highly structured
• Random selection
• Aim is to generalize to the population

Question 16

What are the 4 types of studies?

Answer 16

1. Exploratory
2. Descriptive
3. Explanatory
4. Interpretive

Question 17

What are exploratory studies?

Answer 17

• Seek to explore what is happening and to ask
  questions about it.
• Useful when not enough is known about a
  phenomenon.

Question 18

What are descriptive studies?

Answer 18

They seek to ‘draw a picture’ of a situation, person or event or show how things are related to each other. However, they cannot explain why an event has occurred.

Question 19

What are explanatory studies?

Answer 19

An explanatory study sets out to explain and account for the descriptive information.
- Ask why and how questions

Question 20

What are interpretive studies?

Answer 20

• Interpretive studies seek to explore people’s experiences and their views or perspectives of these experiences.
• Interpretive studies are, typically, inductive in nature and often associated with qualitative approaches to data gathering and analysis.

Question 21

What is an inductive research approach?

Answer 21

A theory-building process starting with observations of specific instances, and seeking to establish generalisations about the phenomenon under investigation.
- You start with observations and then build theory based on that.

Question 22

What is a deductive research approach?

Answer 22

Concerned with developing a hypothesis based on existing theory, and then designing a research strategy to test the hypothesis.