Chapter 4, 5, 6, and 29 Flashcards
Sources of research questions
Personal interest/experience, theory, the research literature, puzzles, new developments in society, and social problems.
What, Why, and How Framework for crafting research (Bryman, 2007)
What?, Why?, How-conceptually? and How-practically?
Steps in collecting research questions
1) Research Area
2) Select aspect of research area (Research problem)
3) Research questions
4) Select research questions
Criteria for evaluating research questions
1) Clear
2) researchable
3) connect with established theory and research
4) Questions linked to each other
5) Potential for making a contribution to knowledge
6) Questions are neither too broad or too narrow
Reasons for writing a literature review
1) Need to know what is already known about the subject
2) Learn from the mistakes of others
3) Learn about different theoretical and methodological approaches to your research area
4) Develop an analytical framework
5) Lead you to consider including variables in your research of which you might not have thought
6) Suggest further research questions
7) It is required
Searching for literature should answer these questions
What is already known about this area?
What concepts and theories are relevant?
What research methods and strategies have been used in this area?
Are there any controversies?
Are there any inconsistencies in findings?
Are there any unanswered questions?
Peer-reviewed
An article that from which you know that its reliable because it is scanned through by others.
Literature sources available
Primary sources: Reports, conference proceedings, theses
Secondary sources: Subsequent publication of primary literature (articles, journals, books, and newspapers)
Tertiary sources: search tools (meta-search, google scholar)
Systematic review (Tranfield et al.,2003)
A method that is gaining popularity in business research as a way of enhancing the reliability of literature searching and review (a replicable, scientific, and transparent process)
Clear and precise aims/objectives
Pre-planned search methods
Clear assessment criteria in selection of articles
Assessment of the quality of research and the strengths of the findings
Synthesizing the individual studies
Presenting the results in a comprehensive, balanced way
Meta-analysis
Summarizing the results of a large number of quantitative studies and conducting various analytical tests to show whether or not a particular variable has an effect.
Meta-ethnography
Synthesizes the conclusions drawn by various authors from their studies of the same or similar phenomena
5 principal research areas that narrative analysis has explored
1) Sense-making - focused on the role of stories as a device through which people make sense of organizational events
2) Communication - explores how narratives are used to create an maintain organizational culture and power structure
3) Learning/Change - analyzes how stories help people to learn and subjectively to make sense of change
4) Politics and power - consider the role of shared narratives in the control of organizational meaning.
5) Identity and identification - focuses on the role of stories in creating and maintaining organizational identity.
Issues in writing up business research
1) must convince readers about the credibility of the knowledge claims you make
2) writing style that is persuasive and convincing
3) Kill your darlings!
4) Distinction between what is important and what is not important
Structure of the Perlow (1999) Article
1) Introduction
2) Review of the literature
3) Methods
4) Results
5) Discussion
6) Conclusion/Implications
