W2 Key Terms Flashcards
Abstract:
An abstract is a short- comprehensive synopsis or summary of a study at the beginning of an article.
- It quickly focuses the reader on the main points of a study
- A well-presented abstract is accurate, self-contained, concise, specific, nonevaluative, coherent, and readable.
- Abstracts vary in length from 50-250 words. The length and format of an abstract are dictated by the journal’s style.
- Both quantitative and qualitative research studies have abstracts
Assumptions:
A critical reader actively looks for assumptions (accepted truths), key concepts and ideas, reasons and justifications, supporting examples, parallel experiences, implications and consequences, and any other structured features of the text so as to interpret and assess the text accurately and fairly
Critical reading:
Is “an active”, intellectually engaging process in which the reader participates in an inner dialogue with the writer
Critical reading is a process that involved the following levels of understanding and allows you to critically assess a study’s validity: • Preliminary: • Comprehensive: • Analysis: • Synthesis:
Critical thinking:
- Is the rational examination of ideas, inferences, assumptions, principles, arguments, conclusions, issues, statements, beliefs, and actions.
- This means that you are engaging in the following:
- Systematic understand of the research process
- Thinking that displays a mastery of criteria for critiquing research and evidence-informed practice
- The art of being able to make your thinking better (i.e, clearer, more accurate, or more defensible) by clarifying what you understand and what you do not know.
Critique:
Is the process of critical appraisal in which a person objectively and critically evaluates a research report’s content for scientific validity or merit and application to practice
• It requires some knowledge of the subject matter, as well as knowledge of how to read critically and use critiquing criteria.
Critiquing criteria:
Are the standards, appraisal guidelines, or questions used to judge (assess) an article
Dependent variable:
Represented as (Y)- is often referred to as the consequence or the presumed effect that varies with a change in the independent variable. • The dependent variable is NOT manipulated. • It is observed and assumed to vary with changes in the independent variable. • For example: A researcher might assume that the perception of pain (i.e. the dependent variable) will vary according to the person’s gender (i.e. independent variable)
Independent variable:
- Symbolized as (X) – is a variable that has the presumed effect on the dependent variable
- In experimental studies, the research manipulates the independent variable.
- For example; a nurse may study how different methods of administering pain medication affect the patient’s perception of pain intensity. The research may manipulate the independent variable (the method of administering pain medication) by using nurse-versus patient-controlled administration analgesics
- In non-experimental research, the independent variable is not manipulated and is assumed to have occurred naturally before or during the study.
- For example; the researcher may be studying the relationship between gender and the perception of pain intensity. The independent variable- gender- Is not manipulated; it is presumed to exist and is observed and measured in relation to pain intensity.
Population
A well-defined set that has certain properties
• Is either specified or implied in the research question.
• Is the scope of the question has been narrowed to a specific focus and the variables have been clearly identified, the nature of the population is evident to the reader of the research report
• For example; a research question may be
“is there a relationship between the type of discharge planning for older adults hospitalized with heart failure and the outcomes for participating patients and their caregivers?”
o This question suggests that the population under consideration includes older adults hospitalized for heart failure and their caregivers.
Problem statement:
- When research questions generated from situations or problems that emerge from practice- they are often articulated in a problem statement such as the following:
- “The general problem that this article addresses is the continuing prevalence of poor communication during the diagnostic window of time within the cancer experience”
Research Question
Presents the idea that is to be examined in the study and is the foundation of the research study
• If the research question is primarily explorative, descriptive, or theory generating, the research opts for qualitative methods – in these studies, a hypothesis is not formulated.
• For studies in which the researcher is seeking a specific answer to a research question, however a hypothesis is generated and tested.
• Research questions or hypotheses often appear at the beginning of research articles.
Variable
- Is something that varies
- Properties that differ from each other such as; age, weight, height, religion and ethnicity.
- Researches attempt to understand how/why difference in one variable relate to differences in another variables
For example; a research may be concerned about the rate of pneumonia in post-op patients on ventilators in critical care units. The rate is a variable because not all critically ill post-op patients on ventilators have pneumonia.
Clinical question:
An inquiry that is the basis of evidence informed practice. A clinical question concerns 5 components: population, intervention, comparison, outcome and time (PICOT)
Directional hypothesis:
A hypothesis that specifies the expected direction of the relationship between independent and dependent variables
Hypothesis:
A best guess or prediction about what a researcher expects to find with regard to the relationship between 2 or more variables.
