References:
- Nursing Review Guide, 1st Edition, ISBN 978-621-02-2289-0, by Glenn Reyes Luansing
A study’s design is the systematic and controlled plan on how the study will be conducted. It servers as the roadmap, skeletal framework or the blueprint in research.
Based on existing knowledge, research design may be
- Exploratory Studies: done to gain richer familiarity for phenomenon which has less or few existing information or data available.
- Descriptive Studies: done to study the relationship between variables in a known phenomenon; it studies the relationship and characteristics of a particular subject in a certain phenomena as it naturally happens (Brink and Wood, 2001)
- Explanatory Studies: helps provide basic explanations about the relationships between phenomenon.
Based on the setting or environment, research design may be
- Clinical Setting: often more controlled.
- Field Study: ordinary setting where subjects naturally exist.
Based on the type of data collected, research design may be
- Quantitative Research: a type of research whose result can be determined by objectivity, senses, and other empirical methods. This study is usually measurable, single reality, and can be subjected to statistical analysis based on numerical data.
- Experimental and non-experimental designs
- Qualitative Research: a type of research that focuses on a subject’s subjective insights and values about given facts, i.e., perceptions, understanding, emotions, feelings, behavior, etc. These focus more on words than numbers. Data is represented in thematic or narrative forms.
- Historical studies, case studies, phenomenological studies, ethnographic studies, ethnography, and grounded theory
- Mixed/Triangulation Research: a combination of quantitative and qualitative research.
Experimental Research
In this design, researchers try to manipulate or control the independent variable to reproduce a certain effect (on the dependent variable). It is mainly concerned with the “cause and effect” relationship. Some “True Experimental Designs” are Pretest-Posttest Control Group Design, Posttest Only Control Group, and the Solomon Four-Group Design. Experimental research has the following features:
- Manipulation: the researcher intervenes with the subject under study.
- Control: the researcher uses a certain system or condition to control the investigation or study
- Randomization of Samples: samples are acquired and segregated as control or experimental groups.
- Measurement/Validation of results
Quasi-experimental Studies
These are experimental research designs which may be missing some of the features listed above. Usually, there is no control or comparison group because participants are not randomized.
Various phenomenon may affect the validity of the research:
- Hawthorne’s Effect: changes in behavior attributed to the knowledge of being under study.
- Halo Effect: specific attributes, whether positive or negative, produce an assumption for other, non-related attributes that the researcher may falsely observe, e.g. good appearance does not constitute good decorum, but the latter may be implied by the former, even if not specifically observed.
- Experimenter’s Effect: the researcher’s own beliefs, principles, and values seep into the outcome of the research.
- Reactive Effect of the Pretest: the pretest effects the participants’ actions for the posttest, which produces an imbalance in behavior between tests.
- Selection Effect: a lack of randomization in assigning participants introduces bias.
- History Effect: events that occur outside of the study affect the behavior of the participants under study, such as economic changes.
- Maturation: the participants of the study mature and change during the study, and the findings become altered as a result.
- Attrition Effect: the result is altered by participants that drop-out of the study; the final sample may no longer be representative of the population.
- Instrumentation: the result is affected by changes in calibration of the instruments and equipment used between periods of measurement.
Non-experimental Research
Samples are not subjected to any burdensome control or manipulation. They can easily cooperate for these types of research, and the researcher is not concerned with the cause-and-effect phenomenon.
- Historical Approach: a type of research based on past events, primarily utilizing pre-existing data such as journals, records, and similar sources or the subjects themselves, merely recalling some past occurrences. Sources may be sources or secondary.
- Survey Studies: the utilization of mass/large/smaller groups; whether mailed, face-to-face, or through telephone; and simultaneously between groups (cross-sectional) or longitudinal (successive surveys for a single group).
- Comparative Studies: contrasting studies in relation to particular variables or phenomenon being studied. There are two types:
- Retrospective Design: a study done “ex post facto”; after-the-fact. The researcher usually selects subjects who have undergone some related experience in the past and attempts to let them describe its relationship with a present study or investigation.
- Prospective Design: a study done at the present, but where the study is consummated in any future time or upon the happening of a future event or occurrence which is certain to happen. The subjects are followed and observed for a period of time.
- Correlational Studies: a study to determine the strength of relationships among variables in a particular subject. This often utilizes statistical analysis.
Qualitative Research Studies
- Case Study/Case Analysis: research data is taken and analyzed on a certain focus group, institution, or single subject only. This is a type of subject that focuses on a smaller number of subjects, making the design costly and time-consuming.
- Ethnographic Studies: data are collected and analyzed coming from a certain cultural group or minority.
- Grounded Theory Studies: studies leading to the discovery or development of useful theories.
- Phenomenological Studies: data based on described human experiences, provided by the very same people involved.
- Field Studies: studies naturally conducted in an ordinary setting, such as in a community.