Description of Study and Design to Be Used in Future Research Project

Topic 1. Describe a vulnerable population in terms of research. Why the population is considered vulnerable? What other groups might also be considered vulnerable populations?

A vulnerable population in terms of research is a population that is often overlooked by the academic community or a population that does not fit in with the mainstream sample. Waisel (2013) states that: vulnerable populations include patients who are racial or ethnic minorities, children, elderly, socioeconomically disadvantaged, underinsured or those with certain medical conditions, and that these populations typically have health conditions that are exacerbated by unnecessarily inadequate healthcare (p. 186). Asian-Americans with type 2 diabetes are a vulnerable population in the U.S. They are a racial and ethnic minority on whom there is scant medical research in terms of how best to provide quality care for them (Walton-Moss, Samuel, Nguyen, Commodore-Mensah, Hayat & Szanton, 2014).

Other groups that might also be considered vulnerable populations would include other minority racial and ethnic groups as well as groups that minority in terms of gender identity, socio-economic status, or groups with disabilities, and so on. These could include homosexual populations, HIV-infected populations, drug abusers, and many others.

Topic 2. Assume you want to do a project that compares the survey results before an intervention to those after an intervention in the same sample (the same people will take both surveys). You plan to use a paired t-test to analyze your results. Using the "Determining the Appropriate Sample Size," Topic Material, perform a sample size calculation to determine how large your sample should be. Justify your sample size calculation with citations. Discuss how your sample size may affect the validity of your study.

A sample calculation of how to determine the size of a sample population will depend on the confidence level Z score that the researcher wants to achieve. If the confidence level aimed at is 90%, the Z score would be 1.645. This score is then plugged into another equation:

Necessary Sample Size = (Z-score)2 * StdDev*(1-StdDev) / (margin of error)2

0.5 is normal standard of deviation and 0.05 is normal margin of error acceptance, so, the equation that is used would look like this:

Necessary Sample Size = ((1.96)2 x .5(.5)) / (.05)2

(3.8416 x .25) / .0025

.9604 / .0025

384.16

385 respondents are required.

As Kadam and Bhalerao (2010) note, a sample is not an entire population but rather on a representational grouping of ita further subset of the target population which we would like to include in the study. Thus a sample is a portion, piece, or segment that is representative of a whole (p. 55). For the sample to be effective, it has to have significance, and the level of significance is the p value, and typically the range for p to have significance is anywhere below 0.05 or p < 0.05.

Topic 3. What are the assumptions for a t-test? How should these be run? Do you want to see a p value of <0.05? Why or why not?

They typical assumptions that are made when conducting a t-test are that the scale of measurement will follow a continuous/ordinal scalefor example, the scores in a math test.

The next assumption is that the data will come from sample that is representative of the population as a wholeusually that means the sample is randomly selected.

The next assumption is that when the data is plotted it will show a normal distribution with a distribution curve that is bell-shaped.

The next assumption would be the sample size is sufficiently large. The larger the sample size, the more likely the results will produce the desired bell-shaped curve on the plot.

Finally, the last assumption is that there will be homogeneity of variance, which means that equal variance will be observed in the standard deviations (Mertler & Reinhart, 2016).

You would always want to see a p value of <0.05 because this would indicate that your results are significant. However, if you want to truly be non-biased in your approach, it should not matter to you whether the findings are statistically significant or not: what should matter is that your data collection method, sample size, design, and analysis are correct. If the results are found to be significant or not significant that is simply something that the researcher should accept. If data is not significant, it could indicate that a larger sample is required, however.

Topic 4. Review the types of data that are considered protected health information (PHI). Do you plan to collect any of this data during your project? How would the collection of this data affect your project (whether you plan to collect it or not)?

Protected health information (PHI) consists of any data types that reveal or contain personal identifiable information and is:

Communicated via digital messaging

Stored in a digital format

Communicated and recorded on any other format, such as paper or even oral communication

Information about a persons health that is created or distributed by a health care professional

Contains information related to an individuals prior, present and even future health

This data can include any of the following types:

Name, Individuals address, Dates regarding an individuals...…peer-review process. That means that if you submit your research to a peer-reviewed journal, it is examined by scholars in the field first before its contents are published. This serves to filter out material that is not fit for publication because it lacks merit, its study is not precise, its methods are dubious, its findings biased, or some other issue is at hand. If my work is published in a journal, my colleagues can embrace it because it would be a good foundation for developing and implementing EBP in their own practice.

Topic 9. Describe how you can be intentional when incorporating feedback from your content expert and faculty chair when revising your prospectus

I can be intentional when incorporating feedback from my content expert and faculty chair when revising my prospectus by being open minded about suggestions and deliberately and thoughtfully incorporating the advice and suggestions of both into my prospectus: they are there to help and their advice can be critical in assisting me in developing my prospectus adequately. The more time and consideration I give to their words, suggestions, tips and advice, the more likely I will be able to produce a successful prospectus.

It is also important to remember that if feedback is incorporated, it has to be incorpoated into the whole documentnot just a section of it. It does not help to just incorporate feedback into the section where it is given if it actually applies to the whole document. I would need to be mindful of this fact when incorporating the feedback so that the whole prospectus is taken care of in this way.

Topic 10 . Your prospectus will require many updates and changes as you progress through the program. Your literature review chapter alone will require 50 or more articles and be more than 30 pages long. Describe a plan to continue the search for articles and add them to your prospectus over the coming months.

My plan to continue the search for articles and add them to my prospectus over the coming months is to examine at least 5 new articles every weekwhich is roughly 1 new article every day. I intend to do this in the evening after dinner when I have time after work and school hours. I can easily read on article in the evening and make notes in my laptop while I am reading.

I would be able to add these notes to my prospectus in the morning before work and school hours. This type of schedule would allow me to stay focused on the task at hand and keep…