Research methods and statistics

¶ … Statistics

The intent of this study is to define both the qualitative and quantitative statistical methodologies including the development of descriptive and inferential statistics applied to the field of education overall and school counseling specifically. Each of the qualitative and quantitative approaches to statistics are also analyzed from the perspective of how best they can be applied to educational and counseling situations to best support and serve the student. The specifics of how to apply these techniques within the context of a methodological approach to completing research projects is also evaluated. Specifically focusing on the steps of research design, data collection, data analysis, and the ethics of the interpretation of research are also discussed.

Exploring Qualitative Research Methods in Education and Counseling

There are many factors that define if a research strategy will have a qualitative or quantitative approach, including the stage of existing knowledge and pre-existing research in the specific area of interest, the level of forced-choice responses that could generated from more quantitatively-focused research, and the broader research objectives. Clearly in the field of education and counseling there are a small percentage of research studies completed using qualitatively focused studies. The fact that only 16 of the 220 studies that Zuga cites in his analysis of technology-based teaching (1994) were based on qualitative analysis techniques, and of those, none completed in the U.S. shows this nations' heavy reliance and focus on the quantification of educational factors and the influence of counseling strategies on performance. The lack of focus on the qualitative aspects of research has created a vacuum in regards to finding emerging interrelationships and undiscovered and therefore unquantifiable aspects of how education and counseling impact students' performance.

Qualitative research, both from a social science as well as a business standpoint is broadly considered to be research completed through non-quantifiable means. As a result, non-quantifiable research relies on approaches and methodologies that focus on observation, interpretation and analysis, and often as a result discover entirely new relationships and causal relationships in subjects and data not seen before. Strauss and Corbin have defined qualitative research as "any kind of research that produces findings not arrived at by means of statistical procedures or other means of quantification" (1990,-page 17) and as a result generates an entirely different knowledge base for any field of research of academic inquiry than does quantitative research.

In the majority of research methodologies, the use of qualitative approaches and techniques are used for purposes of exploratory research according to Dr. Joppe and her tutorials on exploratory research (2007). Qualitative research techniques seek to set the foundation for the quantification of relationships in data in later stages of a multiphase research project. From this standpoint, qualitative research anchors the descriptive research aspects of any research study by seeking to first understand then analyze the extent of relationships seen throughout the subject(s) and areas of interest being studied. This is especially the case in education, where qualitative techniques used for describing the interaction of specific attributes of teaching strategies need to be first evaluated and analyzed to see their influence on the broader populations of interest.

There are many techniques and methodologies that researchers use in completing qualitative research studies. The key point to keep in mind about these specific techniques and methodologies is that the focus is first and foremost on developing insights into entirely new relationships, attributes, and in the case of educational counseling, the impact of alternate learning strategies on students' performance. Qualitative research studies also focus on looking to ascertain the attitudinal and perceptual biases and preferences of students, in an effort to further create a higher level of learning effectiveness from strategies created. In this regard qualitative research looks to find why students perceive, believe and act on one educational strategy relative to another. This is a very critical piece of descriptive research and also is essential defining the future direction of predictive research that will provide the quantification of which elements of a learning strategy will deliver the greatest results.

Qualitative research by definition is more exploratory in nature and as a result has the following characteristics. First, the data acquired from observational methods is by nature unstructured, which leads to more descriptive series of assumptions about how attitudes, behaviors and beliefs impact learning and academic performance through the use of counseling techniques and strategies. The more unstructured the data, the greater the need for continually building out a knowledge base of the area of interest. As a result of the less structured nature of qualitative data, this area of research techniques and methodologies rely to a much greater extent on open-ended questions which are used to gain greater insights from the respondents. The essence of qualitative research as an exploratory research strategy is the use of these open-ended questions to allow the respondents to provide insights that may not be obvious even more significant efforts to gain insights through knowledge alone. As a result of the inherent nature of qualitative research striving to find what motivates students to attain academic performance, including the ability to find value in counseling and act upon advice and direction they see as relevant, the strongest aspects of this area of research surfaces. Finding out the dynamics of how attitudes, beliefs, behaviors, and motivations impact student performance is invaluable and simply cannot be quantified first. What is most critical in many research efforts is to first find these dynamics of how students interact with and develop trust in their counselors;' guidance. For the counselor, finding strategies for making the greate4st contribution possible to students must begin on insights gained from qualitative research. In this regard, qualitative research is critical for setting the knowledge foundation for further, more quantified research. Another aspect of qualitative research that has been often overlooked by many academic researchers is the flexibility this approach provides for re-directing and following specific areas of interest depending on the respondents' interests and focus. This is a critical aspect of qualitative research in that it allows for a significantly greater level of flexibility in following interesting conversation threads with respondents. The focus on exploratory research, taken to an extreme in this regard, resembles an interview vs. A questionnaire-based discussion. The qualitative approach to research gives the researcher significantly greater latitude in pursuing a specific area of interest than do any methods in the more structured quantitative-based approaches used in sub-sequent stages of a research project. On addition to all the above-mentioned advantages there is also the disadvantages inherent in the qualitative research strategies mentioned here. The sample sizes are typically much smaller and therefore not as representative of the entire population as quantitative approaches rely on for statistical reliability and validity. As qualitative techniques do not look to project or define the aspect of their findings across an entire population, the reliability of the findings are often not as robust as with statistically valid quantitative research results. As a result of all these factors, qualitative research is often highly subjective in its interpretation and causality including the interlinking of knowledge generated with other previous experiences. In short, qualitative methods are excellent for building a foundation that defines how a respondent base of interest internalizes, perceives, interprets, and acts on the learning and counseling strategies found in much of the educational research that forms the foundation of strategies in use today.

The qualitative research methods that are most often used in educational research, specifically in the area of counseling include the following: observation; the experience survey; the case study; the pilot study; the depth interview; the focus groups; counselor, student and teacher panels; nominal group techniques; the Delphi method, and a series of projective techniques. Each of these techniques is briefly defined in the context of their contribution to educational research including the definition of learning strategies for the long-term.

Observation is one of the most commonly used approaches to qualitative research, as respondent error is not typically present; as this technique records actual behavior, not stated intentions or even past or future actions. There are several different classifications of the observation technique, and these include participant vs. nonparticipant observation, obtrusive vs. unobtrusive, natural vs. contrived settings, and disguised vs. non-disguised observation, structured vs. unstructured, and direct vs. indirect observation Each of these specific approaches to observation rely on the assumption that was is being observed is genuine and free from bias. Researchers most often use observation to discover ethnographic approaches to learning; which is an area of study that combines both qualitative and quantitatively-based approaches to completing research, yet centers on the social interactions of respondents. In the case of the observation method, ethnographers' studying students would attempt to see behaviors and actions that illustrate a high level of motivation, interest in learning, or a strong focus on how to gain insights into material. What is a major shortcoming of the observation method however is that one of the main benefits of the qualitative-focused research techniques that of finding out the attitudes, beliefs, behaviors and internal motivations of respondents (or students in the case of research on the influence of counseling) are not captured using this technique. There are also ethical issues pertaining to the observational method that will be discussed later in this paper.

Experience surveys are widely used throughout qualitative research studies, due to their focus on bringing greater insights into the study through the interviewing of experts in chosen fields. There is also a strong focus on how to gain insights of experts in the future definition of the methodology being created, and how the research objectives can be more effectively accomplished as well. Experience surveys also are often used in the first stages of a research project. Another qualitative research technique, the case study, takes the concept of gaining insight and applies it to an organization and its dynamics. A case study seeks to define and complete a thorough analysis of one or more specific circumstances within institution of interest. The goal of case studies is to measure the relationships, inter-dependencies and cause-and-effect implications of counseling and student achievement. The case study serves to codify in many respects the insights gained from a series of experience surveys completed in a company. Another approach to qualitative research, the pilot study is meant as a trail run on a much broader, and more in-depth qualitative research effort. The Depth Interview varies from the experience survey in that with the latter the focus is on interviewing an industry expert for guidance in both the areas of the study and its potential contributions to the broader field of knowledge. With Depth interviews, the focus is on spending time specifically with the respondents and going into great depth to understand their latent attitudes, feelings, perceptions and motivations behind specific areas of interest. In many respects the Depth Interview is the most powerful there is in the area of qualitative research in that it gains insight into the specifics of the respondents' perspective and viewpoint of the areas of interest. These are interviews most commonly completed by very advanced and skilled interviewers, and as a result require much time to complete correctly. A typical interview will take between 45 to 90 minutes to complete and is often videotaped or at the very least recorded. Focus groups and panels are approaches to looking at the sociological as well as the attitudinal implications of respondents' perceptions and actions. Both focus groups and panels also look to find a level of consensus in a group and discover through a series of questions what is most critical, most important, and deliver what is most insightful in the topics of interest. A researcher focusing on the impact of counseling on students for example would use a focus group to ascertain why certain counseling services where most and least popular, and also ask what the focus group, as a representative set of students, most felt was missing in their counseling services. There would also be the opportunity to ask respondents in a focus group to break into teams and define what is most critical in the ideal counseling program. Focus groups tend to meet only for a certain length of time, in fact they are often events more than long-running research program as panels are. As a result, focus gr9oups tend to delve more deeply into specific topics and look for both insights at the individual respondent but also at the group level to specific questions and concerns. A Panel on the other hand stresses the need for looking at how attitudes, beliefs and behaviors change over time. Certain panels meld together both the quantitative and qualitative, yet in their purest sense, panels serve to create a long-term sounding board on new initiatives and plans, while at the same time providing useful insights into the attitudes, beliefs and motivations of its members. Panels are used extensively in consumer research as well, with Sony Music using them to plan their current and future artist promotions and needs. The focus on panels from a counseling standpoint is more aligned with finding out what counseling strategies are needed and how the influence of online resources and learning can accentuate the students' overall learning experience. Nominal group techniques, the Delphi method, and projective techniques are also used as part of advanced strategies in qualitative research. Nominal group techniques are specifically used for finding potential alternatives to both actual and hypothetical scenarios, and have been used successfully in new product development efforts including the definition of entirely new web designs. The Delphi Method is often compared to the Nominal Group Technique, was developed by the well-known think-tank the RAND Corporation in 1969, and centers on utilizing a panel of experts to predict future potential outcomes of a decision. The Delphi Method is commonly used in new product and new market development to specifically define how a new product will be accepted into potential markets, how the creation of value will change the existing market and how the product attributes will need to change over time. The Delphi Method's many applications (IIT, 2007) also show how counseling research could greatly benefit from the "always on" nature of research globally through the use of experts on several continents simultaneously. As IIT has mentioned in their description and recommended steps for this technique, the focus on how to integrate often conflicting points-of-view and summarize a specific course of action is critical. The Delphi Method when applied to learning strategies is particularly challenging in that it forces a strong orientation towards a common objective when in fact multiple outcomes of equal value may be possible given the situation. The use of distributed experts however is excellent in that it minimizes the effects of dominating personalities on the broader results of the research. A final set of qualitative techniques include the projective techniques which look to draw out of the most deeply held attitudes, beliefs and perceptions as they relate to the research topic of interest. This is one of the most pow4rful sets of qualitative research tools in that it allows for respondents to project their attitudes, beliefs and perceptions on other objects or people, as they often feel that their own perceptions may be wrong or socially not accepted. Typically administered by psychiatrist and psychologists, these projective techniques include word association tests, sentence completion tests, thematic apperception tests (TAT), and 3rd person techniques. At first glance many feel these are highly customizable and quickly administered to respondents, yet in fact for these qualitative tools to be successful they need to have a specific aligning with the respondent and the research objective. Interpretation is quite precise and requires a trained psychiatrist or psychologist to complete.

In summary, the area of qualitative research is focused on expanding the body of knowledge in a given research area by finding out why and how respondents view and react to areas of interest. In the case of counseling and the improvement of strategies in serving students, qualitative research can be even more powerful than quantitative research, and also sets the foundation for further, more targeted and more refined approaches to measuring and validating market dynamics. Think of qualitative research as the foundation for any research effort to understand more about a given aspect of teaching or counseling. In emerging areas of research relating to counseling, this is a critical step in the overall process of building a knowledgebase that can scale for the long-term.

Exploring Quantitative Research Methods in Education and Counseling

The science of research is based on the foundation of quantitative research. These are the collection of techniques that specifically focus on the validation through statistical techniques and sampling to project the findings of research strategies onto a broader population. As the qualitative research techniques in this paper define the knowledgebase and contribute to the body of knowledge in a given field, the quantitative techniques and methodologies serve to quantify the relationships and also allow for a projection of survey results across an entire population of respondents. In the field of educational research where counseling strategies are critical for the future success of students especially in advanced grades, the combined effects of qualitative and quantitative research is critical;. Specifically in the area of quantitative research, the need exists for defining coaching strategies that can make a significant and lasting difference in the students affected.

The intent of this section is to define those quantitative research techniques that ally specifically in the areas of teaching and counseling research. The foundation of quantitative research is based on the laws of probability, specifically relati9ng to ensuring research results based on a sample can be extrapolated to a broader population. The techniques of simple random sampling, stratified or group-level random sampling, cluster and segment sampling are all techniques used to isolate and statistically validate specific hypotheses being tested. All research projects also rely on two hypotheses, often referred to as the Null and Alternative hypothesis. These hypotheses are used for validating or refuting a fundamental research premise the entire research project is based on. From a statistical analysis perspective, the proving of the Null Hypothesis is the objective of the research. The sampling plan, approach to defining validity and reliability measures of performance, questionnaire design and wording are all factors that contribute to the predictive nature of quantitative research techniques. The greater the level of analytical and statistical rigor that can be applied to a given research design, the higher the level of statistical predictability possible. That's why the collective set of quantitative approaches and methodologies is by far more powerful at predictive statistics than the qualitative-based approaches. Yet many quantitative research studies seek to both define and predict the future of counseling strategies on the overall performance of students, relying on both sets of statistical routines to accomplish this goal. The development however of quantitative-based research studies would not be possible without a strong foundation based on qualitative research. In this sense both approaches compliment one another.

For quantitative research to truly be reliable and valid, each specific question must also be designed to support one of four levels of measurement ands scaling. These include the nominal, ordinal, interval and ratio-scale of measurements that are pervasive through statistical analysis. The fact that nominal and ordinal data is binary by nature, meaning either a condition exists or it doesn't, is at an ample level of quantification for descriptive statistics. If a research study to determine the effects of positive reinforcement from counselors on cumulative GPA performance is needed and the predictors of performance are required, then questions need to be designed to reflect interval and ratio-level analysis of data, as these are by definition measures where the absolute distance of responses from each other is constant. This attribute of a given variable as captured through a questionnaire leads to much higher levels of predictive reliability and validity, and as a result more advanced statistical routines and techniques can be used. These include ANOVA (Analysis of Variance), forecasting techniques using multiple regression and correlation analysis, factor and cluster analysis which are excellent techniques for creating segments, and the development of entire econometric models that will predict the impact of educational attainment based on a very wide variety of variables that encompass sociological, economic, and demographic data.

The analysis of quantitative research is often completed through the use of statistical analysis programs, which are also programmed to understand the level of statistical robustness of each variable. Specifically if a variable is nominal, ordinal, interval or ratio scale, the statistical software program takes this into account when both descriptive and predictive statistics are run on the data. As a result, the validity and reliability of the data is more precisely aligned with the research objectives and the findings generated from the research itself.