-Find a topic that you are interested in (be specific as possible) -Read about what has been done and found before in that area -Identify gaps, limitations, or unanswered questions
Choose a research design
-choose the research design that is most appropriate and feasible for testing your hypothesis ~randomized or quasi-experimental ~comparative, associational ~single-case designs
Develop Methods
-operationalize the variables so that you can measure them -data collection: ~survey/questionnaire ~ test ~ observations
Select participants
Probability sampling: -simple random sample -stratified random sampling Non-probability sampling: -convenience sampling -quato sampling -snowball sampling
Recruit Participants
-Provide the participants with the informed consent information -explain why the study is being conducted (but not the actual hypotheses)
Gather and Analyze Data
-enter it -verify/clean it -select the statistics that adequately tests your hypothesis ~correlation/regressions for variable associations ~t-test/ANOVAs for group comparisons
Type I vs. Type II errors
Type I: -when you reject the null hypothesis when you were not suppose to
Type II: -when you fail to reject the null hypothesis when you were suppose to