Research Methodology

Significance of Research in Social Sciences

Social sciences refer to business, commerce, demography, psychology, sociology, etc. Social sciences directly involve people. Research in social sciences arena deals with the  behavior  of people in their different roles, such consumers, competitors, producers, executives, salespersons, leaders, workers, followers, teachers, students, opinion-makers, etc. Research in social sciences deals with the systematic method of discovering new facts or of verifying old facts, their sequence, inter-relationship, casual explanations and the natural laws which cover them.

The importance that social science research wields today is immeasurable and enlarging. As social, business and economic problems abound, the significance of social research gets enhanced as it provides workable solutions.… Read the rest

Abey Francis

The Purpose of Research

Research is the process of a systematic and in-depth study or search of any particular topic, subject or area of investigation, involving collection, compilation, presentation and interpretation of relevant details or data. It is a careful search or inquiry into any subject matter, which is an  endeavor  to discover to find out valuable facts which would be useful for solving problems or improving existing solutions to problems. The research that involves scientific analysis would result in the formulation of new theories, the discovery of new techniques, modification of old concepts or a knocking-off an existing theory, concept or technique.

Research has proved to be a powerful tool in driving the mankind towards development.… Read the rest

Abey Francis

Standard Error in Hypothesis Testing

The standard error is an indispensable tool in the kit of a researcher, because it is used in testing the validity of statistical hypothesis. The standard deviation of the sampling distribution of a statistic is called the standard error. The standard error is important in dealing with statistics (measures of samples) which are normally distributed.

Here the use of the word “error” is justified in this connection by the fact that we usually regard the expected value to be true value and the divergence from it as error of estimation due to sampling fluctuations. The term standard error has a wider meaning than merely the standard deviation of simple sampling because of the following reasons;

  1. The standard error is mainly employed for testing the validity of a given hypothesis.
… Read the rest
Abey Francis

The Literature Review in Research

Once the research problem is identified and its delimitation made, review of literature is carried out. Sometimes literature review helps in problem identification. But this may be referred to as research reconnaissance. Literature  Review means a review or study of literature relevant to the study taken up by the researcher. The literature may be i) research reports, ii) research papers, iii) reference books, iv) periodicals covering issues relevant to the topics of research, v) government policy notes and reports on issues relevant to the topics, vi) relevant statutes, case laws and legal pronouncements, vii) scholarly text books, etc. The literature may be published or unpublished (but must be  authenticated), local, national and global, individual or organizational, periodic or one-time and so on.… Read the rest

Abey Francis

The Research Problem

The first step in research is formulating the research problem. Stefan Nowak defined a research problem as “a certain question or set of questions to which the research is to provide an answer”.

Problem Identification

Identifying a research problem is the first and foremost step in any research process. A researcher has to devote considerable time and attention for this. A research problem refers to some deprivation or shortcoming or a gap in knowledge that a researcher experiences in a theoretical or practical situation and wants to find a solution for the same. Research really begins when the above referred situation demanding a solution is perceived by the researcher within the realm of general topic selected by hum.… Read the rest

Abey Francis

Sources of Hypothesis in Research

A hypothesis is an assumption about:

  1. The relationship between/among variables or
  2. The level of influence of independent variables on the dependent variable or
  3. The value of population parameter.

Thus relationship between income and brand preference, between education and habit of savings, between cost of capital and capital structure, between motivation and productivity, etc., are hypotheses of the first type. The influence of sales on profit, of profit on value of business, of reward on performance and such other things are the second type. The third type involves putting values on population parameters such as the mean monthly salary of students who graduated from a particular university in the first year of their employment is 1000$ in 2012 or on an average management graduates wait for 6 months after graduation to get job or 40% management graduates get administrative jobs and so on.… Read the rest

Abey Francis