Counseling Psychology - Essay Example

The area of research that the writer has picked is to go into counseling psychology. The goals defined in terms of working with children and adolescents with social, emotional, and behavioral issues can prove to be quiet a challenging task as it will require dealing with teens struggling with abuse, trauma, poverty, drug use, and criminal activity. The study falls along the same lines as my own research on juvenile crime and the social factors that contribute to juvenile delinquency. The writer has chosen sequential exploratory design which makes sense largely because of its focus on exploring a certain topic using qualitative as well as quantitative data which further validates the authenticity of the findings. I have chosen the very same mixed research method to conduct my study while involves dealing with a similar participant base and challenges.

My area of interest is that of criminology, the study of the nature, extent, causes and control of criminal behavior in an individual as well as a society. To narrow down my area of interest into a specific branch of criminology I have picked the topic of juvenile crime and delinquency which analyses the acts committed against the law by underage individuals.The mixed method research design that suits research into my area of interest is sequential explanatory strategy. Similar to sequential explanatory strategy, it is conducted in two phases. However this strategy is characterized by the collection and analysis of qualitative data followed by the collection and analysis of quantitative data. In turn, priority is given to the qualitative aspects of this study. The purpose of this strategy is to use quantitative data and results to assist in the interpretation of the qualitative findingsSince in my mixed method design qualitative and quantitative methods are both incorporated their strengths and their weaknesses form a crucial part in contributing to the overall research; so quantitative research’s key weakness is the possibility that due to to the focus on hypothesis testing and not generation, the overall objective of the study might not be fulfilled. Also the generalizability of the study might be limited to certain areas, situations or individuals (Knowledge base).

This is where the sequential explanatory strategy comes in as it will incorporate both qualitative and quantitative methods. Key challenges of this approach can be the time factor required to gathering the data and analyzing both the quantitative and qualitative data since incorporating both is crucial to the research design. (Creswell, 2009).

During my research I came across an article about Buck et al on ‘Profiles of Urban, Low SES, African American Girls’ Attitudes Toward Science’. Since my own and the writer’s chosen method to conduct the research was that of sequential explanatory strategy. The purpose of his study was to increase the education community’s understanding of the experiences and needs of girls that are discriminated on basis of gender, race and socioeconomic status in a manner that has left their needs largely invisible. The researchers followed a sequential explanatory strategy, in which they used two data collection phases, qualitative followed by quantitative, to investigate 89 African-American girls’ personal orientations towards learning. The mixed method analysis provided four personality orientations which linked academic success and experiences with confidence and importance of science to value/ desire. The conclusion of the research suggested.