Research Method - Assignment Example

Research Methods of the Research Study: The most important factor for to consider when choosing a car. Research question: What is the principal factor for students to consider before buying a Car? Introduction: It is proposed to conduct a PILOT SURVEY for getting answers of around 20 respondents to the above question. The broad aim of the pilot survey is to know what drives a student into buying a car, and the specific aspects that emerge would be with regard to pricing, sources of funding, comfort and safety considerations, besides fuel efficiency and power of the car. Literature review: A number of market research firms and consultants have done research on the trend of auto ownerships by student community, especially in age group of 18 – 25 years. According to these studies, the past trends of seeking lifts or borrowing cars from parents and friends has, over a period of time, fallen considerably, and most young people nowadays, prefer to own or lease their own cars, while some of them prefer to have their cars bought or leased by parents or other family members. According to them one very important factor would be regarding the repayment of monthly instalments towards the settlement of loan for purchase of the car. As it often happens, the inability to pay off the loan instalments could result in seizure of the vehicle and forfeiture of amounts paid by the student (Consumer Alerts. 2006). Therefore the economic consideration would be a major consideration and the students are cautioned to able to take loans only to extent it is financially feasible for them to repay on time, otherwise the interest burdens would make the loan proposal seem very unattractive in the long run and the student would be left with nothing but a lot of debts due to a bad bargain. The writings on the subject seem to suggest that there are a host of factors that may determine the choice of selection and could range from colour, interior décor and choice of accessories like air conditioners, music systems and plush upholstery, to pragmatic considerations like pricing, looking for hidden costs and conditionalities, that are only revealed in the fine print of the offer document. (Consumer Alert. 2006). According to a survey conducted by The Consumer Report National Research Centre conducted through telephone calls made to people over 18 years, the following aspects have the highest weightage when choosing a car: Fuel Economy (27%); Reliability (25%) Product pricing (14%) and Safety (12%) Further a May 2006 Consumer Report survey shows that the high gasoline costs have had a marked effect on the car users and nearly 37% of the current car users were contemplating that they would be changing over to more fuel efficient vehicles. Therefore, according to the results of this survey the important factor has been fuel efficiency and savings. (Fuel economy is the best incentive. 2005). Methodology and research Strategy: The strategy for this Pilot Survey has been through online surveys. The various respondents who have participated have been drawn from a cross section of the student population, aged between 18- 25 years, of genders, income groups, family and cultural backgrounds, in order to represent a viable segment of the target population, once the main survey is taken up after a length of time. Having diverse backgrounds and settings renders the pilot survey most convincing and reliable and eliminates the incidence of bias in sampling and data collection. The selection was made through online chats, telephonic appointments, by mail and personal interviews, requesting their participation in the pilot survey. The interviews and questionnaires were administered through online methods using the web-enabled software. Then norms were established through the use of question and answer techniques, both open-ended and closed which was designed primarily to understand the motive behind their choice of what constituted the main aspects of auto dealings, and what was the chief motivator for buying behaviour. The questionnaires offered were in the form of multiple choices and also, open ended questions in which the respondents had a wider scope of expressing his/her thoughts and intents. The control of the sampling was done by assigning unique password to each respondent, in order to ensure that the same person did not respond more than once to the research study. Further, in order to ensure that there was maximum participation by all the respondents, reminders were sent to the respondents who did not respond, in the first instance. Also, the results of the interim survey were sent to absentee respondents in order to encourage them to participate in the survey and ensure its success. Ethical implications of Research: The ethical implications of research relates to the permission to be sought from the parents, of underage students, who act as respondents in this Survey. Since the nature of this survey is confidential, it is also necessary that its results need to be kept confidential and known only to the persons/agencies to which it needs to be revealed. The matters under this pilot survey would be in the areas of assessing the prime criteria for students to determine what motivates them to buy car and the survey is set to gauge the present trend of the student culture and spending habits through this survey. Thus it is of paramount need that the proceedings of the survey and its outcome needs to be kept in utmost confidentiality within local settings. Analysis of the survey: The results of the survey carried out revealed that nearly 39% of the students wanted to purchase a new car, whereas 32% were in favour of used cars, 49% believed in own purchase or lease of their cars whereas 26% had cars owned or leased by family for them It further showed that college students individually spend around $9860 on auto purchases. (Rochester 2004). Besides the key influences like overall quality dependability and pricing, nearly 55 % of the respondents believed that the brand of the car or its model is a prime criteria when it comes to the question of buying a particular car or not. Nearly 51 % of the respondents believed that it would be necessary to know about the hidden costs in terms of interests and default charges, including mark up due to delayed or non payment for delayed or non-payments of instalments? They were also interested in knowing the conditionality under which the car could be repossessed by the company. In the case of used car, it was seen during the course of the survey that nearly 44% of the respondents believed in investing between £1501 and £ 2000 where a majority of 69% of the respondents believed in new cars investing more than £ 4000. According to the results of the pilot survey, the respondents stood as below in their choice of the most important criteria or prime factor for choice of car: Brand : : 55 % of the respondents Pricing : : 32 % of the respondents Model : 13 % of the respondents Fuel efficiency : 28 % of the respondents Driving safety : 25% of the respondents Power : 18% of the respondents Others (specify) including affordability and resale value: 12 % of the respondents. Findings of the survey Thus, it could be judged from the pilot survey carried out that the primary consideration among students would be the brand image of the car which constitutes the single dominant factor in this survey. As has already been established this is only a pilot survey conducted to know the trends and preferences of a sample population although it could be said that it has been authentic and free of statistical variances and errors since the data were fed into computers and the data analysis and results were free of manual or statistical errors. It could be said that this Pilot study would be the gateway to the detailed and comprehensive study that would be carried on this topic later on. However the basis of this study and its findings would definitely be utilized for the future study on this aspect of student spending behaviour on cars and the trends that have been established in this important aspect of campus culture. While it is an established fact that young people do tend to be impulsive in their spending habits it is seen from the present study that this aspect is now in the decline since nearly 25% of the respondents had laid stress on the safety aspects of driving and also, they were concerned about the resale value and the affordability that car purchases would envisage not only for themselves but also for their parents. The cost factor, especially in the case of equated monthly instalments are important since funds would have to be set aside for meeting the monthly charges, and therefore, the students need to consider all aspects of financing and maintaining a car before deciding to go ahead with the purchase of one. Conclusion: It has been seen that ownership or possession of a car has become an important aspect of campus culture in the current settings and most students, whether residents or non-residents of the campus do believe that use of a car would be a definite advantage for their own use. Therefore, it is seen that in the present context that a large majority of students either owned a car themselves (71%) or combined with spouse and it was only a low percentage that depended on parents owned cars. (Rochester 2002). Questionaire 1. Would you prefer to purchase the car from (1) Manufacturer (2) Dealer outlet (3) Open market (4) Previous Owner? 2. Would you prefer to (1) buy your own car or (1) Borrow from friends (2) Drive family owned or leased car (4) use public transport? 3. Would you enquire abut the hidden costs from the salesman before transacting the deal for car? 4. Would you set your budget for the car between (1) Below £1000 (2) Between £1001 and £2500 (3) Between £2501 and £ 4000 (4) Above £ 4001? 5. What is the most significant factor you would consider while choosing a car : (1)Brand (2) Pricing (3) Model (4) Fuel efficiency (5) Driving safety (6) Power (7) Others (specify)?…………………………………………………………….. ………………………………………………………………………………….. 5. Please describe the attributes that you would like your ideal car to have: ……. …………………………………………………………………………………….. ……………………………………………………………………………………. …………………………………………………………………………………….. Bibliography Consumer Alerts. (2006). [online]. Credit Loans. Last accessed 4 January 2008 at: http://www.creditloan.com/auto-loans-use-online-calculator-and-clear-your-confusion.html Fuel economy is the best incentive. (2005). [online].Consumer Reports.org. Last accessed 4 January 2008 at: http://www.consumerreports.org/cro/cars/new-cars/news/2006/fuel-economy-is-the-best-car-incentive-8-06/overview/0608_fuel-economy-is-the-best-car-incentive_ov.htm ROCHESTER (2004). College students to spend nearly $15 billion on cars in 2004. [online]. Harris Interactive. Last accessed 4 January 2008 at: http://www.harrisinteractive.com/news/allnewsbydate.asp?NewsID=801 ROCHESTER (2002). College students to spend nearly $200 billion Per Year. [online]. Harris Interactive. Last accessed 4 January 2008 at: http://www.harrisinteractive.com/news/allnewsbydate.asp?NewsID=480 Read More