Research Methods Paper- Explore either Attraction or Procrastination - Essay Example

I. Introduction The development of romantic Attraction is an interesting topic that young people of today often discuss. Developing interpersonal relations with the opposite sex can lead to romantic attraction. For this reason, this area is often a popular research theme in psychology as well as sociology. It is interesting to understand and realize influence of physical beauty in looking for a romantic partner. Apparently, young people still “judge a book by its cover”. This research tries to understand certain behaviors of young people such as understanding the factors that makes them romantically attracted to a member of the opposite sex.

In particular, this research would dwell on the influence of physical looks in developing a romantic relationship. II. Statement of Purpose:The research aims to investigate the degree of influence physical looks play in developing a romantic attraction among young people.Specifically, it seeks to answer the following questions:1. How do the respondents profile be described in terms of:1.1 Age1.2 . gender2. How does a high school student’s perception of beauty be associated with romantic attraction?III. Methodology The study would use the normative survey technique under descriptive method of research.

Descriptive normative survey is a fact finding study which goes beyond mere gathering and tabulation of data. This approach attempts to establish norms or standards based on a wide class of survey data. In addition, it is used to collect demographics data about people’s behavior, practices, intentions, beliefs, attitudes, opinions, and judgments. Since this research is concerned with commonality of some elements, the researchers would be able to gather adequate and accurate interpretations on the attitudes of young people’s valuing of physical looks when engaging in a romantic relationship.

The survey method was chosen for this project since it is an inexpensive way of collecting even a large amount of data. However, a survey can also be a failure if the questionnaire is poorly constructed and the implementation of the survey was not well monitored. Also, participants may have ambivalent answers when confronted with an answer choice. It must also be taken into account that bias can also occur when the sampling is not properly considered. Nevertheless, the survey method would best fit the needs of this research since the subjects are high school students and their perception cannot be quantified.

The instrument that would be used to collect data is the questionnaire. This was chosen because it gathers data faster than any other method. Besides, the respondents are high school students 13-16 who could easily read the questionnaires with ease and full privacy. Also, this method is easy to use for a large number of participants and can be arranged and quantified since it supplies standardized answers. Each question would be assigned a numerical code to ease the collection of the data.

The questionnaire comprises of 18 items (Likert scales) that reflect the varying degree of the importance of physical looks . This also highlights the participation of students in the study, as this reflect their perception towards physical looks and romantic engagement. Questions are geared towards answering the research objectives identified.Reference:Nevid, J. A Guide to Psychology: Concepts and Applications, Third Edition. Houghton Mifflin.