Principles of Research and Practice - Assignment Example

Principles of Research in Media and Cultural Studies Research from time to time is described, to some extent, as the organized production of modern facts with replicable skills. To gather the requirements, educational group must be achieved in such a way that other researchers could essentially go over the processes and decide whether the outcomes hold up (Babbie: 1998). Research tools are important in formulating logical thoughts and in supporting the conclusion of a study. Therefore, “subjectivity becomes the mark of objectivity, for it proves that the study is unadulterated by any aspects save those general to all spectators.” Many researchers categorize empirical research methods into three categories: experimental, correlational, and descriptive (Creswell: 1994). These all correspond to ways of taking guesses and theories about humanity into argument with knowledge. Researchers must conduct testing for a wider range of basis, testing starts from pre-testing a research design to challenging the process of a measuring instrument. There is a popular application of methods in examining the fundamentals of hypotheses and this is very appropriate in giving the most reliable evidence of causation (Deacon ET. Al.:1999). A researcher must work on two essential things; first, he must have a control to at least one independent variable. He must observe and measure an independent variable. Second, he must do a random assignment, the researcher must decide whether or to what extent an investigational contributor is depicted to the independent variable. The numerous independent variable in an investigational designs is significantly helpful, the outcomes in the field of media may vary for different kinds of people, such as creating consent to the knowledgeable study of these differences (Jensen: 2002). For example, including both experiences to mediated opposition and gender in one design allows a researcher to observe the independent variable with hostility and their interaction. An interaction happens every time the end result of one thing on another differs according to some third variable. For example, disclosure may have more impact on males than on females. Investigational studies are high in internal validity because of the value for causal inference. In order to use mass communication, social and cultural backgrounds of the viewers must be observed to give a full description of the “real” world. For an instance, connection to broadcasted violence usually happens at home (Malhorta and Birks: 2000). If a researcher be in control of it, he has no guarantee that the results studied will be relevant in more distinctive contexts. Thus, experimental research may specify what can happen, rather than what really happen in "realistic" situations. Experimental research also leans to be limited to the short-term effect of the mass media. One typically cannot influence and have power over media-related activities for months or years. The researcher has no influence in a study using a co-variation among variables, such as televised violence and assault in children (Jensen: 2002). As an alternative, a researcher generally determines the variables as they take place obviously. Such studies usually fall well short of gathering the standards for causal conclusion. A correlation study, regarding measures of discovery to televised violence and aggression; it was a synchronic or cross-sectional study. Each variable was assessed at only one time point. It is occasionally probable to control time order by using a diachronic study, concerning more than one time point. One could correlate a determined independent variable with later adjusts in a dependent variable. Regardless of this inadequacy, correlational studies usually reflect naturally in occurring processes. In this sense, they are high in external validity. In fact, many questions are examined using both experimental and correlational techniques (Malhorta and Birks: 2000). To the extent, each type gives similar evidence such as a person's exposure to mediated violence increases, so does his or her aggression, the two complement each other nicely. Each is strong exactly where the other is weak. Lastly, descriptive studies can be described merely to which something is present (Marshall and Rossman: 1999). There are no efforts made to link self-determining variables with dependent variables. A study regarding the amount of violence during a typical week of prime-time television would demonstrate a descriptive study. Mass communication has a very important impact not only on people, but on the whole social groups which varies in size from families to the whole populations and cultures. Therefore, not like more conventional scholastic disciplines like psychology, media research uses a wide variety of levels of analysis (Newman: 1998). A media researcher studying the effect of television violence on the aggressiveness of a child uses a psychological level; a researcher studying the impact of mass communication on the economic development of an entire country works at a sociological level. Generally speaking, media research engages more on the psychological or sociological levels (Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill: 2003). The sociological level is tremendously broad, because it covers different groups varying in size from dyads in order to complete a society. In fact, most media research is openly connected into a social psychological discipline that is usually described as the study of how individuals are pressured by other persons. Even within the discipline of social psychology, a quantity of researchers reveals a psychological turned and others a sociological one. If a researcher is working in a changeable field, he must be very cautious not to simplify results and theories inappropriately from one level to another (Maykut and Morehouse: 1994). The researcher might discover that societies that have extremely high levels of violence in their media be inclined to have high rates of violent crime, as well. This would not essentially show that violent criminals be likely to see more media violence than others do. An individualistic fallacy engages the conflicting assumption that there is a connection between individuals that produce a similar pattern among groups. There are researchers that work at only one level of analysis, because the person is by far the most widespread rank in communication studies (Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill: 2003). A theorist or researcher studying different groups in a society is likely to presume that such occasions are holistic. From time to time, researchers take for granted the conflicts, that an observable fact at one level is reducible to another, more basic level. In case, a researcher may assume that a sociological phenomenon such as the degree of modernity in a country can be described, by references to the levels of achievement between individuals. Synthetically, studying the divided responses of individual people to mass media using an investigational laboratory setting, may facilitate separate certain factors at work when people also concentrate to the real world situations in media (Deacon et. Al.:1999). In reality, people may focus to media along with other people or because of social motives, such as to become notified in order to contribute as a citizen in a democracy. In particular for the reason that its position as a variable field, the study of communication nowadays signifies a potentially productive gathering ground among social scientists. Its separation, often strengthen by organizational structures and a culture that occasionally considered as "academic." Mass media is even more detached from its associated disciplines like the humanities and social sciences. Quantitative Methods in Studying Social and Cultural Life In making a significant study, it is important that the researcher would have the ability to efficiently determine the best methodologies to be used in order to ensure that the objective and purpose of the research will be met. Through the appropriate methodologies, researches made will be able to have a direction to follow in order to gather the pertinent information and to be able to establish a valid conclusion that would answer the problems posited in the research. In addition, good methodologies will also enable the researcher to provide plausible recommendation to the problems stated. Part of these research methods is the determination of the best approach in collecting or gathering relevant data. Quantitative approaches are defined as an approach which uses statistical techniques to determine the result of the research and is based on large samples. If this will be used in risk management process, the person involved must have the ability to use quantified and numerical data to formulate a specific model to reduce or eliminate the risk elements. In addition, this method typically includes the construction of scales and questionnaires (Creswell: 1994, Malhotra & Birks: 2000). Quantitative Method composed of two kinds of data collection method: the survey method and the observation methods. Survey method comprises of personal interview and self-administered questionnaire which would be useful to determine the risks factors and its causes. Most quantitative research approaches, regardless of their theoretical differences, tend to emphasize that there is a common reality on which people can agree (Newman & Benz: 1998) quantitative approaches is based upon the differences in assumptions about what reality is and whether or not it is measurable. The debate further rests on differences of opinion about how people can best understand what we "know," whether through objective or subjective methods. The individuals working in the naturalistic paradigm believe that there is no single, objective reality "out there," and that people perceive and construct their own realities based on their experiences and understanding of the world around them (Marshall & Rossman: 1999). The process that use quantitative approach attempt to capture the world of their risks assessment by understanding the perceived realities and interpreting teach from their own subjective perspectives as both researchers and individuals. The involved person in the risk management process, supposed that the risks is something perceived by those who may experience it. Herein, it is believed that the outer world or the "external reality" is inseparable from what people already perceived based on how they live and the experiences within their inner reality (Krieger: 1999). In fact, it is argued that the knowledge of the external world is only a small part of what total knowledge can be; what people ever really know is, in essence, self. Thus, the reality that people all see is based on the understanding of the world, which in turn is based on our knowledge of the self. Conversely, this is very different to the positivist ideology of quantitative approach. Interestingly, this "positivism" was a move away from a more speculative, more "unknowable" view. It was a move away from relying on theological and metaphysical explanations of the world. For instance, in risk management process, the person involved relies on a more in-depth analysis using analytical and mathematical approaches to determine the risks. It was a move toward what could be "positively" (confirmed through sensory data) determined (Newman & Benz: 1998). A ‘positivist’ school of thought has been lined up against critical and interpretive perspectives (Jensen: 2002). These different social-cultural perspectives vary in terms of the perceived objectives of the risk management process, the way social reality and human beings are conceived, the role of theory-driven empirical inquiry and the kind of evidence to which most weight is given. In addition, logical positivism upheld an absolute distinction not only between facts and values, but between empirical observations and theoretical conceptions of reality. Filstead (1979) is adamant that quantitative method ‘represent fundamentally different epistemological frameworks for conceptualizing the nature of knowing, social reality, and procedures for comprehending these phenomena. Quantitative approach in studying social and cultural life is first conceptually reduced to a number of measurable and observable behavioural variables. These variables are defined and a system for measuring these variables is determined before actual observation is done. A hypothesis that tentatively describes the relationships among these behavioural variables is then postulated. These relationships, if confirmed through empirical behavioural data, provide a quantitative description or explanation of the phenomenon. These defined behavioural variables are then observed to gather information or data of their quantities. Statistical analyses are performed on these quantitative data to determine whether evidence of the hypothesized relationships indeed exists and the hypotheses are either confirmed or not confirmed. This quantitative approach may be described as a positivistic approach, contains a number of strengths and weaknesses. The main advantages are its objectivity and replicability. When properly conducted, the results of a quantitative observational study are independent of the observer; in other words, different observers following similar procedures should report similar results. This makes the results more credible to an external audience. The main disadvantage of this approach is that when a complex behavioural phenomenon is reduced to few quantifiable variables, the phenomenon can be overly simplified. Even if the research hypothesis is confirmed, it may be that the outcome is only an incomplete and at times unjustifiably superficial and shallow understanding of the phenomenon. Methodologies are perspectives on research; they set out a vision for what research is and how it should be conducted. They are the connection between axioms and methods; methods are tools-techniques of data gathering, techniques of analysis, and techniques of writing. Because it is a tool, a particular method can often be used by many different methodologies. Therefore, methodologies are at a more abstract (or general) level than are methods. Methodology is like a strategy-or plan-for achieving some goal; methods are the tactics that can be used to service the goals of the methodology. In essence, methodologies provide the blueprints that prescribe how the tools should be used. Those prescriptions can be traced to the axioms beliefs about how research should be conducted. References Babbie, E. R. (1998). The Practice of Social Research. 8th Edition. Belmont CA: Wadsworth Publishing. Creswell, J.W. (1994). Research design: Qualitative and Quantitative approaches. Thousand Oaks, California: Sage. Deacon. D., Pickering, M., Golding, P. & Murdock, G. (eds) (1999) Researching Communications: A Practical Guide to Methods in Media and Cultural Analysis, London: Arnold Filstead, W.J. (1979). “Qualitative Methods: A Needed Perspective in Evaluation Research.” In T.D. Cook & C.S. Reichardt (Editions.). Qualitative and Quantitative Methods in Evaluation Research. Beverly Hills: Sage. Jensen, K. (2002). A Handbook of Media and Communication Research: Qualitative and Quantitative Methodologies. London: Routledge. Krieger, S. (1991). Social Science and the Self: Personal Essays on an Art Form. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press. Malhotra, N.K. & Birks, D.F. (2000). Marketing Research: an Applied Approach, 3rd edition, Essex, Prentice Hall. Marshall, C. & Rossman, G.B. (1999). Designing Qualitative Research. 3rd Edition. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Maykut, P.S. & Morehouse, R. (1994). Beginning Qualitative Research: A Philosophic and Practical Guide. Washington, D.C.: Falmer Press. Newman, I. & Benz, C.R. (1998). Qualitative-quantitative research methodology: Exploring the interactive continuum. Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois Saunders, M., Lewis, P. & Thornhill, A. (2003). Research Methods for Business Students. 3rd Edition. New York: Prentice Hall. Read More