Job Discussion Forums

[naturegirl321]

Can someone explain this simply? I'm looking through all the material for my thesis and they say that I have to describe the type of investigation: quantitative or qualitative.

And they further say that I have six choices:
For Quantitative: empiric-analytic or positivist
For Qualitative: interpretive or constructivist
critic or sociocritic vs participative

They've explained the first choice and have left out the other choices. I've been searching on the internet and have found that constructivist means that they accept it to be true if and only if it can be proved true.

Can anyone help shed some light on what the other mean? Or point me in the right direction? Thanks a lot

[Kootvela]

I don't think you have to describe the method itself. Your professors should be smart enough to know what's behind the name. They probably want you to choose a method and briefly write how you are going to apply it and with what data.

[Dedicated]

I teach research methods and EAP at a UK university. The best thing you can do is to try to get hold of a copy of "Research Methods in Education" (5th edition) by Cohen, Manion and Morrison, published by Routledge. This really is the standard work and invaluable.

What they are referring to are research paradigms. Roughly speaking (so I don't bore everybody) there are three main paradigms : 1.Positivist, or Scientific, which mainly uses quantitative methods to collect data (eg. questionnaires or experiments).2. Interpretivist, or sometimes called constructivism, which predominantly uses qualitative methods, such as interviews or case studies. 3. Critical, which uses mixed quantitative and qualitative methods, and where the research is designed to initiate change (cf Paulo Freire and "Pedagogy of the Oppressed").

Critical research is becoming very popular at present, whereas in EFL, positivist is rather "out of fashion" in the UK at least.

I hope this helps - pm me if you need more help. Good luck with the research!

[Glenski]

Too much linguistico-psycho jargon for my taste.

Quantitative -- it can be expressed in facts and numbers.
Qualitative -- it cannot. It is expressed only in subjective values.

Research can be a mix of both.

[naturegirl321]

Thanks a lot. It'll be a relief when I get the thesis done with.

[soapdodger]

Perhaps a more sensible set of questions for people embarking on research for a higher academic qualification might go something like this:

1. Have you chosen this subject for research because
(a) Having had a look round and discovered that all sensible, meaningful and applicable subjects, to say nothing of nutty, outrageous and outright useless ones have been covered over and over again, this was all you could come up with.
(b) You hope this choice panders to the taste of your supervisor and that this will guarantee a result.
(c) It offers the opportunity to produce lots of intelligent-looking guff that no-one will be able or interested enough to check the validity of?
(d) After years of study, you believe you have found a ground-breaking advance in your field which will change and improve it enormously.

2. Realistically who do you think is going to read your paper once it is finished?
(a) You
(b) You and your supervisor and one or two other people who are obliged to skim it to get their daily crust.
(c) In addition to (a) and/or (b) above, friends, family and anyone else you hope to impress.( Read bore rigid)
(d) Most serious practitioners in your field worldwide through extracts published in eminent journals.

3.What is your motivation for embarking on this project?
(a) Vanity
(b) A desire to stay as far away from anything that looks like real work or the real world for as long as humanly and financially possible.
(c) Money. You believe that higher qualifications automatically guarantee higher salaries. Sub question. As an obviously accomplished researcher you have (i) Not bothered to read the statistics for unemployed doctorate-holders as they are irrelevant (ii) Read them but discount them (iii) Read them but do not understand them, they require further research that you will be applying for a grant to carry out.
(d) You believe your research could benefit the lives of countless people around the world.

4. What do you expect to achieve by this research?
(a) Some fancy letters after your name to remind lesser mortals what a monumental genius you are.
(b) Writer's crap or keyboard-related stress disorder that you may be able to sue your institution for.
(c) A better and more important job where you can boss others around and be worshipped like a God.
(d) New and valuable results that will benefit and help to advance your field.

5. How will your paper be used once it is finished?
(a) To gather dust in a large subterranean warehouse at your institution reserved for such efforts.
(b) Bound in a large, brightly-coloured tooled leather cover as the centrepiece in the cubbyhole that passes for your office.
(c) As a corrective for wobbly furniture
(d) As a definitive text in your field.

Note to assessors: candidates answering (d) to all fields should be automatically disqualified and in more than one be regarded with acute suspicion.

Naturegirl, not having a dig at you personally, just academic onanism as a whole!

[naturegirl321]

WEll, I changed my topic twice already. First, because it jsut wasn't practical to carry it out. Second because my thesis tutor didn't approve.
I choose games because I like them and now in Korea am finding that all my classes revolve around games. However, I'm finding it really difficult to figure out how to write my thesis on something very subjective.

Right now I just want to finish, and I just started

Only myself, my tutor and the two peole who are obliged to read it will read it. That and my mother. I don't think that my husband would read it, but that's due to language.

Why am I doing it? TO get my MA. I think that higher qualifications equals higher jobs, not necessarily more pay, but hopefully less stress and a move from the classroom to making materials or planning curicculums.

I just want the fancy degree.

I'll use my paper by playing it up on my CV.

[soapdodger]

I really didn't mean you to answer them! Nice that you did and honestly too. I wish you luck. Incidentally, with reference to the note for assessors, and your responses, it seems to work, doesn't it!!!!

[gaijinalways]

Yes Soap old boy, that is the funny thing with questions, even flippant ones, some people take them seriously and actually answer them !

As I tell my students, "Now are you going to give me your cellphone or am I going to have to carry you outside the classroom?" No one has taken me up on that second choice yet (must have something to do with me blocking out the sun when I ask it ).