Thesis Support

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Comment by DebbieFuco on July 8, 2010 at 8:24am

Hello Everyone,

I am finished with my course work, taking comps in October, and at the beginning stages of writing my proposal. I have a two questions:

1. What software do you use or suggest using to organize your research? My school, Saint Louis University, offers EndNotes, however, it is not compatible with my older Mac PowerBook G4. I've heard of Mac people using Scriviner. What are your thoughts?
2. Does anyone have suggestions on a book or site that helps construct surveys or questionnaires? My mixed methods research project will include surveys and interviews.

Thanks!

Debbie

Comment by Bob Zenhausern on January 24, 2010 at 10:11am

This site has been quiet, but new members have joined. Let me repeat my offer of support for anyone who needs help at any stage of the dissertation process. I directed dissertations for 35 years in psych and ed. Let me know how I can help.

Comment by Bob Zenhausern on November 17, 2009 at 4:39pm

Bob Livingston,
If your committee approves it, who at the school level would disapprove. You have chosen 3 experts in the field and why would others deny that expertise. Sounds logical doesn't it? But one thing I learned is that Academia is not logical.

Dissertations differ from school to school and I think the first 3 chapters are Statement of the Problem and hypotheses, review of the lit, and method and procedure -- or something like that. Is that right?

My reaction to your problem is that if the test is so sensitive to minor terminology changes, it is not robust enough to use in the first place. Again logic does not necessarily rein supreme in Academia. Perhaps you need to consider who is going to second guess your committee. Are there Luddites who are just looking for any chance to shoot down technology?

Now to get a little more serious. Assume the worst and the school demands a pilot to show your changes do not affect reliability and validity. A simple solution might be to give the original and modified versions of the test to the prospective subjects in your study and show the results are the same. Counterbalance order or forms and let time pass between the two admins. If they do not ask for it, do it anyway with half the subjects starting on form 1 at the start of the experiment and form 2 at the end. Reverse it for the other half. This makes a neat little auxiliary study to publish on norms for the MLQ.

Knowing nothing about your study does this make sense?

Comment by Bob Livingston on November 17, 2009 at 9:50am

Bob, this dissertation process is like watching grass grow - and expensive grass at that. My committee approved the first three chapters of the dissertation last week and it has been sent to the school for their approval. I should hear back from them within a month.

The area they may ding me on is I made changes, much like Pounder and others did, to the MLQ (Form 5X) survey instrument. The changes were to make the terminology consistent with the online learning environment. Pounder and others found, in doing the same thing I'm doing, that the instrument maintained its validity. Based on that, I chose to not do a pilot. This decision could come back and bite me if the school disagrees with my rational. So, what can you tell me about pilot studies? Will they ask me to do one for my study? Should I do one anyway, even if they don't ask me to or will the internal validity of the results in the finished product be enough?

...Bob Livingston

Comment by Bob Zenhausern on October 15, 2009 at 4:29pm

This group has been quiet for a while. Now that school has started is anyone conemplating or actually working on research? Does anyone need help in statistics?

Comment by Bob Zenhausern on August 24, 2009 at 10:24am

Things have been quiet here for a while as we all enjoy Summer vacation up over and Winter break down under. I would like to discuss any dissertation/theses ideas, problems, etc for anyone who would like some help.

Comment by Hilary Greenebaum on June 29, 2009 at 9:09pm

Hello,
I defended in 3.09 a phenomenological study of young teachers. If you are using lots of narrative be sure to look into speak recognition software, dragon naturally. Saved my life! Will help as much as I am able!

Keep working at it! ~ Hilary

Comment by Bob Zenhausern on June 27, 2009 at 9:56am

Almost all students hate stat, but it is a mechanical process. I agree with you that the best approach to qualitative analysis is procrastination ;-)

Good luck with it Thanx for the link on Omeka. I will take a look and see how the other half lives.

Bob

Comment by Penny Coutas on June 27, 2009 at 9:51am

ICT = Information Communication Technology. That's the term we use here in Aus to describe learning technologies.

Yes, I mean analysis of data... but I'm a qualitative researcher. My study is an ethnographic one, and I'm using "hypermedia ethnography" as methodology. I'm hoping to present my thesis as a digital "text" rather than as a "book" as all of my data are in digital form. I'm also hoping that the data archive itself will be a "research output" - we'll see how it goes! I'm using a CMS called "Omeka" (http://www.omeka.org) to manage this, and it has lots of potential as a research archival/display tool.

Analysis =/ easy part! Aarghh! Hours of transcription, video editing, coding (tagging!), exploring themes and theories... but oh, what a great puzzle :)

Comment by Bob Zenhausern on June 27, 2009 at 9:35am

Penny,
What is ICT?
When you say analysis stage, do you mean analysis of data? If so, that is the easy part. Can you elaborate? If you are talking about statistics, no more need to procrastinate. I can help

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