Explore the relationship between two or more variables through a correlational analysis. The intent is to determine if and to what degree the variables are related. It does not imply one causes the other.
Intent is to study and understand a single situation, which could be a leader, a classroom, a process, program, activity. Collect a variety of material in a specific and bounded time period. This is also used for historical studies, when collecting historical data to understand and learn from the past.
Compare two groups with the intent of understanding the reasons or causes for the two groups being different.
Describe the lives of individual(s) to get meaning from them.
Test an idea, treatment, program to see if it makes a difference. There is a control group and a test group. Individuals are randomly assigned to the two groups. One group gets the treatment (test group) and the other group (control group) does not get the treatment. There is a pre and post-test for both groups in a traditional experimental design.
The focus is to develop an understanding of a phenomenon or situation in order to be able to develop a theory/model for items such as factors, a form of interaction, or a process.
It is the same as experiment in that there is a control and test group. However, current groups are used as is rather than randomly assigning people to the two groups. Both groups receive the pre and post- test in a traditional design.
Studies a human experience at an experiential level such as understanding what it means for a woman to lose a child. It is about understanding the essence or meaning of the experience.
Mixed Research Designs
A mixed research design involves having both a quantitative design and qualitative design. Mixed designs is the best approach if the study requires both quantitative and qualitative designs to address the problem statement.
Mixed design studies take significantly more time, more resources, and require the researcher to develop expertise in qualitative analysis techniques and quantitative analysis techniques. Qualitative studies can use numbers, counts and even descriptive statistics. Using numbers does not mean the study has to be quantitative or mixed methods.
Version: May 2, 2012