Health care has been called one of the most complex sectors of the U.S. economy. Driven largely by robust innovation in treatments and interventions, this complexity has created an increased need for evidence about what works best for whom in order to inform decisions that lead to safe, efficient, effective, and affordable care. At the same time, traditional approaches to clinical research are …
This book is designed to introduce doctoral and graduate students to the process of scientific research in the social sciences, business, education, public health, and related disciplines. This book is based on my lecture materials developed over a decade of teaching the doctoral-level class on Research Methods at the University of South Florida. The target audience for this book includes Ph.…
In my experience as a teacher, I have worked with many graduate students who have deep and passionate interests they wish to pursue in their dissertations. Often, however, they are stymied by the lack of an appropriate and feasible methodology. They are, in Sartre’s (1968) terms, “in search of a method.” This book is intended for doctoral candidates who are engaged in that search and who …
This analysis of the workforce needs in the biomedical, social and behavioral, and clinical sciences began in May 2008, when the storm clouds on the financial horizon were developing. We had our second meeting in late September 2008 in the midst of the financial meltdown. This has made the business of making projections into the future a very uncertain business indeed. The attempts to do just t…
Quite frequently these days people talk of research, both in academic institutions and outside. Several research studies are undertaken and accomplished year after year. But in most cases very little attention is paid to an important dimension relaing to research, namely, that of research methodology. The result is that much of research, particularly in social sciences, contains endless word-sp…
In this, thefourth edition of Qualitative ResearchA1ethodsjor the Social Sciences, my goal remains identical to that of previous editions: to offer a handbook for any- one interested in but un:fumiliar with qualitative research methods. I continue to envision that this book will be used along with more general quantitative texts traditionally used in a research methods course as well as a stand…
Do you like to know things? Do you ever wonder what other people know or how they know what they do? Have you ever made a decision, and do you plan to make decisions in the future? If you answered yes to any of these questions, then you will probably find the information in this book—particularly the information on research methods—very useful. If you answered no to all of them, I suspect t…
This paper discusses and develops a typology of research methods in the social sciences. Such a typology will be relevant for various aspects of the work of the ESRC National Centre for Research Methods (NCRM) as well as other ESRC initiatives and the wider social science research community. It may be useful, for example, for the prioritisation of research methods, for defining the current focu…