Description of the Appropriateness of Methodologies and Methods (Essay Sample)

Research method and Research Process
Student
Institution
Research Method and Research Process
This paper is a literature review of a selected research topic, which is based on describing the methods and methodologies that are used to research different aspects. It is aimed at a critical analysis of the appropriateness of the methods and methodologies that is used to answer different key research questions. Therefore in this paper I will focus on the research method and research progress by the use of four articles with different discrimination researches questions. These articles are; children’s perception of gender discrimination, young children evaluation of exclusion in gender stereotype peer context, discrimination in children’s construction of sexism between pupils in primary school and preadolescents’ understanding of ethnic discrimination.
Article 1 (children’s perception of gender discrimination)
In this study, children’s judgments were examined about scenarios that involved the likely instances of gender discrimination. This research aimed at investigating whether children are sensitive to contextual information while making judgments related to discrimination and whether developmental and personal differences among children are in any way related to the children’s perception to discrimination. The research involved a sample selection of children from families with diverse socioeconomic background aged between 5 and 10. Every measure was given to children personally by the same experimenter.
The technique that was used to gather information was in form of questions where children were read six scenarios and asked attribution questions. After they had completed the attribution questions, their gender attitudes were assessed. These participants were recruited from three elementary schools that were located at the same city after the school program. As per the results, the researchers found that older children were more likely to make attributions to discrimination than younger children while the conceptual information indicated that it was likely. Girls would view girls to be victims of discrimination than boys while those children who had egalitarian attitude in gender more likely perceived discrimination than their peers.
While conducting this research, the researchers used quantitative methodology. This method was incorporated with other major of gathering data such as questionnaire. The methodology that was used in this research was inappropriate this is because the researchers selected the participants from the same city. May be if they could have selected them randomly from different areas, the results could have been different. Also the discrimination results of children in rural and urban areas are quite different, therefore the fact that the researcher selected the participants from the same city could have affected the result. In addition to this the social, economic and psychological issues such as fear among the participants may have affected the question and answer data collection method. Instead other techniques such as experimental and interview among others could have been used to gather appropriate information relating to discrimination.
The paradigm that was used in this research is positivism. It aimed at testing the theory or describing the children’s experience through measurement and observation to predict the possible outcomes of discrimination in the research. Here the researcher manipulated the students who were the target of the discrimination and the teacher who was the gender of the perpetrator. In addition to this paradigm is interpretive or constructivist. This approach was intended to help in understanding the children’s experience as far as discrimination is concerned. This was simply done by constructing reality socially whereby the researcher relied on the participant’s view of the situation that was studied. With this, the researchers were able to reorganize the results of their own background and experience.
As far as the methods and methodologies are concern, I think that the relevant research question for future project in discrimination that can fit these methods and methodologies is to examine the gender perception of children in both rural and urban areas. This research focused on children from only three elementary schools, and the results were used to generalize the views of all children. Instead, the participants could have been selected in a random was from several elementary schools from both rural and urban areas. Another gap that exists in this research is the fact that some researchers were bias during the research such that in the selection of the participants, they selected more of them from a single area (European American). This might have affected the results because most of the participants had a similar culture. Instead, they could have selected participants from several different areas and with difference in culture. The appropriate method and methodologies that fit in researching the research question I have stated above are experimental, questionnaire. Experimenting and interviewing among different participants may lead to a plenty of research ideas from people in different localities and of different ethnicity. This will allow the researchers to see where the social research interacts with the theories, worldviews, and values.
Article 2 (children’s construction of sexism between pupils in primary school)
This research aimed at investigating whether pupils construct gender as a source of discrimination in their school lives. In this research were the possible cases of sexism in schools and the methods the victim’s uses to cope with the issues. The method that was used to gather information was the interview, where children aged between 7 and 11 years from four different schools were examined. The findings of the research were that a large number of children claimed to have observed incidents of sexism in school while some of the students argued that sexism did not occur in school.
The researchers used interview method as well as questionnaire methods to gather information. The methodology is this research indicates that the research was understood, designed and conducted in a way that the social background of the participants underpinned their responses and the interpretations that were made. The methodology and method used in this research were appropriate as it allowed the researchers to view the interaction between the participant’s views, values and theories with the social research. It also gave room for a tried and tested techniques and ways of gathering the data.
The researchers applied positivist paradigm. Here the researchers aimed at describing the experience by observation and measurement as a way of predicting the possible outcomes of the research. Although this paradigm was used, I think the one that fits this research is transformative. This paradigm tends to address the issue of social justice and marginalized people. This could have provided the researcher with the structure for the development of a complete picture of a social world.
The appropriate research question for future research that fits this area is an investigation of whom among boys and girls in primary school were most violated sexually. This emanates from the fact that as per the results, large number of students claimed to have witnessed incidents of sexism in school, therefore it's more important for researchers to get to know who among boys and girls are the most victims of sexism. Also, this research had more of the participants being girls. As a result could have affected the results because sexism views of girls are quite different from that of boys. In addition to this, the participants were selected from only four schools. Instead, the researchers could have selected at random the participants from several schools in both rural and urban areas as well as pupils with different cultural, social and economic background. The best method and methodology that fits the above-stated research question are questionnaire and interview. By use of these methods and methodology, the researcher will be in a better position to acquire relevant data as well as plenty of information to support the research. In addition to this the researchers can get face to face contact with the pupils who in one way, or another have been victims of sexism.
Article 3 (young children’s evaluation of exclusion in gender stereotype peer context)
The research was based evaluation of the appropriateness of excluding boys and girls from two types of activities (doll play and truck play) in different contexts. The results of the research were that, students judged straight forward exclusion from activities on the basis of gender as wrong even if the children gender was stereotypical of the activity. The participants were children of middle-class background who enrolled in two preschools in a large city.
The researchers used interview method to gather the relevant information whereby, in a session that lasted approximately 20 minutes students were interviewed individually by female graduate research assistance. The methods and methodology that was used to conduct this research was inappropriate. This is because, the researcher was not in a position to collect the actual data compared to how actual the data would have been, if the research were conducted by use of other methods and methodology such as experimental and questionnaire. The fact that the participants were children from middle-class background and that they were from two schools located in the same city greatly undermined the findings.
As far as the paradigm was concerned, the researchers applied pragmatic paradigm whereby they were not...