COMMUNICATION RESEARCH METHODOLOGY (4 Credits)

Learning Outcomes:

On successful completion of this course, student will be able to: LO1 – define the assumptions and decisions that every researcher makes, consciously or unconsciously; LO2 – describe the research problem in communication study and the implications for research under perspectives; LO3 – apply the research systematically, precisely, and completely in the scope of communication; LO4 – analyze the advantages and disadvantages of graphics (quantitative) versus text (qualitative) for explaining research findings.

Topics:

1. Getting Started: Possibilities and Decisions;
2. First Decisions: From Inspiration to Implementation;
3. Ethics: What are My Responsibilities as a Researcher?;
4. You Could Look It Up: Reading, Recording, and Reviewing Research;
5. Measurement: Research Using Numbers;
6. Sampling: Who, What, and How Many?;
7. Summarizing Research Results: Data Reduction and Descriptive Statistics;
8. Generalizing From Research Results: Inferential Statistics;
9. Surveys: Putting Numbers On Opinions;
10. Quantitative Understanding of Content: Content Analysis;
11. Qualitative Understanding of Content: Rhetorical and Critical Analyses, and More;
12. Qualitative Understanding of Communication Behavior: Interviews, Focus Groups, and Ethnography;
13. Research Results In Print and Online: Writing and Presenting for Scholarly and Other Publics.