This post is a continuation of the academic subjects that I have been publishing in recent dates, it is also a translation that I had already promised to make at the end of a post that I originally wrote in Spanish and that constitutes the source of this current writing, you can consult it at: Marco Metodológico en un Borrador de Informe de Investigación: Notas sobre su contenido
Since it is a post with manual or tutorial content, I take the platform of Steem-bounty/Forever to share it and allow it to continue receiving rewards despite having more than 7 days of publication.
In a previous post I presented what I hope to find in a Theoretical Framework for a draft Research Report, you can consult it in: Marco Teórico en un Borrador de Informe de Investigación: Notas sobre su contenido (in Spanish) or Theoretical Framework in the preparation of the Research Report: about its content (in English). It is now time to explain what corresponds to the next chapter in the report in question: The Methodological Framework.
Methodological Framework: Components (explanation of the image at the foot)
Fuente de la Imagen
Red Circle to the Center: Methodological Framework
Elements in the text boxes (starting on the left and following the clockwise):
- Research Level
- Design of the investigation
- Population and sample
- Techniques and instruments for data collection
- Data processing and analysis techniques
Already with the image, I can say that I am going to rely mainly on the book of Arias (2004), although I will also use some personal experience to indicate some things. In addition, as the draft to be submitted corresponds to students of the initial semesters of the degree, the level of demand will be "kind" (please do not confuse kind with academic "Celestina").
Well, the contents that we could find in this chapter of the report would be:
- Kind of investigation
- Design of the investigation
- Modality of the investigation
- Population and sample
- Data collection techniques and instruments
- Data processing techniques and instruments
- Validity and reliability of the instruments.
So then we could factor the list and group it into three sections:
- Intended to indicate the generalities of the investigation
- Research Approach
- Type of Research
- Research Level
- Research Design
- Intended to point out "Who" is investigated
- Universe
- Population
- Sample
- Focused on explaining "How and With What" will work
- Data collection and information techniques and instruments
- Techniques and instruments for data and information processing
- Techniques and instruments for the Presentation or Disclosure of the information prepared
- Validation and Reliability of the instruments
About the Methodological Generalities
It is necessary to indicate what is the focus of the research that is going to be carried out, marking what is the type of research, its design selection and the level of knowledge that is expected to be generated.
In some authors it can be found that the term Modality is mentioned instead of design, but in any case, whatever the methodological current we follow, it is necessary to indicate the source of what we say, although in the draft to be delivered I am not demanding the exact appointment, in the final delivery if they will have to quote their source and explain what they understood from the appointment and why they decided on it and not another.
About Who we investigate
The research is carried out on a problem of scientific research that was previously formulated, at that time we had to face the question that since we were an event or object of reality what we used to formulate our problem, it happens that in such reality there are entities of some and that we must consider them within the work.
When I talk about the Universe, I mean the possible totality of members of the class or type of entities that we are working on in research, it is not something that is comprehensible by current work, but it does remember what I have said about going from the greatest to At least, they will understand that it is about delimiting or limiting the reality to work.
Already then, the population corresponds to the totality of the entities under study to which I can have access, they are classified as population as they share at least one common characteristic that defines them as of interest for the job. The population may still be so numerous that it is not feasible to work it in its entirety, so we move on to the last term.
The sample corresponds to a subgroup of the population that is representative of it, is constructed according to selection criteria or sample criteria that allow to build a subset that fits the objective of the investigation. It is usually indicated that every subset of the population it represents it to some extent, but what it is about is to select members of the population with the work criteria to build the MOST representative group we can have.
In the case of work in progress, it turns out that it is under a documentary design ... so do we have population or sample?
It may be a bit strange if you don't pay attention, but the answer is: Yes!
There is something particular, so far I have used "entity" or "entities" to refer to what composes the population and shows, well, in a documentary work most of the authors I know agree that there are no people or entities alive to consider, but it can be assumed that the universe corresponds to any document that theoretically exists on the subject of study, population would already be the portion of the documents that we can access for work and that we collect and group in the ARCHIVE of research and in As for the sample, then, it turns out that there is the peculiarity that from the Archive created we can identify certain documents that become the key pieces for our analysis, we usually designate Corpus for Analysis for this group (I don't think it has to explain much would be equivalent in some way to the sample)
About Techniques and Instruments
Well, having said all of the above, we have to clarify what procedures we will use to work and what tools or instruments are necessary to comply with them.
We can divide your presentation to our reader as they are for the collection of data and information in our archival materials, or for their processing and preparation of our own information, or for future disclosure or presentation of our research results.
A particular detail corresponds to the validation and study of the reliability of our instruments, in truth that, like several things that I have to clarify about the samples and sampling, it requires a lot of explanation and it is already convenient to leave it for a next post .