Saturday, October 29, 2011

Survey and Quasi-Experimental research design

According to Creswell (2003), quantitative research methods focus on surveys and experimental modes of inquiry (p. 153). Survey research collects data and information from a selected population through the participants' responses to questions. This design of research provides numeric description of trends, attitudes, or opinions of the studied population (Creswell, p. 153). Experimental research is most appropriate for answering a research question about the effect of a treatment (Schutt, 2006, p. 201), which identifies a sample and generalizes to a population (Creswell, 2003, p. 154). He provides comprehensive and significant steps for novice researchers who choose to use either a survey or an experimental research plan (2003, pp. 154-155, 162-183). This chapter adopts the strategies from Creswell's book in designing a preliminary survey and an experimental research plan for my research topic - college students’ motivational aspects in the information literacy instructional class at the National American University (NAU) Overland Park, Kansas campus.

The purpose of my study is to gather information on the motivational aspects of college students in an information literacy class with an aim to improve the instructional design and strategies for librarians. Considering the demographic variable of this study, this study will exclude to students who are in paralegal, nursing, and business administration programs and those who are enrolling in daytime classes. The selected demographic profile of evening class students most likely differs from daytime students with the assumption that day student are full-time/immature students versus evening part-time/mature students.

Survey Design

Considering the limited time and funding of my research, using a survey to collect data from the selected population would be the most economic and efficient method. For the survey design, I have two options:

(1) A most common-used web-based survey, Survey Monkey (or Kwik Survey) will be sent to participants (students) via email. However, the inexpensive Internet surveys have a major disadvantage – there is a lack of effective ways for me to monitor the Internet survey closely, as a result, there may be a low response rate. Participants might be unable to open the link, or they simply do not realize that they have not completed before they send back the responses.

(2) A self-administrated questionnaire would be the more practical choice since I work on campus five days a week. I will simply distribute the questionnaire to the students after their classes. I will be able to monitor the responses and do follow-up with those non-respondents.

The survey questionnaire will contain 12 questions in the following six categories: intrinsic goal orientation, extrinsic goal orientation, task value, control belief of learning scale, self-efficacy for learning and performance, and test anxiety. There are two questions for each category. Using the format of the Likert Scale, the answers will be rated from 1 to 5. The students will circle the appropriate rating according to the direction given (i.e. 1=Strongly Disagree, 2=Disagree, 3=Somewhat Agree, 4=Agree, 5=Strongly Agree) in the “motivation scale.”

In order to assess the validity and reliability, a pilot study will be conducted to test the survey instrument prior to the actual study. Individuals who participate in the pilot test will be considered part of the study population (e.g. the evening class students at the National American University), but will not be included in the study sample. The survey will be administered in person over a three-week period. The students in the study population are those who are either asked to or voluntarily attend the one-hour non-credit information literacy instructional class. Students will be asked to take the survey after the instructional sessions.

Quasi-experimental Design

This design of research is to test and determine whether a treatment/program/invention has the intended effect on a selected population. There are two common quasi-experimental designs:

(1) The data are collected from one selected population, no comparable group, which Creswell (2003) defined this type of research as “one-group pre-test/post-test design” (p. 168), and Schuett (2006) identified as “before-and-after designs” (pp. 212-214).

(2) The main feature of this type of design is that a comparison group is selected to compare with the treatment group. The data are collected from pre –test and post-test with both a treatment and the comparable group (i.e. control group. Both Creswell (2003, p. 169) and Schuett (2006, pp. 210-212) named as “nonequivalent control group designs.”

The quasi-experimental design hypothesizes that students would more likely feel greater confidence in approaching academic research after they took the information literacy instructional courses. This study will use the multiple group, before-and-after design. In this design, several before-and-after comparisons are made involving the same variables (e.g. day class student, full-time students) but different groups (students are major in nursing, paralegal, and business administration.

This study will involve multiple pretest and posttest observations of the same group of students over the three-week study period. This quasi-experimental design will be similar to Phillips’s (1982) study of the effect of TV soap-opera suicides, the “Pre-test – Treatment – Post-test design (Schuett, 2006, pp. 210-211).                
Students will be informed at the beginning of the experiment. They will be informed the purpose of this study is NOT to evaluate their research skills, but rather to study how the literacy instructional class motivates (or demotivates) them in participating in academic research projects.

The above-mentioned quantitative research designs are tentative and will be revised as I gain more knowledge and experience of survey and experimental research.

References:

Creswell, John W. (2003), Research design: Qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods approaches (2nd ed.), Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

Schutt, Russell K. (2006), Investigating the social world: The process and practice of research (5th ed.), Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

Halloween "blue"

The decorations of Halloween are all over the places at the university. One just cannot ignore the fact that it is Halloween holiday. Of course, the neighborhood kids are getting excited and waiting impatiently for the evening arrives.

I might be the only one in the world who hates a Halloween. The Halloween holidays makes me feel extremely sad for a personal reason.

Artificial enthusiasm?

Not everyone like their jobs; yet no one wants to be on the "chopping board." neither. Most people do what they are asked to do on their jobs with artificial enthusiasm. They do not like their jobs, or they are not interested in the tasks; but they still do a good job for their assignments. From the employers and managers viewpoints, it works. Tasks get done in no time.

It will be interesting if we implement the art of artificial enthusiasm in education and learning strategy. Students will learn and accomplish tasks that they are not interested. We might be able to see higher scores of the standardized school tests. It will work for the school administration. The argument is whether it is the only way we can teach our young generation. Are there any negative effects to implement artificial enthusiasm in the classrooms?

Friday, October 28, 2011

Curosity and motivation

Some researchers convince that curosity is the main core of motivating a person's interest in learning or "knowing.", especially for children. It might be truth for young age groups; yet in the adult world it might be not the case. For instance, in a workplace most people feel "curosity of their new coworkers and "test" the person in many ways. This cursosity might have a negative effect on the new worker - the new environment and the new coworkers keep posting "test" and "tasks" might discourage the new worker's interest in the new working environment.                                        .

Pay your bills via iPhone?

It is said that the new way of paying your bills and fees via iPhone. So we are going to move from a "plastice card" to the digital device. It is for sure that our daily life keeps changing no matter how you take it, like it or not.

Tuesday, October 25, 2011

The good, the bad, the ugly professors

The mid-terms are here! Students form study group, discussing the lectures and notes. I overheard so many "stories" about professors without participating their discussions.

I know them all; The good, the bad, and the ugly professors.

Monday, October 24, 2011

APA style and mongraphs

Our campus librarians have decided that we are NOT going to include monographs in our APA citation handout - it is not peer-reviewed articles and not too many students will use monographs for their research papers. Yet some monographs are written by experts in their fields.

Should monographs not be used for a research paper? how about those are considered as "scholarly monographs"?

Saturday, October 22, 2011

Education for sale?

With the US economy environment, the domestic student enrolment has been gone down at most university in the US. Instead, the enrolment of international students, especially the "FULL FEE" student, has increased. Particulalry the full-fee students from China. The number ihas increased dramatically.It is simply because China's economy is BLOOMING! Those students "bring" thousands and thousdands of dollars to the US university. According to an unviersity in the midwest, the Chinese undergraduate full-fee students in the past five years has 450% increase!!! 450%!

Is the US education now up to "sell"?

Wednesday, October 19, 2011

Embarrassing news at the University of Kansas

Two professors (both in science fields) get caught plagiarizing despite the warnings from colleagues. It was said that one of the professors plagiarized text in four scholarly works; the otheer professor failed to take action to stop the plagiarized text - "Unfortuantely it was published." Both professors made to the front page on the local newspapers, Journal World (with photos).

How embarrassing!

I am wondering whether they did it intentionally or unintentionally. Do they know there are many ways youcan detect and avoid plagiarizing? There are even free software that people can use to check on the "suspected plagiarized text."

Tuesday, October 18, 2011

APA citation - monographs

Monograph with Issue & Serial Number:
Example:
Scott, J.P. (1976). The process of primary socialization incanine and human infants. Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development, 28 (1, Serial No. 189).

Monograph Bound Separately as a Journal Supplement:
Example:
Parsons Project in Language and Communication of Mentally Retarded Children. (1963). Language studies of mentally retarded children; a report. Journal of Speech and Hearing Disorders MonographSupplement, 10.

Monograph Bound into a Journal with Continuous Pagination:
Example:
Seeger, J. (2004). Adapting writing voice for a computer environment [Monograph]. Computers and Composition, 2, 201-218.

Wall Street protest

The Wall Street porest has been going on for a month now. That's what happened when many professionals could not find a job. The umemployment rate, in my opinion, cannot reflect the bad job market - many people work part-time, underemployed and underpaid.

Where are the jobs? Mr. President Obama?

Quasi experimental research design

Quasi experimental Theory -

The meaning of "quasi" is "pseudo, self-styled (sort of)." Thus, this experimental design is considered non-scientific and unreliable by researchers in pure science fields such as medical and biology science.

So why do researchers conduct this research design? Quasi-experimental research attempts to examine the effects of an intervention on a specific population; it aims to determine whether a program or intervention has the intended effect on a study's participants (NCTI www.nationaltechcenter.org).

There are many types of quasi-experiments. Here are a few of the most common (Trochim, 2006 and NCTI, [n.d.]):

  • Pretest-Posttest design study without a control group: collect data on study participants' level of performance before the intervention took place (pretest), and again collect the same data after the intervention took place (posttest). This study only looks at one group of individuals who receive the intervention.
  • Pretest and posttest design with a control group ("non-equivalent groups design): An existing group of participants receive a treatment (treatment group), and another existing group of participants to serve as a control (or comparison) group. Participants are not randomly assigned to conditions, but rather are assigned to the treatment or control conditions along with all the others in their existing group.
  • Interrupted time-series designs: This study design is similar to a pretest-posttest design but with multiple pretests and multiple posttests. 
National Center for Technology Innovation (NCTI) (n.d.), Quasi-experimental study. Retrieved October 16, 2011 from: http://www.nationaltechcenter.org/index.php/products/at-research-matters/quasi-experimental-study/
Trochim, William M.K. (2006), Research method knowledge base: Quasi-experimental design. Retrieved October 16, 2011 from http://www.socialresearchmethods.net/kb/quasiexp.php



Oh Blackberry

Last week Blackberry did not work for four loooooong days! It surely made a great impact ont he company!

Oh Blakcberry, Oh Blackberry..

All Blackberry users should receive a profound apology - actually they did; but in the digital age, that surely was a very inconvenience for most people.

Thursday, October 13, 2011

A biographical film about Waris Dirie supermodel

The most unforgetable scene is when Waris gave a speech at the United Nations. She said,"I underwent genital mutilation (female circumcision) as a child...," I cried from the bottom of my heart (sobbing in the couch). I always thought that the Chinese foot binding is the most "uncivilized" custom in the world until I watched this film.

I admire her courage to draw the world's attention to that unhuman and horrible tradition. 

The title of this file called "Dissert Flower" (2008), which is based on Waris' biography. Waris served as an associate producer for the film. Highly recommended.

Wednesday, October 12, 2011

102 Years Old Librarian in Greater Kansas City area?

I recently read this "old news: - August 30, 2008. There is a librarian who is 102 years and still work at the library since she started in 1926. The title of the article is: "Love of Books Keeps 102 Year Old Librarian Working." The reporter is James Fussell, Kansas City Star.

The article can be found at: http://www.kansascity.com/2008/08/29/773043/love-of-books-keeps-102-year-old.html

My thoughts are complicated. I, of course, respect her dedictation; yet I am sorryy for the young librarian who has never have a chance to be a librarian at her library! I wonder why there are so many librarians received "pink slips" in those days.

Research Questions and Hypotheses

Difference between research questions and hypotheses.....

Research questions are the core of a research project which Creswell (2003) identified as “the central direction for the study” (p. 105). These questions are well-crafted, indicating what researchers wish to focus on. Generally researchers start from ideas with inquiry and questions, and then formulate their questions precisely which enable them to answer, explain, and have a better understanding of their phenomena. Research questions are shaped by the identified problem and constraint the design of the study (Marshall & Rossman, 1999, p. 39), providing direction to the research process, suggesting the hypothesis (hypotheses).

Hypothesis is a proposition or set of propositions, which is widely used in scientific experiments. Social scientists adopted this scientific research skill ; using the hypotheses to test what they predict for a study. In this chapter, the research questions and hypotheses are formulated from Chapter 4 as descriptive, inferential, and causal questions.

NBA players and owners

When we talked about NBA, we cannot avoid discussing the NBA business. I heard from NPR that the NBA game has been cancelled for two weeks becaye the owners and players DID not reach an agreement.

It's amazing how "money" involes every aspects of our lives.  The NBA players received millions and millions follars per year and still want more! Well, here is Ameria!

Monday, October 10, 2011

Motivating the underemployed librarian?

With the budget cuts in th elirbary world, some unfortunate librarians were let go. Some of them are able to land a job in different library settings, some are "forced" to take on paraprofessional library positions. How can library administration mortvate this group of library staff?

I have learned theories and best practice how to motivat library support staff from the motivational aspects of information sicence class; yet we do not have discussion about how to motivate the underemployed or underpaid librarians. It surely is a very interested topic for class discussion.

They chose China - a documentary film

"In January 1954, months after the end of the Korean War, U.S. soldiers held in POW camps were at last free to return home. A small group, however, refused repatriation to the U.S. and, after being given 90 days to reconsider their decision, 21 American soldiers decided to stay in China. In THEY CHOSE CHINA, Academy Award-nominated Chinese documentarian Shuibo Wang tells the controversial story of these forgotten American dissidents." - I watched this film via Free Sppech TV last night. Highly recommended.

More information about this film:
http://icarusfilms.com/new2006/they.html

Sunday, October 9, 2011

Documentary file: What's matter with Kansas

I watched this film last night.It talks about gay marriage, pro-life, democratic, and other political issues. Having lived in East coast for a while, in many ways I felt that Kansas is an country that wrongly put on the U.S. map.

What's wrong with the people in Kansas ?

Racial Profile

So many news came out from TV and radio about the new immigration law in Alabama. It's just the beginning. I am sure that all 50 states will enforce similar immigration law.

I am wondering what is our President Obama's opinion on this issue?

What's matter with Alabama?

I heard from NPR that one-third of school children are "missing" from school since the Alabama launched the new immigration law a week ago. It is said that police has the legal right to ask for paper anyone who is being suspected as an illegal alien.

Most likely the color people such as Asian, African, Hispanic, or even the dark skin person will be questioned. The White/Caucasians people no doubt will be exempted.

SO it will be too crazy to be a color person to live in this country.

What's wrong with Alabama? What's wrong with this country?

Saturday, October 8, 2011

Steve Jobs' inspirational quote

I have been very sad about the APPLE inventor's death in the past few days. I found one of his inspirational quotes this morning that I would like to share:

"I’m sorry, it’s true. Having children really changes your view on these things. We’re born, we live for a brief instant, and we die. It’s been happening for a long time. Technology is not changing it much — if at all."

iSad, iSad, iSad ...

Thursday, October 6, 2011

Motivating library staff

Motivation is an essential elements in a workplace. In the past decades, social scientists have applied the well-known theories to the librarianship particularly Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, Herzberg’s Hygiene theories. I have learned the effective strategies of motivating library support staff from these previous studies; yet when we carefully look at these studies, we notice that there are some crucial elements are missing or being failed to address:
  • These studies did not address how library managers discouraged the support staff. For instance, very often I hear discouraging story like this when I go for library conferences and meetings: “I suggested and created a youth program for my library. But once the program was taken off successfully, it was taken away from me and given the credit to the librarian. Eventually the librarian runs the program and tells me that it is part of the librarian’s jobs.”
  • During the economic downturns, it is not uncommon that professional librarians (those who have a MLS degree) are forced to take on paraprofessional jobs. How do library managers to motivate these underemployed (and also underpaid) library staff?
When we discuss the motivation of library support staff, the about two issues are important elements on the topic, definitely cannot be ignored or overlooked. 

An unforgettable speech Steve Jobs

On my way home, I heard from the radio that the former Apple CEO, Steve Jobs died yesterday. The radio replayed the speech which he gave at the 2005 Standford University Commencement. here is the best part I have been thinking all evening:

"No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don't want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life's change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true.

Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary."

Sunday, October 2, 2011

What's the matter with Kansas?

I spotted this title when I browsing the local library material - What's the matter with Kansas? What I am referring to is not the book written by Thomas Frank (2004). Instead, it is a documentary film which came out this year.

Just out of my curiosity, I put a hold on the item. Hopefully I will get the DVD next week.

Saturday, October 1, 2011

Shortage of school librarian?

I read the news of LA school district laid off all the school librarian. I just found this article, addressing the shortage of school librarians. Really? The article was published in Summer 2010. So, it seems that less than a year the shortage of school librarisna became "too many" school librarians. What's going on in current's library world?

Stephanie A. Jones, (Summer/Fall 2010), The occupational choice of school librarians, Library Trends, 59, 166-187.

Where are the librarians?

With the turmoil of economy situation, layoffs have been the headlines of the US major newspapers. Workers were laid off EVERYWHERE. In the Midwest, the University of Kansas Edwards Campus laid off two full-time library assistants; Johnson County Public Library stopped hiring any new employees (hiring-freeze); the Kansas City Public Library imposed a similar policy. This year, in May the School District on Los Angeles laid off school librarians.

"What next?" "Where are the librarians?" "Who will be the next on the chopping block?"