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The academic writing thread

BassyBill

BassyBill

Gold Supporting Member
In Memoriam
Mar 12, 2005
18,174
4,621
West Midlands UK
#1
I know we have a lot of undergrad and postgrad students here on TB, as well as academic faculty members. I thought there might be some interest in discussing what you're currently writing about in dissertations / theses / general research or for any other purpose - journal articles and the like. So, this is the thread for sharing ideas about your writing and asking for views about any related topic such as research paradigms and methodology, literature reviews and referencing, data collection methods and so on.

I'm just in the process of looking at teachers' perspectives on digital technology and seriously thinking about Q methodology as a tool for collecting and interpreting data on this. Anybody else using Q out there with some experiences you could share? To this newbie to Q, it looks complex but potentially very powerful.
 
#4
Martin, I haven't done any "real science" research since I left the R&D division of the company I used to work for to go into teaching. But I've enjoyed some of the educational research that I've done since then because the methods of working are such a contrast to what I cut my teeth on.

Some of my recent stuff:
What are the key principles that form the foundation of effective chemistry teaching?
How valid and reliable is lesson observation as a tool for assessing teacher performance?
How do new teachers enhance their subject knowledge and pedagogy during their training?
How do new teachers in the "digital natives" category use technology to support their learning, and to what extent do educational and institutional policies reflect the reality of this?

This "use of technology by new teachers to support their development" stuff is sort of becoming my main field of interest now. It's quite a broad topic and touches on the sociology of learning in formal and informal contexts, differences between younger learners and adult learners (pedagogy and andragogy), self-directed learning (heutagogy) as well as the psychology of motivation and self-determination theory. And the Q methodology thing is great for this sort of research; it's a very scientific and statistical way of investigating people's personal views and perspectives. I'm digging it, to be honest. I'm such a nerd these days. :D
 
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#6
PhD in computer science. My work is on making automated verification work for web applications.

I've never heard of the Q methodology, but it seems like a sensible thing to do. Especially with touchscreens you could make people sort statements quickly, it really wouldn't be a hassle.
 
#7
I have a dissertation defense in a week and a half. The short laymen's explanation is that it's a work in the sociology of jurisprudence examining labor policy. The long, in-depth explanation is that it's an application of Anthony Giddens's structuration theory to a study on how policy narratives of the NLRA have changed over the decades as communicated through NLRB, administrative law judge, and Supreme Court case law using a qualitative content analysis approach. Giddens's theory deals with how structures are created by actors that then constrain or facilitate future behavioral action and shape social reality. I look at how case law acts as structure through setting precedent, which then subsequently binds jurists to reapply the principles of the leading case to a similar set of fact patterns. Precedent, however, becomes a more dicey concept in administrative law, since administrative agencies can easily overturn previous precedents.

I'm one of those people who came into my PhD program heavily slanted towards quantitative research (having done my undergraduate training in psychology), but ended up conducting a qualitative study for my dissertation due to the research questions and ontological paradigm necessitating it. My master's degree was a quantitative factorial design. I really like qualitative research, especially since it gives me a lot of freedom for interpretation and theory-building.

I'm presenting a paper at a small conference this upcoming weekend that is completely removed from labor policy and the law. It's an analysis and critique of Neil Strauss's The Game informed by evolutionary psychology, particularly the work of David Buss. Ironically, my dissertation chair is a gender and men's studies scholar, so this paper is actually closer to his expertise than my actual dissertation research.
 
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#8
LM, like you I come from a positivist/quantitative background but have ended up currently working in an area that requires a much more interpretivist/qualitative paradigm. I found the whole ontology concept as it applies to this quite difficult to get my head around at first; it really made me question my own long held assumptions about some things. I would think this may be a fairly common experience, although it might be rarer to find people travelling in the opposite direction (I could be wrong). It's a not a bad thing to have a foot in both camps, or a general tendency to mix methods. I've heard some really dogmatic silly stuff from folks who are probably too entrenched in one tradition or the other.

Good luck with the paper presentation and the dissertation defence. ;)
 
#10
I'm on the biotech end so things are a lot more orientated towards practical quantitative experimentation - old-fashioned, make it work then try to make it not work to see if it really does work science in a lot of cases!
Some of our little buggy friends are not doing what they are supposed to ina particular area we are working on at the moment (or more accurately, the by-products of our little buggy friends) so as well as being a monumental PITA its also good from an objective point of view because its getting the little grey cells working to try different ways to get the things to do what we want them to. Fun!

Hope all goes well LM, dazzle them!
 
#12
MartinG1957 said:
Hope all goes well LM, dazzle them!
Click to expand...

Indeed, with the dissertation, I'm hoping to go the dazzle route rather than the baffle route. :D But the dissertation defense process in the UK sounds intimidating with the internal and external reviewer arrangement. In most American universities, you generally defend your dissertation or thesis in front of a three- or four-person committee that you most likely picked yourself and is made up of faculty and experts with whom you probably already have a relationship and are generally interested in your success.
 
#14
That's what I call an interesting thread.:thumbsup:

No PhD candidate here.
Currently at uni working my way toward my master's degree (History & English). I already have a degree in jazz studies (5 year jazz program in the Netherlands), but decided it's not what I want to do full time for the rest of my life.

I have several papers in the making at the moment. Unfortunately, I'm not quite sure if I can explain the topics sufficiently in English to be honest.
Lemme try.

Passing on of historical knowledge and concepts regarding the Third Reich and its crimes through three generations within one family (if that makes any sense).
It's basically about the question of how the generation of witnesses (many of them already dead by now) has passed on their concepts of "Third Reich, "war crimes" and "Holocaust" and their own role in the system to their children and their grandchildren, and how the middle generation has passed on the learned concepts to their children.
Interesting thing so far is that the context and the content seem to change significantly sometimes, thus facts get twisted around, are being put in a different context, roles are changed and so on.

The massacre of My Lai, its depiction in the media (especially Time magazin, " [...] what a tragedy") and the self perception of the perpetrators (not the actual title, but that's what it's about).
Interesting part so far is that some soldiers took part in the carnage thinking they were merely following orders, others (based on their own testimonies) had a "killing mindset" and thought everything was clearly justified and absolutely necessary, while a third group didn't participate at all. I will probably have to include sociopsychological aspects on human collective behaviour, and have to include the William Calley trial as well.

Have an English paper coming up in July, but so far, I have no idea whether it'll be literature or linguistics.

Now back to bass.:bassist:
 
#16
fdeck said:
Does that mean you're a doctor?
Click to expand...

It's considered socially appropriate to refer to me as one, though the actual diploma will be conferred in May. I'm really not one for titles, but since I don't work in academia where using the title is commonplace as to be mundane, I'll soak it all up for now. :D But thank you for the congrats. :) Now, I'm just hoping to avoid an existential crisis since being a student is finally over. *lol*
 
#17
LiquidMidnight said:
It's considered socially appropriate to refer to me as one, though the actual diploma will be conferred in May. I'm really not one for titles, but since I don't work in academia where using the title is commonplace as to be mundane, I'll soak it all up for now. :D But thank you for the congrats. :) Now, I'm just hoping to avoid an existential crisis since being a student is finally over. *lol*
Click to expand...
Passing the defense is generally considered to be the final hurdle. The rest is paperwork. Great job, Dr. Midnight!
 
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#18
BassyBill said:
What are the key principles that form the foundation of effective chemistry teaching?
How valid and reliable is lesson observation as a tool for assessing teacher performance?
How do new teachers enhance their subject knowledge and pedagogy during their training?
How do new teachers in the "digital natives" category use technology to support their learning, and to what extent do educational and institutional policies reflect the reality of this?
Click to expand...

My question is how would you collect sufficient data with sufficient variables to a level that you could analyse it such that it would be satistically significant.

If you collect some set of statistics but not enough to tease out any confounding variables you might see a correlation between A and B for which you cannot find any causal relationship because the causation is C->A and C->B and C wasn't captured.

If you have lots of data you are going to have to be fairly clever in terms of the analysis to sift it, though. I know a bit about some forms of analysis, but you'd need a good statistician.

You'd need good design for the statistics capture too, to avoid bias due to the capture, or even over capture of statistics that relies on people filling out forms can lead to either people being turned off the process and just making up responses on question 356 onwards of the 1000 question form, or in a longitudinal study people changing how they fill out forms because they understand what is being asked better, meaning that a change in response might not be due at all to what you might think it is.
 
#19
BassyBill said:
I know we have a lot of undergrad and postgrad students here on TB, as well as academic faculty members. I thought there might be some interest in discussing what you're currently writing about in dissertations / theses / general research or for any other purpose - journal articles and the like. So, this is the thread for sharing ideas about your writing and asking for views about any related topic such as research paradigms and methodology, literature reviews and referencing, data collection methods and so on.
Click to expand...
I have a Ph.D. (1989) in social/personality psychology, with a minor in quantitative psychology, and have been in the same faculty position (now full Professor, as of a few years ago) since 1991. I do research in evolutionary psychology, and teach courses in that area and in statistics (undergraduate and first-year graduate).
BassyBill said:
I'm just in the process of looking at teachers' perspectives on digital technology and seriously thinking about Q methodology as a tool for collecting and interpreting data on this. Anybody else using Q out there with some experiences you could share? To this newbie to Q, it looks complex but potentially very powerful.
Click to expand...
My knowledge of Q methodology is limited, but I never cared for it. (It's never been especially popular in psychology.) I still maintain a strong preference for theory-driven, rather than data-driven, research. For most purposes I'd rather survey a larger sample with a smaller, conceptually focused set of questions than a small sample with a large, diverse set of items. That said, I'd be happy to talk more about your project and help if I can.
 
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#20
Congrats to Liquid Midnight!

I'm a PhD candidate in cultural anthropology, currently at the mid-point of dissertation writing. The writing is a good portion of the reason I don't spend much time on TB - or any site, for that matter - I'm in lockdown, and plugging away.

My own research queries the nature of oil and gas communities and the informal economies that spring up around them - lots of sociological nods in my work. Also very timely, it appears.

Reading Lobster 11s comments above, I was struck by how different our approaches are: I occupy the opposite end of the investigative spectrum, relying heavily on data rather than theory, and qualitative data at that. For me, numbers are great for filing taxes. When it comes to understanding people, culture, history, and place, less so. I suppose that makes sense in my case, as I'm not a scientist; more of an interested outsider, who participates and chronicles. I do analyze, obviously, but case-by-case, with focus placed on lived experiences leading to collective knowledge.

I'm probably not doing a good job of explaining anything here, and I'll chalk that up to my current 'analysis paralysis' state. I'm much more fun in person ;)
 

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