CHAPTER 4: SELECTING A STUDY

DESIGN
Dr. Le Nguyen Hoang
LEARNING OBJECTIVES

Understand what research design means;

Explain the important functions of research
design;
Distinguish between different types of
research designs;
Identify the corresponding data collection
methods of each study design;
Select the appropriate research approach
(qualitative or quantitative) for each research
design.
 RESEARCH DESIGN

Definition

A research design is a plan, structure and strategy of

investigation so conceived as to obtain answers to
research questions or problems;
It includes an outline of what the investigator will do
from writing the hypotheses and their operational
implications to the final analysis of data (i.e. study
design, data collection method, sampling technique,
analytical technique and how you are going to
communicate your findings)
 RESEARCH DESIGN

Functions

Conceptualise an operational plan to

undertake the various procedures and
tasks required to complete your study;
Ensure that these procedures are adequate
to obtain valid, objective and accurate
answers to the research questions (e.g.
the control of variance).
RESEARCH DESIGN

Basic contents in a research design

• Who will constitute the study population?

Population • Will a sample or the whole population be selected?
and Sample • How will the sampling frame be identified?

Data • If a sample is selected, how will it be contacted?

collection • What method of data collection will be used and why?
method • How will ethical issues be taken care of?

Data
processing • How is the data preliminary analysed?
• What techniques are used to analyse the data? Why?
and analysis
methods
 TYPES OF RESEARCH DESIGNS

By objectives perspective

Exploratory
Research

Causal Descriptive
Research Research
 TYPES OF RESEARCH DESIGNS

By the number of contacts, the reference period,

and the nature of of the investigation
 TYPES OF RESEARCH DESIGNS

By the number of contacts

 TYPES OF RESEARCH DESIGNS

By the number of contacts

 TYPES OF RESEARCH DESIGNS

By the number of contacts

 TYPES OF RESEARCH DESIGNS

By the reference period

Retrospective studies investigate a phenomenon,
situation, problem or issue that has happened in the past
(e.g. the respondents' recall of the situation).
Prospective studies refer to the likely prevalence of a
phenomenon, situation, problem, attitude or outcome in
the future.
Retrospective–prospective studies focus on past trends
in a phenomenon and study it into the future.
TYPES OF RESEARCH DESIGNS
 TYPES OF RESEARCH DESIGNS

By inquiry perspective

Qualitative
Quantitative
 TYPES OF RESEARCH DESIGNS

By objectives perspective
TYPES OF RESEARCH DESIGNS

Example of consent form in an exploratory study

TYPES OF RESEARCH DESIGNS

Example of consent form in an exploratory study

 TYPES OF RESEARCH DESIGNS

Example of a conceptual model from an

exploratory study
 TYPES OF RESEARCH DESIGNS

Example of a supply chain descriptive analysis

from a qualitative study
 TYPES OF RESEARCH DESIGNS

Example of a descriptive analysis results on

brand awareness from a quantitative research
 TYPES OF RESEARCH DESIGNS

Example of a conceptual model testing results

from a quantitative study
 TYPES OF RESEARCH DESIGNS

By the nature of the investigation

TYPES OF RESEARCH DESIGNS
 TYPES OF RESEARCH DESIGNS

Three types of variables

Independent variable is a variable (often denoted by
X) whose variation does not depend on that of another.
Dependent variable is a variable (often denoted by Y)
whose value depends on that of another.
Controlled variable is not a variable of interest in the
study, but it is controlled because it could influence the
outcomes. Meanwhile, extraneous variable is any
variable you’re not interested in studying as well as
controlling that could also have some effect on the
dependent variable.
 TYPES OF RESEARCH DESIGNS

Example of variables in an experimental design

EX: Customer loyalty = f(Product quality, Before-sale
services, After-sale services)
 Dependent variable: Customer loyalty (Effect)
 Independent variables: Product quality, Before-sale
services, After-sale services (Cause)
 Extraneous variable: Customer experience (have
some effect on the dependent variable but it is
NOT controlled)
TYPES OF RESEARCH DESIGNS
 TYPES OF RESEARCH DESIGNS

Group discussion:
 TYPES OF RESEARCH DESIGNS

Changes in the dependent variable

In any causal relationship, changes in the dependent
variable may be attributed to three types of variable: :

"Max-Min-Con" principle of variance (Kerlinger, 1986:

286): 1/ Maximise experimental variable, 2/ Minimise
error variance; 3/ Control extraneous variance.
 TYPES OF RESEARCH DESIGNS

Experimental design
The following two methods ensure that the control and
experimental groups are comparable with one another:
Randomisation: ensures that the two groups are
comparable with respect to the variable(s). It is
assumed that if the groups are comparable, the extent
to which extraneous variables are going to affect the
dependent variable is the same in each group.
Matching: is another way of ensuring that the two
groups are comparable so that the effect of
extraneous variables will be the same in both groups.
 TYPES OF RESEARCH DESIGNS

Experimental design with 1 independent variable

Experimental Group Control Group
Determine the number Compare Determine the number
of customers who of customers who
choose to buy the At one point in time choose to buy the
product product
t0
DO NOT change
Change product
product packaging
packaging design
design

Determine the number Determine the number

of customers who Compare of customers who
choose to buy the choose to buy the
product
At one point in time product
t1
 TYPES OF RESEARCH DESIGNS

Experimental design with 2 independent variables

 TYPES OF RESEARCH DESIGNS

Experimental design with 2 independent variables

 TYPES OF RESEARCH DESIGNS

Traditional experimental design

 Experimental notations:
EG: O1 X O2
CG: O3 O4
 Horizontal dimension: indicates the movement of
events through time (e.g. before and after the
intervention).
 Vertical dimension: indicates the events occured
simultanously.
 TYPES OF RESEARCH DESIGNS

Quasi-experimental design
 One-Shot Case Study (or After-only design)
- Experimental notations: EG: X O1
 One-group pretest-posttest design
- Experimental notations: EG: O1 X O2
 TYPES OF RESEARCH DESIGNS

Quasi-experimental design (Cont')

 Static group comparison design
- Experimental notations: EG: X O1
CG: O2
 Time-series design
- Experimental notations:
EG: O1 O2 O3 O4 X O5 O6 O7 O8
 TYPES OF RESEARCH DESIGNS

Solomon four group design

- Is a research design that attempts to take into account the
influence of pretesting on subsequent posttest results
- Experimental notations: EG1: O1 X O2
CG1: O3 O4
EG2: X O5
CG2: O6
- Test Effect: TE = (O2-O1); (O2-O4); (O5 – O6); (O4-O3);
(O2-O1)-(O4-O3)
 RESEARCH APPROACH

Qualitative research design

Qualitative research is usually in a form of exploratory

research;
It is an approach that seeks to describe and analyse
cultural and behavioural characteristics of people and
groups of people from the researcher's point of view.
Qualitative research methods allow the discovery of
important topics that researchers may not have covered
before.
 RESEARCH APPROACH

Quantitative research design

Quantitative research is an approach directed at the

design of quantitative observations of variables,
measurement methods, and the applications of univariate
analysis and/or multivariate analysis to discover facts
about social phenomena.
 RESEARCH APPROACH

Qualitative versus Quantitative research

SUMMARY OF RESEARCH
DESIGNS
 HOMEWORK
You are the marketing manager for Lego toys. You intend to
develop and launch a new product line of Lego toys and plan to
collect data from your target market to support the success of this
product line. Please select the appropriate research design and data
collection method(s) by answering below questions:
Questions Answers
1. What is the appropriate research design
(exploratory, descriptive, causal) for the above
topic? Why?
2. Which research approach should be chosen?
Why?

3. What data collection methods can be proposed

for the chosen research design?