Read the summary and the most important questions on Business research methods 4rd edition

• 2 The research process and proposal

• 2.3 Research process

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• Decisions for the research design, for instance:

   Laboratory or field research?
   Interviews or surveys or observations?
   Participants and sampling technique?
   Data collection conditions and allocation?
   What are relevant variables (what to measure)?

• 3 Literature review

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• We now know what literature is, but what is a literature review?

   A literature review provides the reader with an overview of the current state of art regarding a problem and the research theme
   A good review provides the reader with insight into the existing knowledge and what is not yet known

•  Searching information (literature) using academic databases, for instance:

   ABI/INFORM, ECONLIT, EBSCO, PSYCHLIT, SOCIOFILE, PSYCARTICLES, GOOGLE SCHOLAR)
   Working/discussion papers databases
   Publishers’ databases

• How can you determine which literature is relevant?

   Read the title
   Read the abstract
   Check keywords  
   Scan the manuscript (empirical part)
   Read the beginning of the discussion section
   Check reference list (can lead to a new reference)

• 5 Quantitative and qualitative research

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• What is the role of passengers in the development of a train delay?

  • Research design: cross‐sectional survey with fixed questions and answers 
    
  • Sample: all passengers at Eindhoven Station on four Fridays in December, 2018 
    
  •  Statistical analysis:  hierarchical regression analysis  
    

• Descriptors of research designs:

  • the purpose of the study
  o descriptive study
  o casual study
  o predictive study
  • degree of research question crystallization
  o exploratory study
  o formal study
  • method of data collection
  o monitoring
  o interrogation/communication study
  o archival study
  • researcher control of variables
  o experimental design
  o ex-post facto design
  • the time dimension
  o cross-sectional study
  o longitudinal studies
  § panel
  § cohort
  • the research environment
  o field conditions
  o laboratory conditions
  o simulations

• 5.4 Field and Quasi-experiments

• Proxies for a real experiment

   Field experiments are conducted in a natural setting
   Participants usually do not know that they are studied
   If a researcher cannot meet the requirements of a true experiment: s/he can conduct quasi‐experiments
   For example: no randomization possible, no real control group

• 6 Sampling strategies

• 6.4 What makes a good sample?

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• Representativeness depends on two aspects:

  1. Accuracy: unbiased sample; no systematic variance due to (un)known influences that cause the scores
  2. Precision: no random fluctuations (i.e., no sampling error); calculated by the standard error of estimate (i.e., the smaller this value, the greater the precision)

• 6.5 Sample size

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• Principles that influence sample size:

   Population size
   Degree of variance in the population
   Degree of reliability
   The desired precision of the estimate
   Interest in subgroups

• 7 Survey research

• 7.3 Survey method choice

• The choice for a certain survey method is largely dependent on the following factors:

   Costs of the research
   Topic of the research
   Accessibility and spread of the population
   Response time
   Anonymity or confidentiality