Elements of Research Design

• Theoretical Framework
 Research Design

• Having identified the variables in a problem

situation and developed the theoretical
framework.
• Design the research in such a way that the
required data can be gathered and analyzed
to arrive at a solution.
 Research Design
Design involves the issues relating to decisions regarding:
• Purpose of the study
• Location (study setting)
• Type (type of investigation),
• The extent to which it is manipulated and controlled
researcher (extent of researcher interference)
• Temporal aspects (time horizon),
• Level at which the data will be analyzed (unit of
analysis)
 Elements of Research Design
Purpose of the study

Exploratory
Descriptive
Hypothesis testing
 Exploratory Study
• When not much is known about the
situation at hand, or
• No information is available on how similar
problems or research issues have been
solved in the past.
• In such cases, extensive preliminary work
needs to be done to gain familiarity with the
phenomena in the situation
 Exploratory Study
• Extensive interviews with many people
• Some qualitative studies (as opposed to
quantitative data gathered through questionnaires)
• Data are collected through observation or
interviews.
• Exploratory studies are important for obtaining a
good grasp of the phenomenon of interest and
advancing knowledge through subsequent theory
building and hypothesis testing.
 Descriptive Study
• Descriptive study is undertaken in order to
ascertain and be able to describe the
characteristics of the variables of interest in a
situation.
• The goal of a descriptive study is to offer to the
researcher a profile or
• To describe relevant aspects of the phenomenon
of interest from an individual, organizational,
industry-oriented, or other perspective.
 Descriptive Study
• A bank manager wants to have a profile of the
individuals who have loan payments outstanding
for six months and more.
• The profile will include details of their average
age, earnings, nature of occupation, full-time/part-
time employment status,and the like.
• This might help him to elicit further information
or decide right away on the types of individuals
who should be made ineligible for loans in the
future.
• Case studies, Qualitative data through interviews
 Hypothesis Testing
(Analytical & Predictive)
• Explain the nature of certain relationships
or
• Establish the differences among groups or
the independence of two or more factors in
a situation.
• Hypothesis testing is undertaken to explain
the variance in the dependent variable or to
predict organizational outcomes.
 Type of investigation
Causal study
• When the researcher wants to delineate the
cause of one or more problems
• Does smoking cause cancer?
Correlational study
• When the researcher is interested in
delineating the important variables
associated with the problem.
• Are smoking and cancer related?
Extent of researcher interference

• Depends upon whether the study

undertaken is causal or correlational.
• Correlational study is conducted in the
natural environment of the organization
with minimal interference by the researcher
with the normal flow of work
Extent of researcher interference
• In Causal study there could be varying
degrees of interference by the researcher.
• In manipulation and control of variables in
the research study.
• Either in the natural setting or in an
artificial lab setting.
 Study setting: contrived and
noncontrived
• Organizational research can be done in the
natural environment where work proceeds
normally (that is, in noncontrived settings)
or in artificial, contrived settings.
• Correlational studies are conducted in
noncontrived settings,
• Whereas causal studies are done in
contrived lab settings
 Unit of Analysis
Unit of analysis refers to the level of
aggregation of the data collected during the
subsequent data analysis stage.
• Individuals
• Groups
• Organizations
 Time horizon
Cross Sectional (One Shot)
• If data gathered just once, perhaps over a
period of days or weeks or months, in order to
answer a research question.
Longitudinal
• In some cases the researcher might want to
study people or phenomena at more than one
point in time in order to answer the research
question.