Research Methods for Public Health

Course Type	Course Code	No. Of Credits
Discipline Core	SPG3PH602	4

Semester and Year Offered: 1^st Semester, 1^st Year

Course Coordinator and Team: N. Nakkeeran and Samik Chowdhury

Email of course coordinator: nakkeeran@aud.ac.in

Pre-requisites: None

Aim:

The course aims to build the research competency and understanding of research with a special emphasis on public health research. This course is conceived in five parts. The first part will deal with key epistemological perspectives relevant to public health research. The second part will cover important study designs that rely on quantitative and qualitative methods and permits collection of descriptive / narrative as well as quantitative data. The third part will cover some of the key methods such as different types of interview and observation methods, participatory techniques, focus group discussion, etc. The fourth part will introduce students to methods to analyse data of different types.

Course Outcomes:

On completion of this course students are expected to:

To get introduced to key epistemological perspectives relevant to public health research
Gain understanding on the conceptual relationship and alignment between epistemological perspectives, study designs and methods
Understand the nature and meaning of a range of research related concepts across different epistemological perspectives.
Gain familiarity with use of one or more qualitative data collection methods across different epistemological perspectives
Learn one or more methods to analyse quantitative and qualitative data

Brief description of modules/ Main modules:

Module 1: This module will introduce the concepts of knowledge, reality and value, their relations and interactions to build a foundation on a set of epistemological perspectives such as positivism, critical theory, constructionism, interpretativism, anti-foundationalism. This module will end with a reflection on meanings of ‘research’ and related concepts across these perspectives.

Module 2: The idea of (research) methodology will be introduced in this module, starting with a discussion on many meanings of ‘methodology’. It will go on to discuss a range of approaches to research including ‘sociological imagination’, ‘ethnomethodology’, hermeneutics, semiotics, historical materialism; a set of research methodologies like survey, ethnography, case study, oral history, participatory research, different kinds of document / textual analysis; and set of research designs such as cross-sectional, longitudinal, case-control, cohort and ecological studies.

Module 3: This module will be devoted to discuss a range of data collection methods, associated research techniques and strategies to ensure rigour and quality in research. Data collection methods will include interviews of different types and intent; different observation based methods – structured, unstructured, participant, non-participant, diary method; group situation based methods such as focus group discussion, group interviews, Delphi; case study method, participatory techniques. This section will also discuss methods /techniques that use secondary data. Quality and rigour in research – objectivity, reliability, validity, power, bias, sampling techniques; credibility, trustworthiness, transferability, reflexivity, positionality, saturation, triangulation, respondent validation. Questionnaire, schedule, scale, guide, checklist, memo, log, diary, field-notes

Module 4: The fourth module will be devoted to introduce students to one or more methods of analysis of research data in the form of qualitative data of various kinds and textual data of different types. Principles in qualitative data analysis; open coding, grounded theory based analysis, framework analysis, and introduction to a qualitative data analysis software.

Module 5: The 5^th module introduces students to exploratory analysis of quantitative data/information. The module includes topics like (1) operationalizing concepts through variables (2) types of variables (3) measurement scales (4) data presentation (frequency tables, contingency tables, graphs and charts) (5) data summarization techniques (central tendency, dispersion), (6) elementary concepts of probability and distribution, (7) concept of sample and population (7) probabilistic and non-probabilistic sampling techniques and (8) measures of association and causation (correlation and regression). Students will be encouraged to adopt a hands-on approach (preferably in MS-Excel or SPSS) to learning.

Assessment Details with weights:

A review assignment – this will involve students preparing a review of literature in the field of public health pertaining to a specific research approach / method. (30%)
A Presentation (30%) – This will be a presentation on a substantive topic explaining how the student will approach this topic / area for research
A term paper / written assignment – This will be built from the presentation. This will be a conceptual write up on approaching a substantive topic through one or more methodologies / approaches. (40%)

Selected Readings:

Baronov, David. (2012). Conceptual Foundations of Social Research Methods, 2nd Edition. Boulder, CO: Paradigm Press.
Crotty, M., The Foundations of Social Research: Meaning and Perspectives in the Research Process, Allen &Unwin, 1998 (Chapters on ‘Introduction to Research Process’ and ‘Constructionism’)
Geertz, C., Thick Description: Towards an Interpretive Theory of Culture (Chapter 1: Introduction)
Harding, S., (1987) “Introduction: Is there a feminist method?”, Sandra Harding (ed.) Feminism and methodology, Bloomington, Indiana University Press. Pp.1-14.
Lincoln, Y. S. and Guba, E. G. (2000). Paradigmatic controversies, contradictions, and emerging influences. In N. Denzin and Y. Lincoln (eds.), Handbook of Qualitative Research (2nd ed., pp. 163-188). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Berger, Peter and Thomas Luckmann. 1966. The Social Construction of Reality: A Treatise in the Sociology of Knowledge. New York: Anchor.
Kuhn, T., The Structure of Scientific Revolution, Chicago University Press, 2012.
Levers, MJ., “Philosophical Paradigms, Grounded Theory, and Perspectives on Emergence”, SAGE Open October-December 2013: 1–6, DOI: 10.1177/2158244013517243
Mills, C.W., (1959) “On intellectual Craftsmanship”, Appendix to TheSociological Imagination, OUP
Said, E., Orientalism (Chapter -1 Introduction)
Taylor, Charles. “Interpretation and the Sciences of Man.” Pp. 15–58 in Philosophy and the Human Sciences: Philosophical Papers 2. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1985.
Cunningham, N., and Carmichael, T., 2018. Finding My Intuitive Researcher’s Voice Through Reflexivity: An Autoethnographic Study. The Electronic Journal of Business Research Methods, 16(2), pp. 56-66, available online at www.ejbrm.com
Glaser, Barney G. and Anselm C. Strauss. 1965. Awareness of Dying. Chicago, IL: Aldine Transaction.
Hammersley, M. and P. Atkinson (2007), Ethnography: Principles in Practice, Taylor & Francis London,2007
Johnston R, McIvor A. Oral history, subjectivity, and environmental reality: occupational health histories in twentieth-century Scotland. Osiris 2004;19:234e49
Strauss, Anselm C. and Barney G. Glaser, eds. 1975. Chronic Illness and the Quality of Life. St. Louis, MO: C. V. Mosby.
Clifford, J., Writing Culture: The Poetics and Politics of Ethnography, University of California Press, 1986.
Creswell, J. W. (2009).Research design: Qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods approaches (3rd ed.). Los Angeles: Sage.
Bernard, Russell H., Research Methods in Anthropology, Qualitative and Quantitative Approaches, Altamira Press, 1995
Bryman, A. (1984). The Debate about Qualitative and Quantitative Research. A Question of Methods or Epistemology. The British Journal of Sociology. 35(1): 75- 92
Chambers, R., “Rural Appraisal: Rapid, Relaxed and Participatory”, in Amitava Mukherjee edParticipatory rural appraisal methods and appucations1n rural planning
England, KVL., (1994) Getting Personal: Reflexivity, Positionality, and Feminist Research, The Professional Geographer, 46:1, 80-89, DOI: 10.1111/j.0033-0124.1994.00080.x
Denzin, N., The reflexive interview and a performative social science
Ritchie and Lewis (ed) Qualitative research practice: A Guide for Social Science Students and Researchers
Srivastava, Vinay Kumar (Ed.), Methodology and Field Work, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2004
Townsend, K and Burgess, J (2009). Method in the Madness: Research stories you won’t read in textbooks, Chandos Publishing
Statistics without Tears: A Primer for Non-mathematicians, Derek Rowntree, Penguin Books
Healey, J. F. (2015). The Essentials of Statistics: A Tool for Social Research. United Kingdom: Cengage Learning.