(Ethical considerations and Data analysis) which are two parts of my full proposal - Essay Example

Leadership Styles and Their Impact on the Effective Development of Faculty Members By Majed A. ALshammari Course:Tutor: Hull UniversityDepartment: 24th April 2012Ethical considerations There are always some ethical issues present in all kinds of research where data is collected among individuals. The process of doing research leads to a tension build up that is brought up by the goals of the research and the need of privacy on the part of the respondents in the research (Orb, Eisenhauer, & Wynaden, D. 2000). This research has a number of contingency measures which will be undertaken so as to address the ethical issues that may arise.

Firstly, we will get permission and consent of the course leader of the MED Leadership and Learning at Hull University. This is important because the research would be conducted among members of this faculty and permission is required from the relevant authority. In asking for the permission to conduct the research, a letter will be sent which articulates crucial details of the various reasons why we have chosen that particular department to conduct our research there. Consequently, the letter also addresses issue of approval to conduct the study through the questionnaire and interview primary methods.

Confidentiality in data collection will be applied through anonymity or use of letter symbols like letter b. Part of sample consists of a dean and five heads of departments who are all leaders. In this regards, it will be easy to conduct interviews or collect data through questionnaire in anonymity and the ensuing data will be used in the study without infringing any legal rights of the respondents in the research.Data analysis Data analysis alludes to different methods that help to describe facts, tests hypotheses, detect patterns and develop explanations.

It is applied in many areas of research and it does not necessarily involve numbers because it may be either qualitative or quantitative. After data collection, the next logical step is to analyze it because it will help the researcher to edit the information on the questionnaires and interviews. After refining of the questions and editing the already available ones, new questions for the interviews and questionnaires will be appearing in the next interviews for response by the respondents. This means that the data analysis process is interactive and in participatory way which will continue until consistent results are gotten (Pidgeon & Henwood, 1996).

The research will involve both qualitative as well as quantitative data analysis. In qualitative data analysis method, there are five main steps to be followed for its accomplishment. The first step is taking enough time to read and review the data which has been gotten from interviews and questionnaires. After this, it is advisable to make and review notes in the field of study. The third step is encoding the data to make it easier to identify notes in accordance to their importance. After this, interpretation of the data ensues according to the importance of the subject and methods of collection and in consideration of alternative explanations by looking for differences in the response or observations that was recorded in data collection.

The final step is drafting of the final report according to the results (Lacey & Luff, 2000). In quantitative data analysis, there are different standards of measurement. The researcher has to identify the level of measurement before doing analysis of quantitative data. The first standard is nominal such as male and female. After the first level, the second level is Ordinal for example the size (small, medium, large). The next level in terms of standard in data analysis is interval data – which contains a logical order and continual which has standardized various values between values, but no natural zero such as Fahrenheit degrees.

The fourth level is Ratio (scale). Ratio data – data is continual, ordered, standardized various between values, and a natural zero such as weight, age and height. Finally, Often the process of analysing quantitative data deals with tables, graphs and computer programs devoted to this kind of data, for example the SPSS software.(Creswell, 2002).ReferencesAmerican Academy of Pediatrics. 2004, Ethical Considerations in Research with Socially Identifiable Populations. Pediatrics, Vol. 113, No. 1, pp. 148 -151Creswell, J.

2002, Educational Research: Planning, Conducting, and Evaluating Quantitative and Qualitative Research, Saddle River, NJ: Prentice HallLacey, A. & Luff, D. 2000, Trent Focus for Research and Development in Primary Health Care Qualitative Data Analysis, Available at www.dcc.unicamp.br/~wainer/cursos/2s2009/Qualitative%20Data%20Analysis.pdf [Accessed on 24th April 2012]Pidgeon, N. and Henwood, K. 1996, Grounded Theory: Practical Implication. In J. ichardson (ed.) Handbook of qualitative research methods, Leicester: The British.

Psychological Society.Orb, E., Eisenhauer, L., & Wynaden, D. 2000, Ethics in Qualitative Research, Journal of Nursing Scholarship, vol. 33, no. 1, pp. 93-96.