Nordic Research School in Library and Information Science

Research design II: Basic and advanced methods

Main responsible person: Assist. Professor Jesper W. Schneider

Course organizers/lecturers (tentative):
Professor Niels Ole Pors (Copenhagen)
Assoc. Professor Nils Pharo (Oslo)
Assoc. Professor Katriina Byström (Borås)
Assoc. Professor Peiling Wang (The University of Tennessee, Knoxville, US)
Notice: Additional names will be included

Purpose of the course:
Selecting an appropriate research methodology and relevant methods for empirically founded doctoral dissertation work is one of the key decisions for novice researchers. The decision of what research method or approach to apply, and why, is important especially since there are nowadays several alternative perspectives to apply in information and informetric studies. Thus, the choice spans from experimental methods (e.g., empirical IR research in laboratory settings) through softer quasi- and non-experimental empirical studies (e.g., empirical IR involving actual users, information seeking in real life work settings, and informetric studies in general), to analytic methods (e.g., discourse analysis). This course presents different empirical methods, experimental as well as softer approaches. The course addresses these issues by presenting various basic and advanced methods for studying quantitative and qualitative data and the underlying motivations for their use. Quantitative methods will include for instance the experimental design, inferential statistics and model fitting, whereas examples of softer methods will include various interview and observation methods as well as conversation and discourse analysis. The main emphasis of the course, however, will be on experimental and quasi-experimental research methods.

Doctoral research courses and workshops have proven to be excellent means for sharing the Nordic mentoring expertise and creating contacts between doctoral students and senior researchers. Hence, a primary goal of the research course is to provide the doctoral students with a forum in which to present their research projects and to discuss with senior researchers and fellow students the range of appropriate methodologies available.

The research course will be based upon a mixture of lectures given by senior researchers, analysis of case studies, and presentations of research projects by the research students. There will be invited a number of Nordic and international senior researchers to give lectures on specific methods. The lecturers involved will have recent experiences of various methods in the field. A required reading list will be sent to participants with the note of acceptance.

Content:
• Research methodology
• Research questions
• Research methods and study designs
• Models
• Variables, data collection and sampling theory
• Basic parametric and non-parametric statistics (significance test and hypothesis testing)
• Advanced statistical designs (multivariate analyses)
• Reporting statistical studies (causation, reliability and validity)
• Specific quantitative and qualitative methods for information and user behaviour research
• Specific quantitative methods for analyses of informetric data
• Presentation of actual research designs
• Analysis of reported research designs
• Student presentations

Location:
Royal School of Library and Information Science, Aalborg Branch, Denmark
www2.db.dk

Time:
October 15-19, 2007

Accommodation:
To be announced

Application deadline:
2007, August 15

Credits:
NORSLIS recommends 5 ECTS (European Credit Transfer System) for our research courses.
Note: A 5 ECTS (European Credit Transfer System) course normally corresponds to 5 weeks of study. In a typical NORSLIS course, teaching, seminars and discussions are concentrated to one intensive course meeting, normally for 5 days. This means that students need to work on the course both in advance of and after the course meeting. They are usually asked to study the suggested literature and to prepare a presentation in advance of the course. In order for the students to obtain all 5 ECTS they are supposed to write a conference-like paper 1-2 month later, to be send to the course management, evaluated, and to be accepted by the course management (with the course teachers as reviewers). If they do not do that or the submission is really unacceptable, we suggest that they can obtain a reduced number of ECTS. The main responsible person for the course should sign a certificate per participant stating that they actually participated and also give a recommendation about the number of ECTS that the student has achieved (see example here ). Of course, it is up to the responsible persons of the local Ph.D. programme to finally decide how credits should be assigned.

How to apply:
Research students are required to submit a five-page abstract (approx. 2500 words) of their PhD research topic, including research questions and the methodical issues of the research project. The application should also include a brief CV. This information will be used for selection purposes. Please, send the application by e-mail to Jesper W. Schneider.