2. Research Process
• Research process consists of series of actions or steps
necessary to effectively carry out research
i. Define Research Problem
ii. Literature Review
iii. Development of Formulate Hypothesis
iv. Preparing the Research Design
v. Data Collection
vi. Data Analysis
vii. Presentation and summary of data
viii. Reporting the Result
3. Making Sense of Your
Results
• After having some quantitative data, you can apply
a method of analysis and begin to throw some light
on your research question.
• Regardless of what more complex methods of
analysis you intend to use, you will generally want
to start with a table of basic characteristics, or
baseline table, which tells the reader about the
subjects you’ve been working with.
• This table is an essential feature of any written
research results.
4. Baseline tables
• Usually these tables will contain
• Demographic data (age, sex, ethnicity, occupation, etc.)
• Information particularly relevant to the study in question
• E.g. duration and severity of current illness, previous clinical history, …,etc.
• To summarise these data and describe the distribution of the variables
you can use:
• Percentages or proportions
• E.g. to indicate the relative proportions of males and females in the sample
• Means and standard deviations
• if your data are metric
• discrete (i.e. countable data (e.g. number of students in class))
• continuous (i.e. measurable data (e.g. height of a person));
• Medians and interquartile ranges
• if your data are ordinal
• e.g. the Likert scale : (Like Like Somewhat Neutral Dislike Somewhat
Dislike)
• skewed metric (non-normal distribution)
6. Fig. 5 A table of baseline characteristics taken from a randomised double-blind placebo-controlled trial of
nitazoxanide for the treatment of severe rotavirus diarrhoea. This table shows the basic characteristics of the
subjects in both groups (active suspension versus the placebo).
7. • A somewhat more complicated baseline table,
taken from a randomised double blind placebo-
controlled trial of nitazoxanide for the treatment
of severe rotavirus diarrhoea.
• This table, is showing the basic characteristics
of the subjects in both groups (active
suspension versus the placebo) also compares
the values in each category (see the ‘p-values’
in the last column).
8. Research Process
• Research process consists of series of actions or steps
necessary to effectively carry out research
i. Define Research Problem
ii. Literature Review
iii. Development of Formulate Hypothesis
iv. Preparing the Research Design
v. Data Collection
vi. Data Analysis
vii. Presentation and summary of data
viii. Reporting the Result
9. IN WHAT SORT OF JOURNAL
DOES THE PAPER APPEAR?
• Journals publish only research articles which have not
appeared elsewhere
• What appears in a journal is decided by the editor, nearly
always with the help and advice of an editorial committee.
• The best journals also seek opinions from external referees
who comment on papers sent to them, and advise on
suitability for publication. Because these referees are usually
experts in the same field as the authors of the paper, this
process is called ‘peer reviewing’
10. • One way to judge the quality of a journal is to check its impact
factor (IF) – a measure of the frequency with which papers in the
journal are quoted (cited) by other researchers.
• Examples of High Impact Journals
• The New England Journal of Medicine (IF: 72.406)
• Lancet (London, England) (IF: 47.831)
• Nature Reviews. Molecular Cell Biology (IF: 46.602)
• JAMA - Journal of the American Medical Association (IF: 44.405)
• Journal of the American College of Cardiology (IF: 19.896)
12. What is a Research Paper?
• A research paper is a piece of academic writing based on its
author’s original research on a particular topic, and the
analysis and interpretation of the research findings
13. Research paper may refer to:
1. Academic paper
• Also called scholarly paper, which is in academic journals and may
contains:
• Original research results (e.g. Scientific or Clinical research)
• Reviews existing results (Covers those papers which provide an overview some concept,
technique or phenomenon)
• Show a totally new invention
2. Position paper
• An essay that represents the author's opinion
3. Term paper
• Written by high school or college students
4. Thesis or dissertation
• A document submitted in support of a candidature for a degree or
professional qualification, presenting the author's research and findings
14. Components of Research
paper
• Title
• Abstract
• Introduction
• Objectives
• Methods
• Results
• Discussion
• Conclusion
• References
15. The title
• Give you an idea of what the paper is about
• Under the title, authors’ names and affiliations are presented
16. WHO WROTE THE PAPER?
• Papers describing research studies are usually published under
the names of a number of people – the research team.
• From the list of authors, you can tell:
• The range of expertise of the research team.
• Professional backgrounds of the authors are often included, with the address of
each.
• The research centre or centres involved in the study.
• This is useful when you’ve been reading for a while and you know whose work
to look out for – for whatever reason!
• The principal researcher.
• He or she is often named first, or sometimes identifiable as the only author
whose full address and contact details are listed (called the corresponding
author)
19. The Abstract and
Introduction
• Most papers reporting primary research data start with an
abstract
• Abstract: a brief summary of the whole paper that appears
immediately below the title
• The purpose of this brief summary is to help the reader decide
if they want to go on to read the paper in detail, by outlining
the content of the research and its main findings.
20. THE ABSTRACT
• Some journals require authors to provide structured abstracts
• using headings equivalent to those that appear in the main text.
(see next slide)
• Other abstracts are unstructured and simply give a brief
description of the accompanying paper.
• The decision about which style of abstract to use is
determined not by the author but by the journal.
21.
22. THE INTRODUCTION
• After the abstract comes an introductory section.
• Its aim is :
• To provide some background information that makes it clear why the study
described in the paper has been undertaken.
• These background information include:
• Clinical importance
• E.g. Is it about a symptom that affects quality of life, or causes major treatment
difficulties
• Public health importance
• E.g. Is it about an illness that represents a big burden for the community – in terms
of chronic handicap, or costs to health or social services?
• Theoretical interest
• Will further study help us to understand the causes of a condition, or its
consequences?
• These questions will normally be discussed by reference to existing
evidence (see references slide)
23. The Objectives
• Following the Introduction, you should look for a clear
statement of the objectives of the current work.
• This statement can come in two forms:
• Aims are general statements about purpose.
• For example, the authors might wish to examine the attitudes of hospital
nurses to colleagues with mental health problems
• Hypotheses are specific questions, suggested by previous
research or theory.
• For example, does taking the oral contraceptive pill increase the risk of
stroke among women of childbearing age?
24. Methods
• The methods section usually includes information about:
• Design (see next slide)
• Research setting (e.g. community or population-based study)
• Populations and Samples (sampling, sample size, …etc.)
• Identifying and Defining Cases (Inclusion and exclusion criteria,
Case definition, …etc.)
• Controls and Comparisons
• Describing statistical methods
25. Design Matters:
What Type of Study are you Reading
About?
• Quantitative methods
• Cross-sectional study
• Case-control study
• Cohort study (retrospective or prospective)
• Clinical trial
• Qualitative methods
• Observation
• Interviews
• Focus groups
• Mixed methods design
• A methodology for conducting research that involves collecting,
analysing and integrating quantitative (e.g., experiments, surveys) and
qualitative (e.g., focus groups, interviews) research
26. Results
• Identifying the Characteristics of Data
• (see next slide)
• Summarizing the Characteristics of Data (Summary measures of
location)
• There are two principal measures of location:
• The mean ‘averageness’.
• The median ‘centralness’.
• Measuring the Characteristics of Subjects and Measures
• Baseline table
• Data analyses
• Estimation and Hypothesis Testing (Confidence Intervals, the p-Value)
• Results can be presented by
• Text
• Tables
• Pictures
27. Identifying the Characteristics of
Data
1. the type of data values involved;
• Qualitative data: i.e. Categorical data (Nominal, Ordinal)
• Quantitative data: i.e. Metric data (Continuous, Discrete)
2. how these data values are distributed – their shape
a. Negatively (or left-) skewed
b. Positively (or right-) skewed
c. Uniform (The values here are spread fairly evenly across the whole
range)
d. Mound or humped shaped (normal distribution)
28. The Discussion
• The discussion section of a paper comes usually at the end,
after the presentation of results
• The discussion is meant to put results in context for the reader
– indicating the authors’ beliefs about the meaning of their
findings and their implications for the future
29. Elements of the discussion
section
1. Start with a brief summary of the main findings of the study (no data
or statistics)
2. Compare the findings with those from other similar work
• to point out whether they broadly agree with previous research or whether they
disagree
3. A brief critical appraisal of the work that is presented
• pointing out the main strengths and weaknesses of the study
4. Indicate that results are believable and not due to problems with the
study
5. Indicate the meaning of the findings
• A plausible explanation for them
• Implications for future practice
30. The Conclusions
• Papers often finish with a ‘conclusions’ or ‘summary’ section
• Conclusion section provides a quick summary of what a paper
is about
• Conclusion section tells you what the authors would like to
conclude from their study
31. References
• A references page is the last page of an essay or research
paper
• It lists all the sources you've used in your project, so readers
can easily find what you've cited in text.
• In-Text Citations
• When you use an outside source to support or expand your ideas,
it's necessary to give credit with an in-text citation.
• Each source you use in your paper must also appear in your
references page.
• A source is a book, periodical, website, peer-reviewed journal
article, or other media that you've used for support.
• They are also referred to as “citations” or “references”
