A good response to others is not something like “I agree.” Please find something that you can analyze, add to, critique, explain, disagree with, or something. It should be a few cogent sentences. It should contain something that shows your knowledge of the subject, as well as additional materials you might bring from the web and elsewhere.
Apply theories or materials correctly. Apply relevant professional, personal, or other real-world experiences. Supports position with applicable knowledge
You should create substantial responses to your peers. Think of this as your opportunity to teach. Create substantial responses which expand on a point and present information on the topic. Your responses should demonstrate your critical thinking on the topic.
Respond to the following discussions (8X). Write how you would respond to their discussions with approximately 150 words or more each. Be thoughtful and insightful and it must demonstrate critical thinking and analysis.
How have the implications of research design impacted the research questions utilized in your proposal? Provide at least three examples of the implications and impact
1. During my recent research for my proposal I’ve been looking at what type points that would seem relevant to police corruption. The research design for the most part has been a helpful tool in outlining what I will be discussing in my paper. The explanation of certain details of my research paper is what I will have to dig into to really make the reader understand certain parts of my points. I want to explain the specifically what factors contribute a police officer into corruption. Exploring and then explaining various personal character traits as to why police officers might be corrupt will be the hardest part of my research paper because I think this is a major aspect of my paper. What I don’t want to occur during my research tying into the character and physiological factors concerning police corruption is that the exploration of this area is not find sufficient answers to support my theories. The text describes this might occur during the exploration phase as, “the chief shortcoming of exploratory studies is that they seldom provide satisfactory answers to research questions, the reason exploratory studies are seldom definitive in themselves has to do with representativeness” (Babbie, 2017). Overall the description of my research proposal is what will make finding the research for the paper easier because of the clear topics that I want to discuss in my paper. Having at least four main objectives in y description will make my paper clear in reaching a conclusion.
References: Babbie, E. R. (2017). The basics of social research (Seventh ed.). Boston, MA, USA: Cengage Learning.
2. There are three common purposes of research called exploration, description, and explanation. Each of these purposes have different implications on all aspects of research design (Babbie, 2017, p. 94).
Exploration is conducted on social research to explore a topic to expand the knowledge of a researcher. This approach occurs when a researcher strikes a new interest in a subject of study that maybe relatively new. Exploratory studies are very persistent in nature. These extensive research studies can be pursued by focus or small group discussions. Exploratory studies are done for three purposes. The first is to satisfy the researcher’s curiosity and desire for a better understanding. The second is to test the feasibility of undertaking a more extensive study. The third is to develop the methods to be employed in any subsequent study (Babbie, 2017. P.94). As an example, my topic is racial profiling. I could ask a question such as, “Do minorities get pulled over more for being a person of color opposed to being white?” Does this phenomena occur more frequently in larger cities or certain states? Do minorities get arrested more often than a person who is white?
Description is a study that aims at describing situations and events that occur. The researcher must observe and then describe exactly what they saw. The scientific descriptions are more accurate and precise utilizing this study. A great example is if I study the profiles of populations done by demographics and commutate the crime rates for different cities. This would allow me to research the crime rates by demographics in certain cities and compare and contrast what I observe. The descriptive study would impact my overall research paper with accurate information from my observation. Another implication would be if I studied the amount of age-gender minorities who are stopped in certain parts of a city.
Explanation is the third common purpose of research. The descriptive study answers the questions of what, where, when, how and the explanatory studies address questions of why (Babbie, 2017, p. 96). If I studied the amount of age-gender minorities who are stopped in certain parts of a city that would be descriptive, but if I asked why law enforcement is stopping/arresting minorities in certain parts of the city more than other parts, that is explanation
3. After going through though this weeks required reading, I revisited my proposal and noticed that the interpretation presented included some convincing evidence in support of my theory. However, it lacked some aspects that should be considered in the initial stages of research design.
According to (Babbie, 2017), the operationalization stage of research design entails deciding how the desired data will be collected (e.g. direct observation, review of official document, a questionnaire, or some other technique). I did not clearly state the procedure in which empirical data will be collected for my proposed topic. Therefore, I’d like to make known that all information observed will be gathered from statistical data that has been released by official sources. With that being said, the most important implication of my theory is that the criminal justice system can mitigate crime that is subjected to capital punishment. The main reason for offenders desisting from crime is their interaction with the criminal justice system. Therefore, the most important event which causes deterrence is proper conviction.
The unit of analysis is another aspect of the research design that I did not clearly state in my proposal. The unit of analysis is basically the subjects (e.g. individual, group, or organization) we choose to study in order to draw our conclusions (Babbie, 2017). I did talk about the criminal justice system but I never mentioned it as one of my units. During the study of my proposed topic, I’ll be observing the statistics of criminal justice organizations and their capital sentencing, as well as the statistics of criminal behavior open to this form of sentencing. The implication will be that in regions where the criminal justice system carries out capital punishment sentencing properly, criminal behavior subjected to this punishment is less.
Lastly, I completely failed to discuss the purpose behind this study. According to (Babbie, 2017) This is the last step of the research process. The implication for this section entail describing the objective of the study.
4. With there being so much controversy over the legalization of marijuana it is hard not to see how all the information can either be misleading or swayed which has major implications in a person’s judgment and outcome of a final decision.
With any good research being done before a decision is reached one needs to find the facts of what the drug is and what it does to a person. This leads to studying individuals that use marijuana and how it affects them in a social setting. Watching and listening to how people act after they consume marijuana is a first step. We must be careful not to make any determinations too quickly as this leads to reductionism in the information and will alter the outcome or decision.
When we start looking at groups of people we must be sure that there are no biases or pre-disposed thoughts of who may use the drug or why. If the study is not clear of biases you may run into ecological fallacy which will not produce the intended results or information of the study. This can also happen with cross-sectional studies, when trying to get the bigger picture on this issue we have to look a the country as a whole not just certain parts of it.
5. Topic Proposal: Crime and Mental Illness. What can be learned about how mental illness influences whether or not someone is likely to commit crimes? Are certain mental illnesses more prone to criminal behavior?
The relationship between these two has been well researched. How will your work be new, novel, or different? What I mean is – what do you see as the current gap in the literature?
Try to identify the current gap in the literature – what has not yet been studied before. You have to show what has already been done to address the problem to show how your work is new or different. See this site; https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/20140912150946-275561203-6-very-useful-approaches-to-identify-research-gaps-and-generate-research-questions
Provide at least three terms that must be defined in your research proposal. Provide the term, your definition and what possible interpretations would/could a reader surmise if you failed to define the term.
6 In the topic ill be covering discusses one of the many questions relating to police and mental issues and mental health concern that impact their life on a day to day basis in the field. Training they are given and what help is there for them in cases where they could be put on office duty until cleared back for field work. Some definitions that might be covered are the differences mental health disorder, post traumatic stress disorder(PTSD), and hardship. Mental health disorder is a change in a person’s way of thinking and feeling that could affect their ability to perform daily activities. Post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is developed by traumatic events that can leave someone with a mental disorder that they could never fully recover from but can find ways in coping. Lastly hardship is something that involves severe suffering or privations. This can be related to the daily grind from work where you may be working scenes constantly back to back on cases where mental disorders could come arise in ones career.
7. For my research proposal I decided to go with capital punishment/the death penalty. With my research proposal I’m going to research the sociological aspects associated with capital punishment/the death penalty, such as sociological theories. The main sociological theories I’m planning on researching are conflict theory, functionalism, and symbolic interactionism.
One term that would need to be defined would be capital punishment/the death penalty. Capital punishment/the death penalty is a sentence served to a criminal. Capital punishment/the death penalty is used in only a handful of cases. “A sentence of death may be carried out by one of five lawful means: electrocution, hanging, lethal injection, gas chamber, and firing squad” (Capital punishment, 2008.) Many people are against capital punishment/the death penalty due to the cost.
Another term that would need to be defined would be conflict theory. Conflict theory is a sociological theory used to describe the different types of conflicts between social classes. Conflict theory, “…states that society or an organization functions so that each individual participant and its groups struggle to maximize their benefits, which inevitably contributes to social changeLinks to an external site. such as political changes and revolutions” (Conflict theory, 2013.)
And a third term that would need to be defined would be symbolic interactionism. Symbolic interactionism is a theory with three different core principles. These three core principles are language, thought, and meaning. “These core principles lead to conclusions about the creation of a person’s self and socialization into a larger community” (Symbolic interactionism.)
If I failed to define these terms, I don’t believe the reader would be able to comprehend what I was writing about, the reader may know some of these terms and not others. By trying to surmise these terms, the reader may surmise incorrectly and thus losing the purpose of my paper in the process. So, by defining these terms, the reader can better understand my paper and the reader will be able to surmise correctly.
8. Here are three definitions of important terms used in my proposal. One of the terms is my own definition.
Alien – Any person not a citizen or national of the United States (INA § 101a(3)).
A reader could surmise that I was being sarcastic, critical, derogatory, or abusive in my language/use of the term.
Social Security Benefits – includes retirement, disability, family (dependents), survivors and Medicare benefits paid by the Social Security Administration
Found at: https://www.ssa.gov/agency/glossary/Links to an external site.
One could surmise that I was only researching one and not all of the five benefits paid by SSA.
Other Household Member – In my study, I am researching if another household member, but not the benefactor is still collecting the benefit.
A reader could surmise that this person collecting this is the individual who is supposed to be collecting. Many times, the member dies and those living in the house do not report the death to the SSA.