– Essay topic: Indicate an area of enquiry that you might explore for an MA dissertation and examine how key concepts in research design can help shape these interests into a research project. This exercise is an opportunity to explore potential ideas that might be pursued in your dissertation. For this assignment, your research topic can be tentative. The focus of the assessment is your application of concepts from the module. It is advisable to structure the assignment by first introducing an area that could be investigated (this may or may not be related to your eventual dissertation). Then explore how each of the following questions may develop the design of a relevant research project.- How do research aims, objectives, and questions help to structure a project? In what ways, if any, might questions about causality feature and be addressed? What value and contributions might qualitative and/or quantitative research bring to an investigation? Might your project be qualitative, quantitative, or both, and what kind of data will you seek? How might your research project be informed by notions of ontology and epistemology and debates between positivism and interpretivism? What limitations and critiques might arise concerning particular research designs?
Additional information
- The assignment must draw on subject / context-specific literature in addition to the readings in the Module (weeks 1 – 7) and additional readings related to your chosen research design.
Example Essay provided below =