Some students avoid statistics. Others dive in headfirst. One student I met this week did the latter—spending hundreds of hours teaching himself statistical analysis from scratch using textbooks, Google, and R Studio. And no, he did not use AI. By the time he came to me to check his results, he had done a solid …
The Scenario A student recently brought me their dissertation proposal for feedback. They had observed a phenomenon, discussed it with their professor, who pointed them to two or three references and worked on this limited basis. In fairness, the student acknowledged they still had work to do on the literature, but their proposal …
Lessons from My Students: The Proposal Without a Literature Review Read More »
The Scenario A student recently approached me to review their dissertation proposal, which had been rejected by their school’s proposal committee. I had not been involved in the proposal. One of the key issues was that the student had confused the concepts of mediation and moderation, which led to flaws in the argument, hypotheses, statistical …
Lessons from My Students: Mediation versus Moderation Read More »
The Scenario A student recently told me they felt “stuck” on their dissertation proposal, even skipping their end-of-year holiday to make progress. A stuck proposal or dissertation often happens because the problem isn’t clear or the research process feels overwhelming. The Issue A stuck or unsuccessful proposal or dissertation typically signals a lack of clarity …
Lessons from My Students: Getting Unstuck – Four Essential Questions to Move Forward Read More »
The Scenario A master’s student recently sent me their survey questionnaire for review. As I’ve seen in many such cases, there were several substantial issues that, if uncorrected, would compromise the quality of the data collected—and, in turn, the analysis, results, and conclusions. Fortunately, the survey had just begun, so there was still time …
Lessons from My Students: Crafting a Flawless Questionnaire Read More »
The Scenario A student’s dissertation I recently reviewed aimed to predict a rare medical disease using data from patient records. The student had not done an upfront power analysis to determine the sample size needed. Given the infrequent occurrence of the event, a large sample was necessary to detect meaningful effects, but, unfortunately, collecting such …
Lessons from My Students: Size Matters – Getting Sample Size Right Read More »
The Scenario A student’s dissertation I recently reviewed raised an interesting research question. Assume it was: What drives employee engagement in virtual teams? The introduction laid out the research problem, purpose and questions, and the literature review explored relevant studies. But something important was missing. There was no mention of a research/conceptual framework in these …
The Critical Role of the Research/Conceptual Framework Read More »
Did you ever play the game “Broken Telephones” or “Chinese Whispers” as a child? In the game, a message is whispered from person to person, and by the end, it has morphed into something entirely different. It can be hilarious. Unfortunately, in research, this kind of drift is far from amusing. It creates inconsistency among …
Less is More – Consolidation is Key The Scenario A recent dissertation I reviewed contained over 100 small tables and graphs, each presenting a single aspect of the student’s findings. Tables were presented per demographic and item, for example, the respondents’ level of education, years of experience, and age group (there were six such small …
Are you an academic or postgraduate student feeling overwhelmed by your research? Are you having trouble analyzing your data or interpreting your statistical results? One key concept that can assist you is understanding what statistical significance truly means and, more importantly, what it signifies for your research. What Is Statistical Significance Telling You? Statistical significance …