Research Methodology
Best Practices for Rigorous, Credible, and Impactful Research
If you’re in North America, please visit our Sage College Publishing website to purchase or sample this book:
Go to College Publishing WebsiteDescription
Research Methodology: Best Practices for Rigorous, Credible, and Impactful Research takes a 360-degree view of understanding and doing research, helping readers become expert researchers, reviewers, and consumers of research. Renowned author, journal editor, and researcher Herman Aguinis distills the vast body of work on methodological best practices into a singular experience. Each of the 16 chapters thoroughly explains a different aspect of methodology step by step, from choosing useful and compelling research topics to reporting results accurately and credibly. Researchers at all career stages will find this text helpful to structure and conduct high-impact empirical research aimed at producing a thesis, dissertation, or journal publication. Research consumers will find instruction on how to evaluate the rigor and credibility of research conducted by others. Instructors will find the book’s modular approach refreshing by assigning students the most relevant topics—from checklists of best practices to an in-depth treatment of a methodology. Filled with “how-to’s” and “dos and don’ts”, figures, hands-on exercises, and “Methods in Practice” boxes that summarize and apply best practices, this book is a must-have for anyone interested in producing or reading research.
Included with this title:
LMS Cartridge: Import this title’s instructor resources into your school’s learning management system (LMS) and save time. Don’t use an LMS? You can still access all of the same online resources for this title via the password-protected Instructor Resource Site. Learn more.
Read a review of the book published in the Academy of Management Learning & Education journal here.
Included with this title:
LMS Cartridge: Import this title’s instructor resources into your school’s learning management system (LMS) and save time. Don’t use an LMS? You can still access all of the same online resources for this title via the password-protected Instructor Resource Site. Learn more.
Read a review of the book published in the Academy of Management Learning & Education journal here.
Contents
Chapter 1: How to Understand the Current Methodological Landscape
- Importance of Research Methods
- Research Methods: A Brief Historical Journey
- Mapping Quantitative Research Methods
- Mapping Qualitative Research Methods: Research Design, Measurement, and Data Analysis
- Research on Research Methods: Best in Kind
- Research Methods: The Present and the Future
Chapter 2: How to Conduct Ethical Research
- Importance of Ethical Research
- Research Ethics: Definition and Two Approaches
- How to Plan Ethical Research
- How to Execute Ethical Research
- Special Considerations for Conducting Ethical Research in Field Settings
- How to Report Research Results Ethically
- How to Enforce Ethical Research
- How to Resolve Ethics Complaints
Chapter 3: How to Make Contributions to Theory
- Importance of Contributions to Theory
- Why Theories Should Be Useful and for Whom
- Important Distinctions in Discerning Good Theory
- When Is New Theory Needed?
- Pruning the Theoretical Landscape
- How to Improve Theory Using Theory Elaboration
- How to Conduct a Theory Elaboration Study
- How to Bridge Levels of Analysis to Improve Theory
Chapter 4: How to Plan Your Research
- Importance of Research Planning
- How to Address an Important Issue and Conduct Research with a Practical End in Mind
- How to Strengthen Causal Inferences
- How to Balance the Internal Versus External Validity Tradeoff
- How to Choose Control Variables
- Illustrations of Best-Practice Recommendations Implementation
Chapter 5: How to Collect Your Sample Using Surveys and Other Means
- Importance of Sample Size
- Why Large Sample Size Is Not Always the Best Option
- How to Make Sure Your Study Participants Are Who You Think They Are
- Implementing Best Practices in Merging Your Data with Data from Existing Databases
- How to Evaluate the Appropriateness of Your Study’s Response Rate When Using Surveys
- How to Deal with Publication Bias and the File Drawer Problem
Chapter 6: How to Measure Your Variables
- Importance of Measurement
- Definition of Measurement and Benefits of Good Measurement
- Scales of Measurement
- How to Create a New Measure
- How to Improve Existing Measures
Chapter 7: How to Design and Conduct Experimental Research
- Importance of Experiments
- How to Conduct Vignette Experiments
- How to Conduct Experiments Online
- How to Conduct Experiments Using Virtual Reality
- How to Conduct Thought Experiments
Chapter 8: How to Prepare Your Data for Analysis
- Importance of Cleaning Up Your Data
- How to Handle Missing Data and Data Transformations
- How to Handle Outliers
- How to Not Clean Up Your Hypotheses by Hypothesizing After Results are Known (HARKing)
Chapter 9: How to Conduct Quantitative Analysis, Part I: Regression-based Approaches
- Importance of Regression Analysis
- Moderation
- Mediation
- Analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA)
- Using Regression to Understand Nonlinear Effects: The Too-Much-of-A-Good-Thing (TMGT) Effect
Chapter 10: How to Conduct Quantitative Analysis, Part II: Multilevel Modeling
- Importance of Multilevel Modeling
- Fundamentals of Multilevel Modeling
- Visual Representation of Types of Variances Modeled in Multilevel Analysis
- Analytic Representation of Sources of Variance Modeled in Multilevel Analysis
- The Importance of Statistical Power in Multilevel Modeling
- Multilevel Modeling: Step-by-Step Illustration
- Why You Need to Examine More than Just the Traditional Intraclass Correlation
- Best-practice Recommendations for Conducting and Reporting Multilevel Analysis and Cross-level Interaction Effects
Chapter 11: How to Conduct Quantitative Analysis, Part III: Meta-analysis
- Importance of Meta-analysis
- Meta-analysis: Choices, Choices, Choices
- How to Conduct a State-of-the-science Meta-analysis
- Meta-regression
- Meta-analytic Structural Equation Modeling
- Is There a Need for an Updated Meta-Analysis?
Chapter 12: How to Conduct Quantitative Analysis, Part IV: Advanced Techniques
- Importance of Advanced Quantitative Techniques
- Market Basket Analysis
- Experience Sampling Methodology
- Bayesian Analysis
Chapter 13: How to Conduct Qualitative Research
- Importance of Qualitative Research
- Interviews with Key Informants
- Computer-Aided Text Analysis (CATA)
- Methodological Literature Reviews
- Mixed Methods
- How to Improve Transparency and Replicability in Your Qualitative Research
Chapter 14: How to Report Your Results
- Importance of How You Report Your Results
- How to Report p-values
- Why You Should Report Effect Size Estimates
- How Your Effect Sizes Compare to Those in Social and Behavioral Research
- How to Interpret the Meaning of Effect Sizes
- How to Report Statistical Results: The Case of ?2 and ?2
- How to Report Your Study’s Limitations and Future Research Directions
Chapter 15: How to Improve the Transparency, Reproducibility, and Replicability of Your Research
- Importance of Transparency and Replicability of Your Research
- How to Improve Transparency about Your Theory
- How to Improve Transparency about Your Research Design
- How to Improve Transparency about Your Measures
- How to Improve Transparency about Your Data Analysis
- How to Improve Transparency about Your Results
- How to Motivate Authors to Improve Transparency
Chapter 16: How to Enhance the Impact of Your Research
- Importance of the Impact of Your Research
- Scholarly Impact: Internal and External
- On the Use and Misuse of Journal Lists as an Indicator of Scholarly Impact
- How to Broaden the Meaning and Measurement of Impact
- Actions that University Administrators, Researchers, and Educators Can Take to Enhance Scholarly Impact
- How to Create Your Own Personal Impact Development Plan
- Enhancing Your Impact: It’s a Journey
Description
Research Methodology: Best Practices for Rigorous, Credible, and Impactful Research takes a 360-degree view of understanding and doing research, helping readers become expert researchers, reviewers, and consumers of research. Renowned author, journal editor, and researcher Herman Aguinis distills the vast body of work on methodological best practices into a singular experience. Each of the 16 chapters thoroughly explains a different aspect of methodology step by step, from choosing useful and compelling research topics to reporting results accurately and credibly. Researchers at all career stages will find this text helpful to structure and conduct high-impact empirical research aimed at producing a thesis, dissertation, or journal publication. Research consumers will find instruction on how to evaluate the rigor and credibility of research conducted by others. Instructors will find the book’s modular approach refreshing by assigning students the most relevant topics—from checklists of best practices to an in-depth treatment of a methodology. Filled with “how-to’s” and “dos and don’ts”, figures, hands-on exercises, and “Methods in Practice” boxes that summarize and apply best practices, this book is a must-have for anyone interested in producing or reading research.
Included with this title:
LMS Cartridge: Import this title’s instructor resources into your school’s learning management system (LMS) and save time. Don’t use an LMS? You can still access all of the same online resources for this title via the password-protected Instructor Resource Site. Learn more.
Read a review of the book published in the Academy of Management Learning & Education journal here.
Included with this title:
LMS Cartridge: Import this title’s instructor resources into your school’s learning management system (LMS) and save time. Don’t use an LMS? You can still access all of the same online resources for this title via the password-protected Instructor Resource Site. Learn more.
Read a review of the book published in the Academy of Management Learning & Education journal here.
Contents
Chapter 1: How to Understand the Current Methodological Landscape
- Importance of Research Methods
- Research Methods: A Brief Historical Journey
- Mapping Quantitative Research Methods
- Mapping Qualitative Research Methods: Research Design, Measurement, and Data Analysis
- Research on Research Methods: Best in Kind
- Research Methods: The Present and the Future
Chapter 2: How to Conduct Ethical Research
- Importance of Ethical Research
- Research Ethics: Definition and Two Approaches
- How to Plan Ethical Research
- How to Execute Ethical Research
- Special Considerations for Conducting Ethical Research in Field Settings
- How to Report Research Results Ethically
- How to Enforce Ethical Research
- How to Resolve Ethics Complaints
Chapter 3: How to Make Contributions to Theory
- Importance of Contributions to Theory
- Why Theories Should Be Useful and for Whom
- Important Distinctions in Discerning Good Theory
- When Is New Theory Needed?
- Pruning the Theoretical Landscape
- How to Improve Theory Using Theory Elaboration
- How to Conduct a Theory Elaboration Study
- How to Bridge Levels of Analysis to Improve Theory
Chapter 4: How to Plan Your Research
- Importance of Research Planning
- How to Address an Important Issue and Conduct Research with a Practical End in Mind
- How to Strengthen Causal Inferences
- How to Balance the Internal Versus External Validity Tradeoff
- How to Choose Control Variables
- Illustrations of Best-Practice Recommendations Implementation
Chapter 5: How to Collect Your Sample Using Surveys and Other Means
- Importance of Sample Size
- Why Large Sample Size Is Not Always the Best Option
- How to Make Sure Your Study Participants Are Who You Think They Are
- Implementing Best Practices in Merging Your Data with Data from Existing Databases
- How to Evaluate the Appropriateness of Your Study’s Response Rate When Using Surveys
- How to Deal with Publication Bias and the File Drawer Problem
Chapter 6: How to Measure Your Variables
- Importance of Measurement
- Definition of Measurement and Benefits of Good Measurement
- Scales of Measurement
- How to Create a New Measure
- How to Improve Existing Measures
Chapter 7: How to Design and Conduct Experimental Research
- Importance of Experiments
- How to Conduct Vignette Experiments
- How to Conduct Experiments Online
- How to Conduct Experiments Using Virtual Reality
- How to Conduct Thought Experiments
Chapter 8: How to Prepare Your Data for Analysis
- Importance of Cleaning Up Your Data
- How to Handle Missing Data and Data Transformations
- How to Handle Outliers
- How to Not Clean Up Your Hypotheses by Hypothesizing After Results are Known (HARKing)
Chapter 9: How to Conduct Quantitative Analysis, Part I: Regression-based Approaches
- Importance of Regression Analysis
- Moderation
- Mediation
- Analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA)
- Using Regression to Understand Nonlinear Effects: The Too-Much-of-A-Good-Thing (TMGT) Effect
Chapter 10: How to Conduct Quantitative Analysis, Part II: Multilevel Modeling
- Importance of Multilevel Modeling
- Fundamentals of Multilevel Modeling
- Visual Representation of Types of Variances Modeled in Multilevel Analysis
- Analytic Representation of Sources of Variance Modeled in Multilevel Analysis
- The Importance of Statistical Power in Multilevel Modeling
- Multilevel Modeling: Step-by-Step Illustration
- Why You Need to Examine More than Just the Traditional Intraclass Correlation
- Best-practice Recommendations for Conducting and Reporting Multilevel Analysis and Cross-level Interaction Effects
Chapter 11: How to Conduct Quantitative Analysis, Part III: Meta-analysis
- Importance of Meta-analysis
- Meta-analysis: Choices, Choices, Choices
- How to Conduct a State-of-the-science Meta-analysis
- Meta-regression
- Meta-analytic Structural Equation Modeling
- Is There a Need for an Updated Meta-Analysis?
Chapter 12: How to Conduct Quantitative Analysis, Part IV: Advanced Techniques
- Importance of Advanced Quantitative Techniques
- Market Basket Analysis
- Experience Sampling Methodology
- Bayesian Analysis
Chapter 13: How to Conduct Qualitative Research
- Importance of Qualitative Research
- Interviews with Key Informants
- Computer-Aided Text Analysis (CATA)
- Methodological Literature Reviews
- Mixed Methods
- How to Improve Transparency and Replicability in Your Qualitative Research
Chapter 14: How to Report Your Results
- Importance of How You Report Your Results
- How to Report p-values
- Why You Should Report Effect Size Estimates
- How Your Effect Sizes Compare to Those in Social and Behavioral Research
- How to Interpret the Meaning of Effect Sizes
- How to Report Statistical Results: The Case of ?2 and ?2
- How to Report Your Study’s Limitations and Future Research Directions
Chapter 15: How to Improve the Transparency, Reproducibility, and Replicability of Your Research
- Importance of Transparency and Replicability of Your Research
- How to Improve Transparency about Your Theory
- How to Improve Transparency about Your Research Design
- How to Improve Transparency about Your Measures
- How to Improve Transparency about Your Data Analysis
- How to Improve Transparency about Your Results
- How to Motivate Authors to Improve Transparency
Chapter 16: How to Enhance the Impact of Your Research
- Importance of the Impact of Your Research
- Scholarly Impact: Internal and External
- On the Use and Misuse of Journal Lists as an Indicator of Scholarly Impact
- How to Broaden the Meaning and Measurement of Impact
- Actions that University Administrators, Researchers, and Educators Can Take to Enhance Scholarly Impact
- How to Create Your Own Personal Impact Development Plan
- Enhancing Your Impact: It’s a Journey
Reviews
Research Methodology
Best Practices for Rigorous, Credible, and Impactful Research
March 2024 | 616 pages | Sage US
| Format | Published Date | ISBN | Price |
|---|
Research Methodology: Best Practices for Rigorous, Credible, and Impactful Research takes a 360-degree view of understanding and doing research, helping readers become expert researchers, reviewers, and consumers of research. Renowned author, journal editor, and researcher Herman Aguinis distills the vast body of work on methodological best practices into a singular experience. Each of the 16 chapters thoroughly explains a different aspect of methodology step by step, from choosing useful and compelling research topics to reporting results accurately and credibly. Researchers at all career stages will find this text helpful to structure and conduct high-impact empirical research aimed at producing a thesis, dissertation, or journal publication. Research consumers will find instruction on how to evaluate the rigor and credibility of research conducted by others. Instructors will find the book’s modular approach refreshing by assigning students the most relevant topics—from checklists of best practices to an in-depth treatment of a methodology. Filled with “how-to’s” and “dos and don’ts”, figures, hands-on exercises, and “Methods in Practice” boxes that summarize and apply best practices, this book is a must-have for anyone interested in producing or reading research.
Included with this title:
LMS Cartridge: Import this title’s instructor resources into your school’s learning management system (LMS) and save time. Don’t use an LMS? You can still access all of the same online resources for this title via the password-protected Instructor Resource Site. Learn more.
Read a review of the book published in the Academy of Management Learning & Education journal here.
Included with this title:
LMS Cartridge: Import this title’s instructor resources into your school’s learning management system (LMS) and save time. Don’t use an LMS? You can still access all of the same online resources for this title via the password-protected Instructor Resource Site. Learn more.
Read a review of the book published in the Academy of Management Learning & Education journal here.
Table Of Contents:
- Chapter 1: How to Understand the Current Methodological Landscape
- Importance of Research Methods
- Research Methods: A Brief Historical Journey
- Mapping Quantitative Research Methods
- Mapping Qualitative Research Methods: Research Design, Measurement, and Data Analysis
- Research on Research Methods: Best in Kind
- Research Methods: The Present and the Future
- Chapter 2: How to Conduct Ethical Research
- Importance of Ethical Research
- Research Ethics: Definition and Two Approaches
- How to Plan Ethical Research
- How to Execute Ethical Research
- Special Considerations for Conducting Ethical Research in Field Settings
- How to Report Research Results Ethically
- How to Enforce Ethical Research
- How to Resolve Ethics Complaints
- Chapter 3: How to Make Contributions to Theory
- Importance of Contributions to Theory
- Why Theories Should Be Useful and for Whom
- Important Distinctions in Discerning Good Theory
- When Is New Theory Needed?
- Pruning the Theoretical Landscape
- How to Improve Theory Using Theory Elaboration
- How to Conduct a Theory Elaboration Study
- How to Bridge Levels of Analysis to Improve Theory
- Chapter 4: How to Plan Your Research
- Importance of Research Planning
- How to Address an Important Issue and Conduct Research with a Practical End in Mind
- How to Strengthen Causal Inferences
- How to Balance the Internal Versus External Validity Tradeoff
- How to Choose Control Variables
- Illustrations of Best-Practice Recommendations Implementation
- Chapter 5: How to Collect Your Sample Using Surveys and Other Means
- Importance of Sample Size
- Why Large Sample Size Is Not Always the Best Option
- How to Make Sure Your Study Participants Are Who You Think They Are
- Implementing Best Practices in Merging Your Data with Data from Existing Databases
- How to Evaluate the Appropriateness of Your Study’s Response Rate When Using Surveys
- How to Deal with Publication Bias and the File Drawer Problem
- Chapter 6: How to Measure Your Variables
- Importance of Measurement
- Definition of Measurement and Benefits of Good Measurement
- Scales of Measurement
- How to Create a New Measure
- How to Improve Existing Measures
- Chapter 7: How to Design and Conduct Experimental Research
- Importance of Experiments
- How to Conduct Vignette Experiments
- How to Conduct Experiments Online
- How to Conduct Experiments Using Virtual Reality
- How to Conduct Thought Experiments
- Chapter 8: How to Prepare Your Data for Analysis
- Importance of Cleaning Up Your Data
- How to Handle Missing Data and Data Transformations
- How to Handle Outliers
- How to Not Clean Up Your Hypotheses by Hypothesizing After Results are Known (HARKing)
- Chapter 9: How to Conduct Quantitative Analysis, Part I: Regression-based Approaches
- Importance of Regression Analysis
- Moderation
- Mediation
- Analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA)
- Using Regression to Understand Nonlinear Effects: The Too-Much-of-A-Good-Thing (TMGT) Effect
- Chapter 10: How to Conduct Quantitative Analysis, Part II: Multilevel Modeling
- Importance of Multilevel Modeling
- Fundamentals of Multilevel Modeling
- Visual Representation of Types of Variances Modeled in Multilevel Analysis
- Analytic Representation of Sources of Variance Modeled in Multilevel Analysis
- The Importance of Statistical Power in Multilevel Modeling
- Multilevel Modeling: Step-by-Step Illustration
- Why You Need to Examine More than Just the Traditional Intraclass Correlation
- Best-practice Recommendations for Conducting and Reporting Multilevel Analysis and Cross-level Interaction Effects
- Chapter 11: How to Conduct Quantitative Analysis, Part III: Meta-analysis
- Importance of Meta-analysis
- Meta-analysis: Choices, Choices, Choices
- How to Conduct a State-of-the-science Meta-analysis
- Meta-regression
- Meta-analytic Structural Equation Modeling
- Is There a Need for an Updated Meta-Analysis?
- Chapter 12: How to Conduct Quantitative Analysis, Part IV: Advanced Techniques
- Importance of Advanced Quantitative Techniques
- Market Basket Analysis
- Experience Sampling Methodology
- Bayesian Analysis
- Chapter 13: How to Conduct Qualitative Research
- Importance of Qualitative Research
- Interviews with Key Informants
- Computer-Aided Text Analysis (CATA)
- Methodological Literature Reviews
- Mixed Methods
- How to Improve Transparency and Replicability in Your Qualitative Research
- Chapter 14: How to Report Your Results
- Importance of How You Report Your Results
- How to Report p-values
- Why You Should Report Effect Size Estimates
- How Your Effect Sizes Compare to Those in Social and Behavioral Research
- How to Interpret the Meaning of Effect Sizes
- How to Report Statistical Results: The Case of ?2 and ?2
- How to Report Your Study’s Limitations and Future Research Directions
- Chapter 15: How to Improve the Transparency, Reproducibility, and Replicability of Your Research
- Importance of Transparency and Replicability of Your Research
- How to Improve Transparency about Your Theory
- How to Improve Transparency about Your Research Design
- How to Improve Transparency about Your Measures
- How to Improve Transparency about Your Data Analysis
- How to Improve Transparency about Your Results
- How to Motivate Authors to Improve Transparency
- Chapter 16: How to Enhance the Impact of Your Research
- Importance of the Impact of Your Research
- Scholarly Impact: Internal and External
- On the Use and Misuse of Journal Lists as an Indicator of Scholarly Impact
- How to Broaden the Meaning and Measurement of Impact
- Actions that University Administrators, Researchers, and Educators Can Take to Enhance Scholarly Impact
- How to Create Your Own Personal Impact Development Plan
- Enhancing Your Impact: It’s a Journey
Recent Product Reviews:
This is an interesting, fresh approach, describing the development of research methodologies throughout the years… Much better than my current textbook.
Verl Anderson, Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University
This book is easy to read and teach. Students can understand the language and be able to use it with their own research. It is both modern and has history of research within it. Overall, students would benefit in early research to using this book.
Mindy Myers, Midwestern State University
I can think of no other research methods book I've recently used that devotes this much attention to theory and I think this attention is well-deserved.
Ewa Golebiowska, Wayne State University
The discussion or parsimony, falsification, and precision within this book are particularly welcomed and map precisely how I teach these topics.
Scot Schraufnagel, Northern Illinois University
I like that there is a chapter devoted to making connections to theory. This is novel. I have not seen such a chapter in similar texts, and it is important. Often junior scholars ask questions for the sake of simplicity or curiosity but lack the skills to link their inquiries to theory. This chapter is a useful contribution!
Rachel R. Tambling, University of Connecticut