How to Design and Evaluate Research in Education

xiv LIST OF FEATURES www.mhhe.com/fraenkel7eImportant Findings in Correlational Research 330Significant Findings in Causal-ComparativeResearch 372Important Findings in Survey Research 395Important Findings in Content AnalysisResearch 475Important Findings in Ethnographic Research 502Important Findings in Historical Research 541An Important Example of Action Research 597CONTROVERSIES IN RESEARCHShould Some Research Methods Be PreferredOver Others? 14Clinical Trials—Desirable or Not? 55Ethical or Not? 61Sample or Census? 101Which Statistical Index Is Valid? 139High-Stakes Testing 150Is Consequential Validity a Useful Concept? 160Can Statistical Power Analysis Be Misleading? 236Statistical Inference Tests—Good or Bad? 245Do Placebos Work? 277How Should Research MethodologiesBe Classified? 365Is Low Response Rate Necessarily a Bad Thing? 403Clarity and Postmodernism 426Portraiture: Art, Science, or Both? 428Should Historians Influence Policy? 539Are Some Methods Incompatible with Others? 560How Much Should Participants Be Involved inResearch? 593TABLESTable 4.1 Criteria for IRB Approval 61Table 5.1 Some of the Major Indexing andAbstracting Services Used in EducationalResearch 71Table 5.2 Printout of Search Results 79Table 5.3 Major Indexes on the World Wide Web 80Table 5.4 Leading Search Engines 81Table 6.1 Part of a Table of RandomNumbers 94Table 7.1 Hypothetical Examples of Raw Scoresand Accompanying Percentile Ranks 135Table 7.2 Characteristics of the Four Types ofMeasurement Scales 139Table 7.3 Hypothetical Results of StudyInvolving a Comparison of Two CounselingMethods 140Table 8.1 Example of an Expectancy Table 153Table 8.2 Methods of Checking Validityand Reliability 158Table 9.1 General Techniques for ControllingThreats to Internal Validity 179Table 10.1 Example of a FrequencyDistribution 187Table 10.2 Example of a Grouped FrequencyDistribution 187Table 10.3 Example of the Mode, Median, andMean in a Distribution 193Table 10.4 Yearly Salaries of Workers in a SmallBusiness 194Table 10.5 Calculation of the Standard Deviationof a Distribution 196Table 10.6 Comparisons of Raw Scores and z Scoreson Two Tests 199Table 10.7 Data Used to Construct Scatterplotin Figure 10.17 202Table 10.8 Frequency and Percentage of Total ofResponses to Questionnaire 207Table 10.9 Grade Level and Gender of Teachers(Hypothetical Data) 208Table 10.10 Repeat of Table 10.9 with ExpectedFrequencies (in Parentheses) 208Table 10.11 Position, Gender, and Ethnicity ofSchool Leaders (Hypothetical Data) 209Table 10.12 Position and Ethnicity of SchoolLeaders with Expected Frequencies (Derivedfrom Table 10.11) 209Table 10.13 Position and Gender of SchoolLeaders with Expected Frequencies (Derivedfrom Table 10.11) 209Table 10.14 Gender and Ethnicity of SchoolLeaders with Expected Frequencies (Derived fromTable 10.11) 209