HLTH464-20S1 (C) Semester One 2020

Research Approaches for Health and Sport

30 points

Details:
Start Date: Monday, 17 February 2020
End Date: Sunday, 21 June 2020
Withdrawal Dates
Last Day to withdraw from this course:
  • Without financial penalty (full fee refund): Friday, 28 February 2020
  • Without academic penalty (including no fee refund): Friday, 29 May 2020

Description

This course will develop students' specialist knowledge and skills to support postgraduate research and/or industry led projects. Philosophical, ethical and methodological issues influencing research design will be examined and applied to researching health or sport related issues.

Through critique and application, the principles of research design will be identified across the research continuum. The course requires students to demonstrate the application of their knowledge and understanding in relation to a specific methodology as utilised in health or sport research. Students will take an active role in applying this knowledge for the benefit of a wider audience.  The course requires students to analyse and write up a data set as a research project or, develop a research proposal, both of which are presented to a community of interest for critique. In doing this, students are demonstrating a critical awareness of current and emerging issues in an area of health or sport practice; demonstrating their leadership in analysing research data or research proposal development; communicating results back to the community of interest; and demonstrating the application of highly specialised knowledge to the relevant literature. In essence this is a capstone course which provides an opportunity for students to draw on their particular backgrounds, knowledge and expertise in order to produce a research report or proposal of relevance to a particular health or sport community.

Learning Outcomes

  • Critique important philosophical perspectives on research and justify the implications of these for their research design.
  • Critically analyse different research traditions and design strategies that affect knowledge development and application to practice.
  • Evaluate the ethical and cultural considerations related to research in New Zealand.
  • Engage in group processes to prepare and deliver peer teaching resources
  • Utilise experiential learning from workshops for research design decisions, including analysis.
  • Apply research design principles to produce a research report or proposal.
  • Present the outcomes of the report / proposal to an identified community of interest for peer critique and review.

Prerequisites

Subject to approval of the Head of School of Health Sciences.

Course Coordinator

For further information see School of Health Sciences Head of Department

Assessment

Assessment Due Date Percentage  Description
Methodological critique 03 Apr 2020 35% Critical appraisal of a methodological approach utilised in health / sports science research.
Experiential workshops 20% Simulated Quantitative and Qualitative Workshops: Team work and Peer Teaching. Due Date: 29 & 30 April 2020.
Research Project / or Research Proposal 02 Jun 2020 45% Research Project, analysis of data. Project may involve qualitative or quantitative data. Written report and peer feedback OR Research proposal and peer feedback. Weighting 45% in total: 40% Project / Proposal, 5% for peer feedback process.

Textbooks / Resources

There is no set text for this course. Rather, students are expected to access appropriate resources to develop their knowledge of research methodologies. Besides the University of Canterbury library, the universities (Otago; Canterbury; Victoria; Auckland; AUT; Massey) and polytechnics (Otago, EIT; WINTEC) with postgraduate Masters of Health and or Sports Sciences programmes usually have their theses collections on line.  The design chapters will illustrate the application of various methodologies to the research process. These are excellent sources for research application.

The following are also recommended:

Yilmaz, K. (2013) Comparison of Quantitative and Qualitative Research traditions: epistemological, ontological and methodological differences. European Journal of Education, Vol 48, No. 2, 311-325.

Thomas, J.R; Silverman, S; Nelson, J; (2015) Research Methods in Physical Activity 7th Edition.

SAGE Research Methods database, University of Canterbury Library.

Statistics Done Wrong

NZResearch has quite a few theses and journal articles that might be useful secondary sources.

Indicative Fees

Domestic fee $2,193.00

* All fees are inclusive of NZ GST or any equivalent overseas tax, and do not include any programme level discount or additional course-related expenses.

For further information see School of Health Sciences .

All HLTH464 Occurrences

  • HLTH464-20S1 (C) Semester One 2020