Research Design, as Independent of Methods

Objectives •Readers of this chapter should be in a better position to: •Understand the process of research design •Place their own and others work within a full cycle or programme of ongoing research •Understand why good research almost always involves a mixture of evidence •Defend themselves from those who want numbers and text to be enemies rather than allies •Argue that good research is more ethical for society than poor researc

Challenge course : research, design, and plan

Ball State University offers an extensive variety of recreational and leadership opportunities but no challenge course. Administrators have determined that there is a need and interest in the challenge course facility and its curriculum. The BSU challenge course will be available for students to use as an educational, developmental, recreational, and therapeutic medium to enhance both personal and professional growth (Attarian, 2005). The course will provide an environment for students to strengthen skills such as: problem solving, self-efficacy, self-concept, trust, teamwork, and communication. The purpose of this creative project is to research, plan, and design a challenge course that meets the needs of the Indiana region and could be implemented at BSU. The Hults Farm that is managed by the Field Station and Environmental Education Center at BSU has been chosen to propose the site design. The project objectives were to: (1) designate appropriate land for construction; (2) research a variety of challenge course elements; (3) research factors that are unique to the Indiana region; (4) assess budget concerns and constraints. BSU has been presented a working document with designs and management plans of a potential challenge course that may one day be implemented at BSU or used for other areas in the state of Indiana.Department of Natural Resources and Environmental ManagementThesis (M.A.

Surveying the factors that influence maintainability: research design

We want to explore and analyse design decisions that influence maintainability of software. Software maintainability is important because the effort expended on changes and fixes in software is a major cost driver. We take an empirical, qualitative approach, by investigating cases where a change has cost more or less than comparable changes, and analysing the causes for those differences. We will use this analysis of causes as input to following research in which the individual contributions of a selection of those causes will be quantitatively analysed