Academic phrasebank- A guide to thesis writing

Academic Phasebank is a resourceful link to assist research writers in their theses writing. My friend gave this link to me and I found it's very useful especially to those who are thinking of the appropriate phrases for their thesis regardless in any chapter. Do browse this website http://www.phrasebank.manchester.ac.uk/links.htm to benefit from it.

Determining normality of data

I learned new thing in my quest to know what normality test base on Kolmogorov-Smirnov and Shapiro-Wilk is. Despite the fact that the normality test can be determined using the table, I can also refer to graphical representations of the few other measures. This is because Kolmogorov-Smirnov is sensitive and stringent. Han & Yoon (2008) in their book; Introduction to Statistical Analysis in Social Sciences write that normality test from the table (Normality test table of Kolmogorov-Smirnov and Shapiro-Wilkis) sensitive and stringent. For that matter, a researcher may use boxplot, Normal q-q plot and Detrended Q-q plot. All these have their own interpretations of how we can determine that our data is normally distributed. Once we are clear with these, we can now concentrate on outliers. In determining outliers, Pallant (2006) in her book SPSS Survival Manual; A step by Step Guide to Data Analysis Using SPSS, affirms that extreme value needs to be eliminated from the data. However, value with symbol 'O' may be eliminated or may not be. In deciding to retain the 'O' value, we need to refer to 5% Trimmed Mean. If the 5% Trimmed Mean does not differ that much from the mean values (need to refer to Descriptive table in the SPSS output) we can decide to retain the value. For instance 26.73 and 26.64 does not differ much, so we may consider to keep the value for analysis. Apart from that one must also look at skewness and kurtosis. If the former is lesser than 2 while the latter is from -1 to +1, distribution of data may be assumed to be normal (Hair, Anderson, Tatham & Black, 1998 in Fah & Yoon, 2008) as well.

I am stuck!!

I haven't write anything yet for Chapter 4 and it has already been 3 weeks data from tests and questionnaire was inserted in the SPSS. I also met one of my supervisors last week to discuss with him concerning the data I collected. Although he helped me to analyse the data, but one and the most important thing he didn't cater is to test the normality of the data. He did cater it, but it was really "shallow". I am rather stupid-ignorant with statistics, but I think determining normality of data is the first priority before concentrating on analysing the research questions. He reasoned that 'people' in my field was not too concern about this i.e. data normality, and therefore it was fine for me to just report on the fact that the outliers were taken care off before proceeding to analysing research questions. How can it be when it the first place that determine whether I can use parametric or non parametric statistic.

Back at home, I tried to write according to what he said. Yet, I couldn't. So, I started to ask around. And now since Hadif is having chicken pox, I can only email my friends asking them to help me regarding this. It's a process of learning, I know. But sometimes you can feel distress also because of people around you who are not really supportive and understanding.

Five-minutes break

I am still transcribing the interview... but felt a little bit sleepy. I guess, I need to write something. I found a very useful article from Prof. Muhd Kamil's blog. This was what he wrote with regards to presenting our writing:

Dalam tempoh dua bulan yang lepas saya menerima dua tesis sebagai pemeriksa luar. Tesis pertama saya baca dan terus berhenti. Pandangan pertama pemeriksa menyatakan “ia tidak sepatutnya dihantar”. Kenapa? Teksnya kelam kabut. Ada double spacing, ada single spacing. Jadual-jadual yang disusun di “cut and paste”. Susun aturnya tidak mengikut format penulisan tesis.Ia hanya pandangan pertama. Dan pandangan ini sepatutnya boleh dikawal oleh pelajar tersebut. Ia bukan memerlukan kepakaran luar biasa.

Saya menggambarkan beliau sebagai seorang yang cincai.

Tesis kedua yang diterima selang seminggu dibaca dan ia amat menyenangkan hati pemeriksa.Apakah yang dilakukan oleh pemeriksa? Maksud saya, saya sebagai pemeriksa. Pertama, saya melihat secara keseluruhan tesis tersebut. Memegang-megang dan membelek-belek tanpa tujuan. Jika ia tesis yang teruk [penulis sangat cincai] pelbagai kesilapan tesis akan dapat dilihat melalui proses ini.

Siapa kata wajah tidak penting?

Kedua, saya membaca abstrak, melihat isi kandungan, jadual-jadual dan menoleh kepada rujukan yang ditulis di belakang. Apakah rujukan yang terakhir? Lalu saya membuat keputusan mahu meneruskan bacaan atau mencari mood lain supaya beliau tidak dihukum berdasar pandangan pertama.

Tesis kedua, VIVA hanya terlangsung 30 minit dan keputusannya Lulus tanpa Syarat. Kedua-dua pemeriksa – dari dua universiti berbeza - bersetuju begitu. Terdapat pembetulan-pembetulan tersangat minor tidak direkodkan. Ia masih perlu dibetulkan dengan seliaan supervisor.

Tesis pertama, VIVA berlangsung hampir sejam. Saya mempunyai 18 komen dan pemeriksa yang satu lagi mempunyai 50 komen bertulis. Keputusannya, “Lulus dengan pembetulan major. Ia perlu dibetulkan tidak kurang dari enam bulan dan tidak boleh melebihi setahun”.

PhD…… ia diri kita!

Reading the above posting really gives a great impact to me. His writing reminds me that everything needs to be checked before submitting draft(s) to our supervisor or committee members. Don't take something lightly when it comes to submitting our works especially works related to our phd... "it's your life" as what Prof Muhd Kamil claims. As a human, we surely know that someone is not serious when his/her work resembles that he/she just want to get over with something (i.e. to complete the write-up). I also go for neatness when it comes to submitting works...it has to be this way. However, we're not perfect. Ok, I need to pen-off here. Got to continue transcibing the interview ;-)

My 5S

5S is five Japanese words which are seiri, seiton, seiso, seiketsu and shitsuke. It is being widely practice in many working organisations. As for me, the system is useful as to make sure that documents are put in manageable ways for easy retrieving. The picture above are all the tests and questionnaires that have already been keyed-in by my research-assistant. I paid her RM4.15 per hour and she did it for only a week. That is the standard allowance in hiring a student as a research assistant. She is a diploma holder and currently is pursuing her degree in the university where I work. She really value punctuality and sometimes I have to make sure that I reach to work before she did...impressions count. And often she skipped lunch or take lunch in the lab so as to make sure that she could finish key-in the data for only a week. In fact, this was the agreement we decided to take. I was not really pushy with her...as long as she knew what she was doing, it was OK for me. And often bought her breakfast or lunch. She agreed with it. Back at home, this is where I place the documents at the mean time.

Coincidentally, when I did the 5S I also made a new look for my filing. Label the files and there you go. I remembered a friend of mine told me that it was rather good if we could have one file for one variable, and so on and so forth. It was an advice from her supervisor actually. I think her supervisor got a point there. Again, it is easy for us to retrieve articles...time is not wasted. It's more manageable. I still have several articles which I haven't printed yet. Got to buy some more files for the filing. Although my mind is full with so many things to do, I want to make sure that everything is well manage.

Analysing data---- Insignificant results???

This week I am done with key in the data for my study. To be exact, I was not the one who keyed-in all the marks and responses (for the questionnaire). I hired a student to do the job. As far as sorting the instruments in the study is concerned, I did it myself. Also, transcribing part I am still doing it. Some of the results of the study showed insignifcant results. It worried me badly. Finding how to report the findings, gave me some ideas that there were few things that might contributed to the results. I obtained the ideas to jusitfy the insignificant results when I I goggle it. Though many of the websites I found discuss more on the significant results. However, one of the articles wrote that in reporting for insignifcant results, a researcher may look at the following:

(i) inadequate or biased sample. I think i can include this because one of my treatment groups were diploma holders while two other groups were matriculation and STPM holders
(ii) incorrect methodology. I might take a look at this. Perhaps I needed to compare which part of the questions did students score more.
(iii) design flaw.
(iv) errors in measurement. Maybe there's a point to consider
(v) data collection analysis
(v) unforeseen circumstances. I remembered that students were instructed to take the posttest after they sat for their final exam paper. Maybe there were under pressure having had their paper before the posttest was administered.

For whatever reasons in obtaining the insignificant results, I need to justify thoroughly of why it happened. Again, this has to be checked with previous literature. What others had to say and what they found (Like a CSI investigator). It's a challenge for me. I have already had some justifications at hands, yet, as I told, I need to back-up with relevant literature. Next week I'll be going to see one of my supervisors. Maybe I can discuss the results with him... Ya Allah I hope I can handle this well.