AREA OF RESEARCH: EMPLOYEE MOTIVATION AND PRODUCTIVITY 

Select five empirical articles from peer-reviewed journals that: 

• you consider critical to your understanding of your area of dissertation research
• all address a particular phenomenon and attempt to contribute to theory about it

Part 1 
1. Describe each study, including: 

• the research problem, questions, or hypotheses
• the research purpose
• type of design and elements of the design (e.g., sample, data analysis, operationalization of constructs)
• threats to validity and if and how they were addressed
• the findings and their implications

2. Critically evaluate each study: Does the author make a compelling case for the meaning and significance of the findings? 

Part 2 
Write a literature review that explains what is known and not known about the phenomenon based on a critical evaluation of the five studies. 

Part 3 
Develop a research question that addresses one of the unknowns you identified in Part 2 and sketch a quantitative or qualitative study that can answer the question about what is unknown and contribute to theory (in some sense of theory you discuss in Question 1). 

Address: 

• the research purpose
• type of design and elements of the design (e.g., sample, the type of data you need to collect and how you will collect it, data analysis)
• the strengths and weaknesses of your envisioned design and methods
• quantitative: threats to validity and how your design will address them
• quantitative: the constructs you will measure and what you will do in order to determine how to operationalize them (you need not identify specific measures)
• qualitative: your means of ensuring the quality of your findings
• justification for why your chosen design and methods are more appropriate for your research question than alternatives you have considered
• your methods of data analysis
• how the data you collect will enable you to answer your research question and contribute to theory