TEST YOURSELF

You'd be surprised how many important scientific breakthroughs were the result of informal talk (aka "bull") sessions between people interested in the same or similar topics. Just sitting around and talking about ideas is one of the great pleasures when it comes to learning and scientific discovery. Be a bit creative and list five ideas you have or questions you find particularly interesting about any topic. Don't worry at this point how you would answer the question but take a few intellectual risks and see what you come up with.

TEST YOURSELF
As Pasteur said, chance does favor the prepared mind and you will never know where the best information will come from. So, even if some class seems to contain material unrelated to your specialty or your interests, you never know what insight you might gain from reading widely and discussing ideas with your fellow students. What five things might you read (that you have not) that are related to your interests?

TEST YOURSELF
In the simplest of terms, what is reliability and why is it important?

Reliability
Why is reliability important in research? Why is validity important in research? Consider the time and resource constraints you may have with your proposal. How will you evaluate the reliability and validity for your research?

Advantages & Disadvantages
What are the advantages and disadvantages of using a paper-and-pencil questionnaire or an in-person interview?

Exploring Research
If you have an interest in criminal justice, I would recommend the following website http://nij.gov/ I have signed up for daily notifications of everything from newsletters to the latest research on treatment and outcomes for this population. Take a look and share your thoughts. Anyone?

Exploring Research
Nominal measurements is when data does not have an order but can be placed in categories. For instance, red, yellow, blue and green are primary colorers but there are other colors that can be placed in the families of the primary colors because of undertones. Ordinal can be used in ranking. An example is ranking the taste of the top 5 steaks such as Porterhouse, Sirloin, Strip, and Fillet Minion for preference. There is no distance to measure between the steaks on a scale. Each person may have a different taste preference. Interval reminds me of store questionnaires of when they want to see on a scale of 1-10 whether or not you are satisfied or dissatisfied with the store performance. Distances between 1-10 can be measures throughout the scale. Ratio example ages. There is a zero point and there are equal intervals between the points. For instance, 20 years through 30 years has the same points as 40 years -50 years which would be 10 years (Salkind, 2012). Okay classmates, did I get this right?

Contrast qualitative and quantitative methods in 100-150 words.