Research Methodology

Unit1:
1. Briefly describe the different steps involved in a research process.
2. Empirical research in India in particular creates so many problems for the researchers. State the
problems that are usually faced by such researchers.
3. A research scholar has to work as a judge and derive the truth and not as a pleader who is only eager
to prove his case in favour of his plaintiff. Discuss the statement pointing out the objectives of
research.
4. Research is much concerned with proper fact finding, analysis and evaluation. Do you agree
with this statement? Give reasons in support of your answer
5. Explain the meaning and significance of a Research design.
6. Describe some of the important research designs used in experimental hypothesis-testing research
study.
7. Give your understanding of a good research design. Is single research design suitable in all research
studies? If not, why?.
8. Write a short note on Experience Survey explaining fully its utility in exploratory research studies.


Unit 3 :
1. What do you mean by Sample Design? What points should be taken into consideration by a
researcher in developing a sample design for this research project.
2. Distinguish between:
(a) Restricted and unrestricted sampling;
(b) Convenience and purposive sampling;
(c) Systematic and stratified sampling;
(d) Cluster and area sampling.

3. Under what circumstances would you recommend:
(a) A probability sample?
(b) A non-probability sample?
(c) A stratified sample?
(d) A cluster sample?

4. Describe the different methods of scale construction, pointing out the merits and demerits of each.

5. Scaling describes the procedures by which numbers are assigned to various degrees of opinion,
attitude and other concepts. Discuss. Also point out the bases for scale classification.


6. It is never safe to take published statistics at their face value without knowing their meaning and
limitations. Elucidate this statement by enumerating and explaining the various points which you would
consider before using any published data. Illustrate your answer by examples wherever possible.

7. Discuss interview as a technique of data collection.

8. Critically examine the following:
(i) Interviews introduce more bias than does the use of questionnaire.
(ii) Data collection through projective techniques is considered relatively more reliable.
(iii) In collection of statistical data commonsense is the chief requisite and experience the chief teacher.

9. What is a hypothesis? What characteristics it must possess in order to be a good research
hypothesis?
A manufacturer considers his production process to be working properly if the mean length of the rods
the manufactures is 8.5". The standard deviation of the rods always runs about 0.26". Suppose a sample
of 64 rods is taken and this gives a mean length of rods equal to 8.6". What are the null and alternative
hypotheses for this problem? Can you infer at 5% level of significance that the process is working
properly?

10. The procedure of testing hypothesis requires a researcher to adopt several steps. Describe in brief all
such steps.

11. Point out the important limitations of tests of hypotheses. What precaution the researcher must
take while drawing inferences as per the results of the said tests?

12. A sample of 900 members is found to have a mean of 3.47 cm. Can it be reasonably regarded as a
simple sample from a large population with mean 3.23 cm. and standard deviation 2.31 cm.?

13. Ten students are selected at random from a school and their heights are found to be, in inches, 50,
52, 52, 53, 55, 56, 57, 58, 58 and 59. In the light of these data, discuss the suggestion that the mean
height of the students of the school is 54 inches. You may use 5% level of significance (Apply t-test as
well as A-test).


14. In a test given to two groups of students, the marks obtained were as follows:
First Group 18 20 36 50 49 36 34 49 41
Second Group 29 28 26 35 30 44 46
Examine the significance of difference between mean marks obtained by students of the above two
groups. Test at five per cent level of significance.

15. The heights of six randomly chosen sailors are, in inches, 63, 65, 58, 69, 71 and 72. The heights of 10
randomly chosen soldiers are, in inches, 61, 62, 65, 66, 69, 69, 70, 71, 72 and 73. Do these figures
indicate that soldiers are on an average shorter than sailors? Test at 5% level of significance.

16. 12 students were given intensive coaching and 5 tests were conducted in a month. The scores of
tests 1 and 5 are given below. Does the score from Test 1 to Test 5 show an improvement? Use 5% level
of significance.
No. of students 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12
Marks in 1st Test 50 42 51 26 35 42 60 41 70 55 62 38
Marks in 5th test 62 40 61 35 30 52 68 51 84 63 72 50

17. What is Chi-square text? Explain its significance in statistical analysis.

18. An experiement was conducted to test the efficiency of chloromycetin in checking typhoid. In a
certain hospital chloromycetin was given to 285 out of the 392 patients suffering from typhoid. The
number of typhoid cases were as follows:
Typhoid No Typhoid Total

Chloromycetin 35 250 285
No Chloromycetin 50 57 107

Total 85 307 392

With the help of 2 , test the effectiveness of chloromycetin in checking typhoid.
(The c2 value at 5 per cent level of significance for one degree of freedom is 3.841).

19. On the basis of information given below about the treatment of 200 patients suffering from a
disease, state whether the new treatment is comparatively superior to the conventional treatment.

No. of patients
Treatment Favourable No Response
Response

New 60 20
Conventional 70 50

For drawing 2 for one degree of freedom at the 5 per cent level of
significance, viz., 3.84.

20. 200 digits were chosen at random from a set of tables. The frequencies of the digits were:
Digit 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
Frequency 18 19 23 21 16 25 22 20 21 15
Calculate .

21. Five dice were thrown 96 times and the number of times 4, 5, or 6 was thrown were
Number of dice throwing
4, 5 or 6 5 4 3 2 1 0
Frequency 8 18 35 24 10 1
Find the value of Chi-square.

22. Find Chi-square from the following information:

Condition of home
Condition of child Total
Clean Dirty

Clean 70 50 120
Fairly clean 80 20 100
Dirty 35 45 80
Total 185 115 300

State whether the two attributes viz., condition of home and condition of child are independent (Use
Chi-square test for the purpose).

23. In a certain cross the types represented by XY, Xy, xY and xy are expected to occur in a 9 : 5 : 4 : 2
ratio. The actual frequencies were:
XY Xy xY xy
180 110 60 50
Test the goodness of fit of observation to theory.


24.. You are given a sample of 150 observations classified by two attributes A and B as follows:


A1 A2 A3 Total

B1 40 25 15 80
B2 11 26 8 45
B3 9 9 7 25

Total 60 60 30 150


A and B are associated.




25. A survey of 320 families with five children each revealed the following distribution:

No. of boys 5 4 3 2 1 0

No. of girls 0 1 2 3 4 5

No. of families 14 56 110 88 40 12

Is this distribution consistent with the hypothesis that male and female births are equally probable?
Apply Chi-square test.

26. . What is Yates correction? Find the value of Chi-square applying Yates correction to the following
data:

Passed Failed Total
Day classes 10 20 30
Evening classes 4 66 70
Total 14 86 100

Also state whether the association, if any, between passing in the examination and studying in day
classes is significant using Chi-square test.

27. The number of automobile accidents per week in a certain community were as follows:
12, 8, 20, 2, 14, 10, 15, 6, 9, 4
Are these frequencies in agreement with the belief that accident conditions were the same during the
10 week period under consideration?

28. A certain chemical plant processes sea water to collect sodium chloride and magnesium. From
scientific analysis, sea water is known to contain sodium chloride, magnesium and other elements in the
ratio of 62 : 4 : 34. A sample of 200 tons of sea water has resulted in 130 tons of sodium chloride and 6
tons of magnesium. Are these data consistent with the scientific model at 5 per cent level of
significance?

29. A group of 150 College students were asked to indicate their most liked film star from among six
different well known film actors viz., A, B, C, D, E and F in order to ascertain their relative popularity. The
observed frequency data were as follows:
Actors A B C D E F Total
Frequencies 24 20 32 25 28 21 150
Test at 5 per cent whether all actors are equally popular.


30. (a) Explain the meaning of analysis of variance. Describe briefly the technique of analysis of
variance for one-way and two-way classifications.
(b) State the basic assumptions of the analysis of variance.

31. What do you mean by the additive property of the technique of the analysis of variance?
Explain how this technique is superior in comparison to sampling.
32. Below are given the yields per acre of wheat for six plots entering a crop competition, there
of the plots being sown with wheat of variety A and three with B.

Variety Yields in fields per acre
1 2 3

A 30 32 22
B 20 18 16

Set up a table of analysis of variance and calculate F. State whether the difference between the
yields of two varieties is significant taking 7.71 as the table value of F at 5% level for v1 = 1 and
v2 = 4.

33. A certain manure was used on four plots of land A, B, C and D. Four beds were prepared in
each plot and the manure used. The output of the crop in the beds of plots A, B, C and D is given
below:
Output on Plots
A B C D

8 9 3 3
12 4 8 7
1 7 2 8
3 1 5 2


Find out whether the difference in the means of the production of crops of the plots is
significant or not.

34. Test the hypothesis at the 0.05 level of significance that m1 = m2 = m3 for the following data:
Samples
No. one No. two No. three
(1) (2) (3)

6 2 6
7 4 8
6 5 9
3 5
4

Total 19 18 28

35.. Three varieties of wheat W1, W2 and W3 are treated with four different fertilizers viz., f1, f2, f3
and f4. The yields of wheat per acre were as under:

Fertilizer treatment Varieties of wheat Total
W1 W2 W3

f1 55 72 47 174
f2 64 66 53 183
f3 58 57 74 189
f4 59 57 58 174

Total 236 252 232 720

Set up a table for the analysis of variance and work out the F-ratios in respect of the above. Are the
F-ratios significant?


36. The following table gives the monthly sales (in thousand rupees) of a certain firm in three states by
its four salesmen:


States Salesmen Total

A B C D
X 5 4 4 7 20
Y 7 8 5 4 24
Z 9 6 6 7 28

Total 21 18 15 18 72

Set up an analysis of variance table for the above information. Calculate F-coefficients and state
whether the difference between sales affected by the four salesmen and difference between sales
affected in three States are significant.

37.. The following table illustrates the sample psychological health ratings of corporate executives in the
field of Banking. Manufacturing and Fashion retailing:

Banking 41 53 54 55 43
Manufacturing 45 51 48 43 39
Fashion retailing 34 44 46 45 51


Can we consider the psychological health of corporate executives in the given three fields to be equal at
5% level of significance?

38. The following table shows the lives in hours of randomly selected electric lamps from four batches:

Batch Lives in hours

1 1600 1610 1650 1680 1700 1720 1800
2 1580 1640 1640 1700 1750
3 1450 1550 1600 1620 1640 1660 1740 1820
4 1510 1520 1530 1570 1600 1680


Perform an analysis of variance of these data and show that a significance test does not reject their
homogeneity.


Unit 4:

1. While determining the length of the report (since research reports vary greatly in length),
one should keep in view the fact that it should be long enough to cover the subject but short
enough to maintain interest. In fact, report-writing should not be a means to learning more
and more about less and less.

2. A research report should not, if this can be avoided, be dull; it should be such as to sustain
readers interest.

3. Abstract terminology and technical jargon should be avoided in a research report. The
report should be able to convey the matter as simply as possible. This, in other words,
means that report should be written in an objective style in simple language, avoiding
expressions such as it seems, there may be and the like.

4. Readers are often interested in acquiring a quick knowledge of the main findings and as
such the report must provide a ready availability of the findings. For this purpose, charts,
graphs and the statistical tables may be used for the various results in the main report in
addition to the summary of important findings.

5. The layout of the report should be well thought out and must be appropriate and in accordance
with the objective of the research problem.

6. The reports should be free from grammatical mistakes and must be prepared strictly in
accordance with the techniques of composition of report-writing such as the use of quotations,
footnotes, documentation, proper punctuation and use of abbreviations in footnotes and the
like.

7. The report must present the logical analysis of the subject matter. It must reflect a structure
wherein the different pieces of analysis relating to the research problem fit well.

8. Towards the end, the report must also state the policy implications relating to the problem
under consideration. It is usually considered desirable if the report makes a forecast of the
probable future of the subject concerned and indicates the kinds of research still needs to
be done in that particular field.

9 . Appendices should be enlisted in respect of all the technical data in the report.

10. Bibliography of sources consulted is a must for a good report and must necessarily be
given.

11 . Index is also considered an essential part of a good report and as such must be prepared
and appended at the end.

12. Report must be attractive in appearance, neat and clean, whether typed or printed.

13. Calculated confidence limits must be mentioned and the various constraints experienced in
conducting the research study may also be stated in the report.