About the Book:

This fourth multi colour edition has been made better equipped to make the learning more systematic. More details are added to old chapters keeping in mind the need of advanced data analysis in social science research. The usage of popular statistical package SPSS has also been shown through many examples.

It is important to adopt an appropriate methodology in quality research. The present book provides the basic and advanced level discussion on research methodology so that the researchers may become familiar with the art of using research methods and techniques.

The book is intended to serve as a textbook for social science students at graduate and postgraduate level. The book can be taken as a well-organised guide for researchers in social science and other areas.

Contents:

- Research Methodology: An Introduction

- Defining the Research Problem

- Research Design

- Design of Sample Surveys

- Measurement and Scaling

- Data Collection

- Data Preparation

- Deive Statistics

- Sampling and Statistical Inference

- Testing of Hypothesis

- Chi-Square Tests

- Analysis of Variance

- Other Nonparametric Methods

- Linear Regression Analysis

- Factor Analysis

- Discriminant Analysis

- Cluster Analysis

- Other Multivariate Techniques

- Interpretation and Report Writing

Review:

Review which appeared in Journal of Services Research (October 2007-March 2008):

Research from the primordial to the doomsday. Research in some form or the other has a passion with mankind at all times. But it is equally essential for a dispassionate lover of truth to be well aquatinted with the various ways and means of helping himself to explore the reality and truth. This necessarily demands knowledge of research methodology best suited to the researcher's constraints and appropriate to the study. A proper understanding and appropriateness of research techniques help us in making the best use of research resources whether primary of secondary. Research Methodology is taught as a supporting subject in several ways in many academic disciplines such as health, education, psychology, social work, nursing, public health, library studies, marketing research, and management researches. Although these vary in content, but their broad approach to a research inquiry is similar. Some disciplines place greater emphasis on quantitative research, and some on qualitative research. The best approach is use combination of both kind of research methodology. The present book under review is putting equal emphasis on both kinds of research methodology approaches.

The book is primarily targeted to serve as text book to Graduate and M.Phil. students of research methodology in all disciplines of various universities. The book seems to design specifically for the students who are newcomers to research, and who may have a psychological barrier with regard to the subject. The author has used many flow charts and practical examples to communicate concepts; and areas covered in the book follows a simple to complex approach in terms of their discussion. The author takes in consideration modern tools and techniques used in research analysis by introducing a special chapter on ``The Computer: Its role in Research``. The structuring of chapter scheme of the book is designed to be practical in nature. The information in the book chapterized around eight operational steps in research process viz. formulating a research problem (Step I); conceptualize a research design (Step II); constructing an instrument for data collection (Step III); selecting a sample (Step IV); writing a research proposal (Step V), collecting data (Step VI); processing data (Step VII); writing a research report (Step VIII).

The author has over-emphasized on statistic portion. The probable reason can be normally face problems with regard to understanding to applicable statistical technique. Overall this book clearly reflects the teaching experience of the author with this subject. The book can give more value to researchers by introducing some information on how to carry out review of literature and its importance in research.

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