One of my articles which has accomplished numerous hits on my blog is http://drvidyahattangadi.com/why-bibliography-is-important-in-research/

Why citations are important in your research work?

The answer for this question is the fact that we are living in an information economy, in every research work of yours, your ability to allow readers quick access information is more important than the knowledge you present. Providing readers the ability to obtain the information is often more appreciated than the method through which it is obtained.

A citation is a way of giving credit to individuals for their creative and intellectual works that you utilized to support your research. It can also be used to locate particular source which helps in plummeting plagiarism. Citing or documenting the sources used in your research serves purposes such as

i) it allows you to gives due credit to the authors of the work or ideas which you incorporated into your paper

ii) it allows those who are reading your work to locate your sources

iii) in order to trace from where you got your ideas that you included in your paper.

It is ethical to cite your sources

Even if no one reads your article/paper/book but clicks the link they regard your honesty for showing appreciation and giving credit to the hard work of those who helped you out. Make it a practice to religiously cite your sources. You might feel that proper acknowledgement of sources might make you look dumb, yet, there are instances in Universities where PhD thesis have been turned down for the lack of inadequate and genuine citations. Please don’t be under wrong impression that your work goes unchecked by referees.

Non-citing the sources in your literature goes out to portray your academic dishonesty, and the potential snags of plagiarism. While accuracy is all important in any writing, the very act of looking up a reference for verification serves as an accuracy check. 

Citation makes you a better researcher

Some of the hallmarks of good research include attention to detail and the ability to distinguish outlines and make coherent connections with your own thought process. Honest citation practice portrays your reading habits. It shows your patience in reading variety of literature available on a topic while it also necessitates you to add many details, such as correct page numbers, the spelling of author names, and of course, the accuracy of facts that you are presenting in your own article or your thesis. This habit helps you becoming a detail-oriented researcher. As for the ability to spot trends and patterns, preparing a good bibliography trains you for this task which is crucial in scientific analysis.

Citation practice make you a good writer

We all researchers aspire to write elegant papers in which the style is as persuasive as the content and good acknowledgment habits build a strong foundation towards that goal. Citing specific sources for the various facts that we present removes the intellectual laziness, ambiguous thinking, and of course slack writing. A good writer will always write matter which can be substituted with specific sources. And, when you cite sources appropriately, you leave no question in your readers’ minds regarding your point. Furthermore, by citing, you can easily use precise language.

It is important to note that in the Academic Ranking of World Universities also known as Shanghai Ranking the parameter of citations a university has acquired attracts 30% of overall score. It looks at the role of universities in dispersing new knowledge and ideas.

It examines research weight by capturing the number of times a university’s published work is cited by scholars globally. In 2014, Thomson Reuters examined more than 50 million citations to 6 million journal articles, published over five years. The data are drawn from the 12,000 academic journals indexed by Thomson Reuters’ Web of Science database and include all indexed journals published between 2007 and 2011. The citations help to show how much each university is contributing to the sum of human knowledge. It shows whose research has stood out, has been picked up and built on by other scholars and, most importantly, it has been shared around the global scholarly community to push further the boundaries of our collective understanding, irrespective of discipline.

Well-presented bibliography shows your scientific knowledge

A bibliography is the compilation of the various sources that you have read and cited in your own manuscript, dissertation, book, etc. Thus, an extensive bibliography is naturally a sign of extensively read and well-informed researcher. It shows your deeper insights on the topic. It also improves your credibility as a writer.

Citation enables better substantiation of your work

Any piece of academic writing gets examined several times over before it finally makes it into print or onto a website. Whether one is a peer reviewer, editor, or editorial assistant whose job is simply to track down sources in the bibliography and make sure that the citations are exact. This helps your paper easily to be passed through the multiple rounds of editing with negligible criticism. 

I conclude my article with point on bibliography that it is the key element of a research/thesis which is used to judge the quality of the work done by the researcher.  Therefore, use up-to-date citations and cite your references scientifically. Please do not ignore the quality of bibliography. It exhibits your critical thinking, it proves you have read and understood your sources, it establishes your work as a valid source and you as a competent researcher, and it situates your study and topic in a continuing professional conversation. And finally, your bibliography might stimulate other researchers to carry on further work on your chosen topic of research.

A doctoral student must keep in mind that his dissertation must make sense, and must offer consequential conclusions.  The hypothesis of the research plays a pivotal role in the life of a doctoral student. A rarely used style of PhD is Autoethnography, which is a form of qualitative research in which an author uses self-reflection and writing to explore anecdotal and personal experience and connect this autobiographical story for a wider cultural, political, and social meanings and understandings.

The autoethnographic study explores how the scholar has made sense of educational theory while conceptualizing the theoretical framework for his PhD proposal. A scholar uses narrative inquiry usually while completing autoethnographic study. It helps tremendously to convey a sense of the ‘irreducible humanity’ of the person. It should be understood that stories are reconstructions of what the narrator has understood and how the narrator wishes to present it. It has also been observed that subjective meanings and sense of self and identity are negotiated as the stories unfold. Because the narrator presents a person’s experiences, as remembered and told at a particular point in his journey of life, and for a particular purpose. This all has a bearing on which stories have been told and how the stories are told. It further has a bearing on how the narrator (PhD scholar) has perceived it and how he presents it or interpreted it.

Most important point in narrative PhD is that it does not represent ‘life as lived’ but re-presentations of those lives as told to us. For example, the aftermath experienced by the survivors in Bhopal Gas Tragedy has different voices; more than thirty-five years later, the site still remains contaminated, posing significant danger to the environment and city dwellers. As a generation-spawning disaster, it has a strongly contested collective memory, evoking a range of historical narratives from various voices. It is a heritage of pain with global relevance, addressing not only the plight of the survivors and their families, questions of power and accountability, but also wide-ranging issues of environment and technology. The multitudes of post-disaster developments associated with the disaster such as environmental, legal, public health, governmental inaction, industrial safety and disaster management renders the event with multiple perspectives. There are few PhDs related to the Gas Tragedy carried on in few Universities; each researcher has brought different facet of the aftermath.

In autoethnography PhD outline of stories help to organize information and designing strategies to avert accidents/terror, to promote peace and harmony. But, such PhDs are based on interpretations of the scholars. It is about how people have interpreted events; the values, beliefs and experiences that guide those interpretations; and their hopes, intentions and plans for the future. Secondly knowledge gained in this way is situational, transient, partial and provisional; characterized by multiple voices, perspectives, truths and meanings. Shaping them in a mould and suggesting strategies and concluding the experiences for betterment are skills of the scholar.  I am of the opinion that the PhD degree must awarded only if the dissertation contributes to the betterment of society.

The devastation that Katrina Storm of August 2005 has had a lasting impact on the region, particularly New Orleans; even a decade later, that impact is still deeply felt, especially by people who were either children or teenagers at the time of the disaster. Many of those young people say that the horrifying things that they experienced and witnessed during the storm and its aftermath have gotten almost no attention from the media or from the adults in their lives. Of the dozen or survivors MTV News interviewed for this story in which six were featured – none said they’d had any long-term professional counseling or therapy to help them cope with their trauma. In fact, many of the youth affected by Katrina say they’ve rarely spoken about their experiences with anyone. In fact the survivors want to vent out their emotions, a study on the survivors might be of great help for future.

Analysis of narrative style PhDs: There are different forms of narrative analysis – some focus on ‘content’ of stories; others on ‘meaning’ (maybe both). Stories can be viewed as a window onto a knowable reality and analyzed using concepts derived from theory e.g. thematic analysis, or concepts derived from the data e.g. grounded theory – analysis of narratives. For example, in 1947 during India – Pakistan partition the massacres began soon after the British announced partition: Neighbors slaughtered neighbors; childhood friends became sworn enemies. It is remembered as one of the bloodiest triggered upheavals in human history. About 14 million people are thought to have abandoned their homes in the summer and fall of 1947, when colonial British administrators began dismantling the empire in southern Asia. Estimates of the number of people killed in those months range between 200,000 and 2 million. Hindus and Sikhs fled Pakistan, a country that would be Muslim-controlled. Muslims in modern-day India fled in the opposite direction. The legacy of that violent separation has endured, resulting in a bitter rivalry between India and Pakistan. Many movies are made, many authors have penned the emotions but even after 72 years, the scars have not been healed. The separation was a political blunder; it was hurried by the British leaders while withdrawing from India; without much thought may be as a last straw to disturb the country.

Stories can be helpful in building socially situated knowledge; they can be constructed in their own right and disarrays, differences, some with depth and texture of experienced life.   Analysis has occurred right from the Stone Age – throughout the life cycle of humanity. In conclusion, autoethnographic style of dissertation is one of the good methods to carry on studies in faculty of humanities.

It is an era of social media and the Internet is bustling with many blogs. Social media sites are full with links to blog posts on every subject under the sun. For any and every topic you find a few blog post out there. The question is whether researchers can cite contents from blogs?   Why citing is important for researchers? The answer to this question is that it is important to cite sources which they use in their research for several reasons; one most important is authenticity of citation and its relevance to the topic. A good source adds quality of the work conducted. The listing of sources is important for the referee and other reader’s information. To be a responsible scholar, he/she needs giving credit to other original work and acknowledge the source.  No researcher, author, academician can take credit for somebody else’s idea.

There is evidence that blog coverage of scholarly articles associates with increased visibility and impact. Unfortunately, there are a number of obstacles that might limit the use of blog posts as an altmetry source (altmetrics are metrics and qualitative data that are complementary to traditional, citation-based metrics). First, only a small percentage of articles are covered in blogs.

Second, the definition of “scholarly blogs” and the decision about which blog data to use is challenging. When relying on certain collective work and networks for blog data we miss the impact of articles covered by blogs outside the data collection range. The coverage problem is not specific to blogs, or even to altmetrics, but it extends to bibliometric (bibliometrics is statistical analysis of written publications, such as books or articles databases) which are also chosen as sources and to indexing.

Third, there is a lack of sustainability, in sense maintaining a certain level. While most peer-reviewed journals enjoy professional archiving and printed copies (with ISSN/ISBN numbers), blogs can close down or move without leaving a trace (except perhaps in archive.org and similar sites). For blog-derived data to be reliable, they need to be properly indexed and archived. Bloggers need to create more authenticity for their blogs.

What are the reasons to Trust Online Blogs? Blogs can provide readers with insider information. This means that many blogs are typically written by experts actually working within specific fields of interest. They are providing their readers with firsthand knowledge that can help guide the decision making process.

Blogs normally are written without restrictions. Industry writers typically have more freedom when choosing the types of blogs they write. They don’t usually have a chain of checks and re-checks before being published like online periodical pieces would have. Because of the nature of blogs, even the most controversial topics are given an outlet for discussion. Plus, blogs are usually informally written, allowing readers to easily relate to the language and message. This is perfect for writers looking to provide informative web content that their target audience can connect with and act on. Blogs are usually niche blog covering a specific area.

Blogs are frequently updated. This means that web sites that feature regular blog posts provide evolving information that remains relevant and useful. Site owners don’t want their readers to be turned off by stagnant sites that rarely change, so they put significant efforts into creating stimulating content that appeals to their audience. By doing so, blog writers provide their readers with up-to-date information that is relevant to what is happening in the world around them at any given time.

If a researcher wants to quote or interpret part of a blog post, he/she needs to create a reference to a particular specific post, although many blogs end up being outlets for personal opinions and ideologies to be shared, the fact remains that blogs also serve as legitimate sources of news and information from industry experts. Online blogs are clearly in great quantity, and the list just keeps growing every day.

The global increase and popularity of social media stimulates interest in the utilization of blogs for research purposes. There is, however, a significant lack of information about the manner and scope of blog used in certain areas of research. The fact that all of the big citation styles for instance APA which uses citation formats which not only cover newspapers and reports and web pages but also blogs. APA Style is a writing style and format for academic documents such as scholarly journal articles and books. It is commonly used for citing sources within the field of behavioral and social sciences. It is described in the style guide of the American Psychological Association. Therefore, it clearly suggests that researchers and authors CAN USE BLOGS FOR CITATION.

The Fourth International Conference on Grey Literature (GL ’99) in Washington, DC, in October 1999 defined grey literature as follows: “That which is produced on all levels of government, academics, business and industry in print and electronic formats, but which is not controlled by commercial publishers.” While purposefully searching for sources on a research topic, grey literature helps in providing a more comprehensive picture. It becomes necessary to search for this unpublished information due to publication bias. The meaning of publication bias is there are some studies that have negative or insignificant results and therefore they do not get published.

Conclusion of the topic: Can scholarly blogs be cited in research work? The answer is YES.

This article is aimed at research scholars in the area of humanity studies. Often, when students of PhD choose fuzzy topics which they lack clarity about, it only leads getting frustrated. Therefore, keep your topic to the point. Most PhD students emerge to start their PhDs with over-ambitious projects which runs into many disciplines (subject areas). The key to ensure success in research is to check whether your big topic can be fit into one central research question. The problem statement (research question) of your study is the most important because it guides you and others involved in the research towards significance of the study. It helps in setting objectives of the research, writing the hypothesis and framing the questionnaire for data collection. The entire research revolves around the problem statement. It helps you to narrow down your focus. It is therefore important to place the topic into a particular context that defines the parameters of what you are going to investigate.

Choosing the right research topic is quite often a tricky and complicated task, especially for new PhD students. I have observed so far that students with five to ten years experience in the either industry or academics are comfortable with the initial process. The PhD supervisor/guide must offer help to decide on a suitable PhD topic in the initial stage. Also, please remember that the research topic must have social relevance. It must be able to satisfy some social problems. Topic selection is the beginning of your research journey.

Each researcher has unique capabilities: Each researcher has a capability of his own; each one traces the research problem from different angles. For instance, some may concentrate on the groundwork; some may concentrate on the cause of the situation; some on the behavioural factors; and some on the historical and current consequences.  For example, let’s consider the topic is “Importance of mentoring in workplace.” Somebody might only concentrate on various issues at workplace, somebody may concentrate on different needs and practices according to organizational structures, somebody might give case examples (good and futile) in the workplace, and somebody may concentrate on comparative study between two-three organizations of different nations.

Review accessible literature to choose the right topic: The fact is that there is vast data available on Internet on any given topic; disregarding that data often leads to negative results. The biggest job in research is scientifically reviewing the literature, picking only some information from Internet will skew your research findings. Also please remember that somebody somewhere is also working on your chosen topic and might be working on profound consequences. I see that sooner or later all theses will be uploaded on the Internet; the world will be viewing your work. Therefore, maintaining quality from beginning till end will be essential. Please be aware of that in India, University Grants Commission (UGC) wants scholars to upload their thesis on their online Union Catalogue of Indian Universities called IndCat. UGC also has ShodhGanga – Reservoir of Indian Theses. ShodhGanga is a repository platform available for research students to deposit their Ph.D. theses for making it available to the entire scholarly community in open access.  If only Universities and UGC get serious about the process, I am sure we will get a lot of serious research work to view.

It’s advisable to choose a research topic related to your career: When you work on a topic related to you interest area and work area, identifying minute facts, collecting primary data, finding existing research gaps and devising strategies for addressing them becomes easier. A research gap is defined as a topic or area for which insufficient information is available and this creates limitations for devising a questionnaire or schedule for the researcher. When you work sincerely on your topic, basically when you start reviewing literature from all sources such as Internet, news papers, journals, previous research work from University libraries, books and periodicals etc, addressing the research problem by devising strategies becomes easier. And, you can identify the research gaps also easily. You need to read up a lot because only the depth of information that you collect helps in designing your research work. It therefore becomes imperative to choose a meaningful research topic and a well-chosen research question can lead to a persuasive research work.

Researchers who publish a lot during after their PhD work are well-cited and can easily find satisfying jobs in academia or industry. Choosing the right research topic, thus, can open doors to getting desirable opportunities worldwide.

Check these strictures: Is your topic stimulating you to pursue it? And, will it sustain your interest in it till end? Is your research problem solvable? Is your topic contemporary in nature? Will it solve some social issues?  Can you manage the vastness of the topic? Can you design research problem easily in spite of its vastness? Is your topic making a novel contribution to the literature in the field? Will your research help you progress in your career? Please ponder on these points before topic selection.

Regular contact with your guide: After your topic selection, it is advisable to brainstorm thoroughly with your guide, established researchers, agencies and industry experts. Attend seminars, workshops to strengthen your network with the right people. Also, discuss with established researchers to get further insights. I advise taking up the relevant coursework (especially for interdisciplinary research areas) to simplify the process of research topic selection.

Conclusion: Choosing the right research question helps researchers stay focused and motivated throughout their career. Meaningful research questions eventually lead to meaningful discoveries and inventions, which is need of this hour.

One may write a thesis without any trouble or hindrance, may feel that he/she has chosen of the best topics for thesis, but until it goes in hands of the referees (external examiners) and they oaky the thesis for degree of PhD, the final result cannot be concluded. Sometimes the referee may ask the candidate to change certain portion of the thesis, sometimes a thesis is returned for rewriting it, sometimes the data gets too old and therefore goes back for rewriting and at times due to poor language the thesis is returned.

Who can be the appropriate examiner? The examiners’ knowledge of the subject area is most important. His/her capability to scrutinize, assess, previous experience of PhD examining, and the assessment criteria by the University where the student is registered is moreover significant. The examiner gets his independence to judge quality of the research. If that freedom is not given, its better a person denies the responsibility of assessing. He or she should possess a PhD. Often, due to shortage of examiners, many thesis are kept pending in universities.

There are some good and some not-so-good examiners: The good ones assess the strength and weaknesses of the thesis; they are critical yet aware of the facts and figures mentioned in the thesis. They give due credit to the researcher and the supervisor, they are empathetic. Good examiners are experienced ones; they have their style of assessing a thesis and a good track record of doing justice to their job. Whereas, some supervisors believe in negative marking, they concentrate on finding weaknesses in a thesis. They take pride in finding mistakes and sending the thesis for amendment. Honestly, this happens when examiners lack subject knowledge and insight of assessing a thesis. An examiner becomes mature after assessing several theses. He/she gets hands on experience after assessing a number of theses. An examiner is supposed to check what contribution a thesis makes to society; the worth of the topic, uniqueness of the topic, style of presentation, findings, and the conclusions drawn by the researcher are important.

These are few things to remember:

Good document: The thesis must come out as a good readable document. The chapter schemes must be laid in logical and inter-reliant manner. The examiner must not be strained while reading a thesis. There must be natural flow in the written presentation. The examiner will be looking at whether you know the current scenario in the subject area. He will look for the evidences you have presented. The evidence can be in debate form, case form, news form. In short, the examiner looks at how familiar the researcher is with the subject.

Data has age: Remember that the data has an age. In today’s world when things are short lived, do not ignore the gaps in the data. If you have a purpose for choosing gaps, please mention it. The examiner looks out for new ideas, new methods, new modelling, and new strategies presented by the researcher. Make sure, that your thesis makes a significant contribution to original topic. The examiner must not miss your contribution in the chosen area.

Components of a good thesis: The examiners will assess the success of your thesis based on these components: the research problem or the research question; the significance for choosing the research problem; the chapter scheme; the relationship of your thesis to previous work done in the area; how your thesis builds on or adds to existing knowledge in the area; use of appropriate methodology; literature reviewed; conclusions and observations in regards to the research question; bibliography (is a list that goes at the end of a work of research writing. The list contains all the sources utilized in the thesis) there are marks for the bibliography, it goes to show quality of what you have picked up from existing theory, news, the books/journals etc.  A thorough examiner checks the bibliography to establish that all major writers are included. If they are not, you may fail to meet a major credibility criterion.

The role of your supervisor is vital: He must tell at each step of the research what is wrong and how to correct it. You can use your supervisor as a sounding-board in all of the above areas. Think of your supervisor as the channel between you and the examiner. He/she can tell you what the examiners look for. In my opinion, the guide must have experience of examining few theses, so that he/she can tell the gaps. A mature and serious guide will keep showing you whether your thesis demonstrates the capacity to be developed systematically over the length of the dissertation; whether it is ready in all areas in terms of writing and presentation.

The viva: the external examiners often start out by trying to put the candidate at ease. They usually tell the candidate what they expect to see and hear in the presentation. Even in the case of a well-written thesis, the viva can be tough. The examiner looks forward to discuss the thesis topic in more details. It is good practice to approach the viva as a discussion among professionals. A good examiner will never let down or ridicule the student, or ask questions aggressively or dismiss responses without due consideration. The supervisor is an onlooker; rarely the examiner asks questions to the supervisor. But, presence of the supervisor is a must. If the viva turns tangential, the supervisor can give his/her opinion. At the end of the questioning, it is also good practice for examiners to ask the student if there are any questions they want to ask, or any points they want to make about the thesis, the examination process or supervision. A logically concluded viva must not last for more than an hour.

PPT Presentation: make a Power-Point presentation not exceeding 25 slides covering research problem, literature review, chapter scheme, what they cover, hypothesis, research methodology, findings and conclusions. After which, the examiner may ask questions, sometimes examiners ask questions during PPT Presentation itself.  Take time to think before replying, remember to breathe and to speak practically slowly. Don’t become nervous, if the examiner criticises a point, don’t take it personally. Don’t become defensive. Instead, take the opportunity to talk about your research.

The questions that crop up in vivas are: What the thesis is about? What did you do? What did you find? Why does that matter? The time taken for completing the research, why that much time was taken?  What was the experience of data collection, methodology, statistical tools and its effects etc? Remember to keep a clam mind, exuberance and liveliness matters. Wear a formal outfit.

Research objectives are a critical part of a successful research. They are a set of clearly defined and meaningful objectives. Having well-defined objectives narrows and focuses the research on the topic and ensures that the findings are relevant to decision-makers. The objectives should be presented briefly, they should be presented in logical sequence,
they should be realistic which can be achieved within the expected timeframe and achieved within the available resources. They should be phrased in operational terms and they should be fixed till end of the research.

Qualitative Research: This is primarily exploratory type research. It is used to gain an understanding of basic reasons, opinions, and impetus. It provides insights into the problem or helps to develop ideas or hypotheses for potential quantitative research. In a qualitative research the emphasis is put on the natural setting and the points of views of the research participants. Additionally, special consideration is given to the researcher as person. Qualitative Research is often used to discover trends in thought and opinions, and dive deeper into the problem. Qualitative data collection methods vary using unstructured or semi-structured techniques. Some common methods include focus groups (group discussions), individual interviews, and researcher’s observations. The sample size is usually small, and respondents are selected to fulfil a given questionnaire or schedule.

Quantitative Research:  Is used to measure the problem by way of producing numerical data or data that can be transformed into functional statistics. It is used to quantify attitudes, opinions, behaviours, and other defined variables and generalize results from a larger sample population. Quantitative Research uses measurable data to formulate facts and uncover patterns in research. Quantitative data collection methods are much more structured than Qualitative data collection methods. Quantitative data collection methods include various forms of surveys, such as online survey, paper survey, kiosk survey and even mobile survey. It also includes telephonic interviews, face-to-face interviews, longitudinal studies (is a research design that involves repeated observations of the same variables over short or long periods of time) website interceptors, online polls, and systematic observations.

Variables: A variable is defined as anything that has a quantity or quality that varies. The dependent variable is the variable a researcher is interested in. An independent variable is a variable believed to affect the dependent variable. Country, state, gender, age, sex, business income and expenses, country of birth, capital expenditure, class grades, height, health condition, and eye colour and vehicle type are examples of variables.

Mixed Method Research: is done by mixing both quantitative and qualitative research and data, the researcher gains breadth and depth of understanding and confirmation, while offsetting the weaknesses inherent to using each approach by itself. One of the most advantageous characteristics of conducting mixed methods research is the possibility of using several means such as data sources to examine the same phenomenon. This method is also called triangulation. It allows one to identify aspects of a phenomenon more accurately by approaching it from different vantage points using different methods and techniques. Successful triangulation requires careful analysis of the type of information provided by each method, including its strengths and weaknesses.

Advantages of mixed method research: it provides strengths that balance the weaknesses of quantitative and qualitative research. For instance, quantitative research is weak in understanding the perspective or setting in which people behave, something that qualitative research makes up for. On the other hand, qualitative research is seen as incomplete because of the potential for biased interpretations made by the researcher and the difficulty in generalizing findings to a large group. Quantitative research does not have these weaknesses. Thus, by using both types of research, the strengths of each approach can make up for the weaknesses of the other.

Mixed method provides a more complete and comprehensive understanding of the research problem than either quantitative or qualitative approaches alone. It provides an approach for developing better, more context specific instruments. For instance, by using qualitative research it is possible to gather information about a certain topic such as why students fear maths, or changing trends in children’s garment industry in order to develop an mechanism with greater validity and soundness.

Ideally, we should use both qualitative and quantitative research since they provide different perspectives and usually complement each other. There are plenty advanced survey software available in the market; usage of them gives the research team the option to integrate video and chat sessions with surveys, which can give the best of both quantitative and qualitative research. Using this methodological approach is a cost-effective and an alternative to the combination of in-person focus groups and a separate quantitative study.

From 1986 till 1991 Japan witnessed a bubble economy: its real estate and stock prices were greatly inflated. A bubble is created when uncontrolled money is supplied and market experiences credit expansion. This situation leads to over confident speculation assets and stock prices due to eased money supply policy at that moment.

A ‘’financial bubble’’ refers to a situation where there is a relatively high level of trading activity on a particular asset class at price levels that are significantly higher than their inherent values, or built-in values. In other words, a bubble occurs when certain investments are bid up to prices that are far too high to be sustainable in the long run.

The 1990s saw ‘’technology bubble’’.  Many new dotcom companies were floated in market, and their stocks (share) were bid up to extremely high prices in a relatively short period of time. This bubble was so crazy that even companies that were infant start-ups and had yet to produce actual earnings were bid up to large market capitalizations by speculators attempting to earn a quick profit from the bull market in the technology sector. By 2001 however, the technology bubble burst and many of these formerly high-flying stocks came crashing down to drastically lower price levels. Bubbles at time are insane, and they crash down rumbling.

Another noteworthy bubble was the ‘’housing bubble’’ that occurred after the technology bubble; this was characterized by an initial increase in housing prices due to fundamentals; the fundamental can be described as often, homeowners make the harmful error of assuming recent price performance will continue into the future without first considering the long-term rates of price appreciation. As the bull market in housing continues, many investors begin buying homes as speculative investments, and this unsustainable run-up in housing prices eventually come crashing down badly. The United States housing bubble was responsible for the ‘subprime crisis’, which affected over half of the United States. Housing prices peaked in early 2006, started to decline in 2006 and 2007, and reached new lows in 2012.

A real estate bubble is a type of economic bubble that occurs periodically in local, regional, national or global real estate markets. In the stock market, booms are associated with bull markets (where investors are optimistic that stocks will go up) whereas the busts (break) are associated with bear markets.

What is a ‘Boom’? Stocks that suddenly become very popular and gain strong, elevated market profits are the result of a stock boom. A company or industry boom results in an increase of output, jobs and investment in that industry. Certain events can be citywide or nationwide booms for business activity, such as hosting the Olympics, which translates into capital investment, TV broadcasting deals, sponsorship deals and tourism. For example, TV broadcasting revenue alone was projected to be $4.1 billion for the 2016 Summer Olympics in Brazil.

On the other hand, a downturn in a particular industry or financial sector can result in a bust for an entire city or state, especially if the region has invested too heavily in that industry or sector. Arizona and Nevada are currently mired in an economic slump because they were hit hardest by the real estate bust due to the subprime crisis of 2007-08.

Booms are not essentially sustainable; but when they end, things level out, the industry experiences a minor setback. When a Bubble ends, a significant number of people experience serious economic hardships. That’s the difference between bubble and boom. Okay, a boom is what you call a bubble before it bursts.

On a serious note, a bubble is a situation when one particular thing becomes overvalued. Think back to the 90’s. There were some really successful internet start-ups like Google, Amazon, Ebay, etc. Investors went absolutely insane giving any idiot with an internet company a ton of money to invest in their business. Those businesses became worth a ton of money overnight. Eventually, people realized that many of those companies were not particularly profitable, and pulled out their money. It was a kind of the bubble burst. Overnight those companies went from being wildly expensive to be being completely valueless.

A boom on the other hand is a normal thing. It is like there is a huge demand for a product such as herbal products, especially in towns where there are no herbal product shops; the marketer expands demand for the products through shops from other town. Everyone loves the product, so the demand increases hence many other herbal companies also open shops. This part is the boom. The post–World War II economic expansion, also known as the post-war economic boom, the long boom, and the Golden Age of Capitalism, was a period of economic prosperity in the mid-20th century which occurred, following the end of World-War II in 1945, and lasted until the early 1970s.

Economic booms are helpful for market expansions. Expansion Strategy is adopted by organizations when they attempt to achieve a high growth as compared to its past achievements. For example, let’s talk about one restaurant owner who grew his business by adding a private catering service. He also adds a third dimension of selling signature dessert items through local grocery stores. Fourth – he adds a grocery store of his own to his business expansion.

The cyclical nature of the market and the economy in general suggests that every strong economic growth happens in bull market which follows by a sluggish low growth bear market. Usually bubbles start with some good economic reasons.

Some factors that cause bubbles:

Illogical enthusiasm: In certain circumstances, investors buy assets because of strong psychological pressures which encourage them to ignore the fundamental value of the asset and believe that prices will keep rising.

Herd mentality: People often assume the majority can’t be wrong. If prominent and well-established financial leaders are buying, they assume it must be a good investment.

Short term perspective: People make decisions based on short term thinking rather than the long-term.

Adaptive expectations: People often judge the state of a market and economy by what has happened in the recent past. They hope they can beat the market and hence they decide to buy and then get out before the bubble bursts.

Cognitive dissonance: It refers to filtering out bad news and looking for views which reinforce our beliefs. People often do it; they look out for views from market which suits their pre or post buying decision.

The style and format of research papers varies from subject to subject and researcher to researcher. There are certain guidelines which can be followed for all subjects. These are some hints for people who might just have started to write papers. How you write depends on the journal/type of reader you are addressing. Also, keep in mind some role models – people you know or famous papers. The general aim is to be attractive to non-experts as much as can be expected, while interesting and not offensive to experts. You make a beginning by choosing a topic for your paper.

Choose a topic: Generally describe the topic and how it fits into your field of study. Describe the environment and its conditions. Describe what you intend to show; argue your point in depth. Discuss reasons. Tackle points such as why, when, what and how? Discuss significance of your study.

Illustrate your points with interesting examples. Remember you are writing for an audience and want to capture their interest. Begin to define terms, concepts, vocabulary. Make use of trustworthy sources for literature review. Mention your sources in the footnote.  There is a large pool of sources out there on Internet which provides you with a broader perspective of the topics within your scope of research. Along the way you will find many topics within your field that do not interest your research aptitude. Remember, you need a large variety of sources that you can use, which can be in favor of your topic, against your topic. You need to look at it from different perspectives to “carve” shapes out of nowhere to guide you toward topic that is directly relevant to your choice of topic.

The good news is that as you research you may find that some of your sources that were published in the same decade or so will cite and reference each other. Remember, the more your read, your ideas will get clarified. Make note of the references.

Review the Literature: The Literature review is a vital part of the research process.  You will gain important insights by reviewing assortment of literature available on your topic of research. By reviewing literature you will gain an approach, knowledge, and more awareness on your chosen topic for research. An in-depth literature evaluation will help you in setting the stage for a better-designed study and will help improve your chances in obtaining significant results.  Therefore, it is worth the time and effort to analyze it in right fashion.

Reviewing the literature involves finding the sources, analyzing, amalgamating, and interpreting. You might find incompatible and contrasting views expressed by different authors on your topic. These conflicting points of view might be the indicators of swerving theories within the same topic. To shape up a genuine research, you need to be aware of these conflicting theories as well. Remember, verity of arguments and your views add flavor to your paper. Being aware of those theories will help you later in your life; you will be able to talk and apply your knowledge in your work from different perspectives.

Develop your Hypotheses: Your hypothesis is your proposed explanation that you will test to determine whether it is true or false. Avoid over-generalizing, and reference the research findings of others to support why you think this will work. There is no rigorous, formulaic way of devising hypotheses; hypotheses are typically a product of experience, intuition, insight, analogy, and extrapolation.  Your hypothesis may be correct or even wrong. It needs to be verified through your work.

Styling: Give enough information. List the variables used. These are what change, or that you manipulate, throughout the test. Look for empirical research. Whenever possible, look for peer reviewed empirical research. These are articles or books written by experts in your field of interest, whose work has been read and vouched for by other experts in the same field. These can be found in scientific journals or via an online search.

Findings: This is descriptive and numeric data. You can present them in tables, charts, pictures etc. Develop your argument based upon your findings. While the data may read for itself, you will need to interpret:

• How it validates your hypothesis.
• What falls outside of validity?
• How it impacts the literature you have cited in your paper.

Conclusions: Reaffirm and recap your findings and discussion either in order to simply complexity or to provide a summary for those who skip to it. A conclusion is like the final chord in a song. It makes the listener feel that the piece is complete and well done. This applies to your paper writing and for your audience. They should not feel incomplete after reading your paper. You should therefore support what you stated in your research. You then become a reliable author for them and they are impressed by that and will be more likely to read your work in the future. They may also have learned something and maybe have had their opinion changed by what you have written or created! The conclusion need not be long. It can be accomplished in as little as two sentences.

Recommendations: A research paper is not a dissertation, an editorial, or a story. All declaration of fact must be documented. Be careful while making any generalization. Try your best not to make any ambiguous inquiries. It is worth stressing that the evaluation of your paper will never be determined by whether or not your hypotheses are verified. It is important to remember that a hypothesis supported by the data does not mean that it is true as there possibly are an infinite number of other theories that lead to the same prediction. Similarly, failure of support does not necessarily mean that your hypothesis is wrong: it may be hold true in some populations.

References: These are very important for your paper. It shows your capability of sourcing the right data for your paper as a researcher.  Present them at the end of your paper.

Case study is a form of qualitative and also quantitative research that focuses on providing a detailed account of one or more cases. Eg: how important is sales training in e-commerce: how different e-commerce companies used sales training to the best of their advantage. And, the best part is that the case study is the most flexible of all research designs which allows the researcher to retain the holistic characteristics of real-life events while simultaneously allowing him/her to investigate the empirical events. In general, a case study is an empirical inquiry which investigates a contemporary phenomenon within its real-life context. Empirical research is based on observations made by the researcher – his/her actual experience rather than any theory or belief. Many times, the theory and observations can have contrasting facts; this is where case study type of research scores higher rank, it allows making the boundaries between phenomenon and context clearly evident and in it multiple sources of evidence are used.

Case studies are one of many ways of doing social science and humanities research: it can be carried out with experimentation, observation, surveys and archival information. Each form of data collection is suited to a certain type of research problem; degree of experimentation has control over events and historical/contemporary perspective and focus. By design researchers chose case studies usually when their topic is their principal subject and they chose selected examples of a social entity within its normal context. At the simplest level, the case study provides descriptive accounts of one or more cases; it depends on the researcher’s perspective how many cases he should handle in his research. It gives the researcher a chance to experiment intellectually more and more insights of one or more selected social factors within a real-life context.

Before deciding to use case study as your research type these are few things you need to do: first decide whether case studies can be useful for your specific investigation. There are three factors that determine the best research methodology: 1. the types of questions to be answered 2. Decide to what extent you have control over behavioural events of the respondents and your chosen sample 3. Understand the degree of focus on present-day as opposed to historical events. You will have to tackle these issues in framing your research questions which are most significant in determining the appropriate approach. Who, what when and where questions can be examined through documents, archival analysis, surveys and interviews. Therefore, I feel that case studies are one approach that supports deeper and more detailed investigation of the type that is normally necessary to answer how, when and why questions.

Case study research is also good for present-day events when the appropriate behaviour cannot be manipulated. Typically case study research uses a variety of evidence from different sources, such as documents, artefacts, interviews, journals, data banks and observation, and this goes beyond the range of sources of evidence that might be available in historical study. In summary then, case study research is useful when: A how or why question is being asked about a contemporary set of events over which the investigator has little or no control.

In contrast to surveys, typically the numbers of units studied in a case study are lesser in number, but the extent of details available for each case can be greater. As compared with an experiment, the case study researcher has much less control over the variables, than if an experiment were used to investigate a situation. In a survey data may be collected from a number of organisations in order to generalise to all other organisations of the same type. In contrast in a comparative case study across a number of different organisations, the objective is to compare or reproduce the organisations studied with each other in a systematic way, in the investigation.

Lesser usage of statistical examination:

While analyzing results for a case study, researcher need not use complex statistical tools because the analysis becomes more opinion based than statistical method based. The usual idea is to try and collate data into a manageable form and construct a narrative around it.

In subjects like social sciences and humanities conservative use of statistics reduces the significance and application of the topic. I have observed that often over usage of statistical tools destroy results which are often reported in an unnecessarily obscure manner. Secondly, in my opinion, the null hypothesis testing concept is extremely flawed. And, thirdly, there are several issues, independent of the particular statistical concepts employed, which limit the value of any statistical approach. For instance, difficulties of generalizing to different situations, and the weakness of some research in terms of the size of the effects found. I have seen how some Universities insist often over usage of statistics which kills the essence and core of a topic.

Therefore, case study as a research plan often emerges as one of the best options for research students and mature researchers who are seeking to undertake a modest scale of research project based on their workplace or the comparison of a limited number of organisations. The most challenging aspect of the application of case study research in this background is to lift the assessment from a descriptive account that can claim to be a worthwhile; it contributes modest addition to the research.

Some facts of case study:

• Case study is an empirical inquiry that Investigates a contemporary phenomena within its real life context.
• It is helpful when the boundaries between phenomenon and context are not clearly evident. This statement emphasises that an important strength of case studies is the ability to undertake an investigation into a phenomenon in its context; it is not necessary to replicate the phenomenon in a laboratory or experimental setting in order to better understand the phenomena.
• Thus case studies are a valuable way of looking at the world around us. On the other hand, it is important not to confuse case studies with ethnographic and other strictly qualitative research paradigms. Case study research can be based on any mix of quantitative and qualitative approaches. Typically, it uses multiple data sources including two or more of direct detailed observations, interviews, and documents. In addition, case studies can involve single or multiple cases as discussed in the next section on research design.

• Case studies are in-depth investigations of a single person, group, event or community. Typically, data is gathered from a variety of sources and by using several different methods.

Do you know that the case study research method was originated in clinical medicine (the case history, i.e. the patient’s personal history). Case studies are widely used in psychology and amongst the best known were the ones carried out by Sigmund Freud. He conducted very detailed investigations into the private lives of his patients in an attempt to both understand and help them overcome their illnesses.

In Business management studies case studies like Malden Mills, Start bucks, Tylenol’s 1982 scandal, David VS Goliath, Tesco’s international expansion and Enron are some of the famous case studies which are so in-depth that while reading them you don’t need to use other referrals. They are well described, well analysed, with apt data and conclusions and observations.

]]> https://drvidyahattangadi.com/case-study-is-one-of-vital-type-of-research/feed/ 0 https://drvidyahattangadi.com/why-bibliography-is-important-in-research/ https://drvidyahattangadi.com/why-bibliography-is-important-in-research/#respond Wed, 03 Dec 2014 03:41:27 +0000 http://drvidyahattangadi.com/?p=1861 Why Bibliography Is Important In Research?

If you are pursuing or planning to pursue research, bibliography is perhaps the most important element in a research exercise. Without a bibliography, the work is in essence useless. While this may sound extreme, it is true that research without fact checking is worthless. No professor or referee will accept a thesis or research paper without citation and citation is incomplete without a bibliography or reference page. So what exactly is a bibliography?

A bibliography is a list that goes at the end of a work of research writing. The list contains all the sources utilized in the thesis. Every bibliographic reference must have the following:

• The author’s name: In every citation format, the author’s name is listed first in the bibliography. The bibliography is also ordered by author’s last name and in alphabetical order. The only exception to this is in footnotes, for Turabian format, the author’s first name is listed first. This style presents bibliographic information in footnotes or endnotes.
• The title of the resource: The title identifies the specific resource used. The title is generally the creative element of the piece; the title of the book, article, news, advertisement gives a hint of its character and lets the reader know what to expect.
• The publisher who published the source. The name and place of publication is important for verification of the type of source material. For example, if a book is published by McMillan Publishers, it is trusted to be a valid, verified resource and you can count on the facts being true. Each publishing houses have editors that fact check and no book would be published by a trustworthy publisher that contained non-verified information.
• The date of publication: The date of publication is included in the work to let the reader know when the information was published. Remember in today’s world, each data has its life. The date is important in your thesis because the reference which you present should not be out of date. The data collected and presented by you also has its life. It’s therefore advisable to conclude your research in record time.

 The scholars are required to use a format depending on the number of sources used in the thesis, setting of the sources in the chapters and the source where the information was taken from. Each element is vital for proper bibliographic listing. Please remember all your bibliography helps other scholars to find resources they may not have known to have existed before. It also facilitates the referees or examiners of the thesis or research paper to trace the steps a student took in preparing his research work.

A citation is a reference to a published or unpublished source. More precisely, a citation is an abbreviated alphanumeric expression fixed in the body of an intellectual work that denotes an entry in the bibliographic references section of the work for the purpose of acknowledging the relevance of the works of others to the topic of discussion.

Citation helps referencing; it’s a way to give credit to the writers from whom scholars borrow words and ideas. By citing the work of a particular scholar, students can acknowledge and respect the intellectual property rights of that researcher. A student can draw on any of the millions of ideas, insights and arguments published by other writers, many of whom have spent years researching and writing. All that is needed is to acknowledge their contribution in building newer assignments.

Research scholars must take advantage of the works of others while researching their own topic. Going to the library and opening a relevant book or journal and going through the  author’s bibliography, students can find more resource material listed there, to hunt for in the stacks and, after having such material, add it to their bibliography, as well.

 An annotated bibliography is a list of citations to books, articles, and documents. Each citation is followed by a brief (usually about 150 words) descriptive and evaluative paragraph, the annotation. The purpose of the annotation is to inform the reader of the relevance, accuracy, and quality of the sources cited.

One of the reasons behind citing sources and compiling an extensive and logical bibliography is to prove that you have done some valid research to back up your logic and claims. Readers of the thesis can refer to the citation in the bibliography and then go look up the material themselves. I want to point out here, that a well reported bibliography influences positively the examiners of the thesis. The examiners can double check a claim or interpretation done by the research scholars.

The research work shapes up stably when the scholar reads up more and collects lot of references. More information and more reading make the researcher an expert on his chosen topic. He braces the ability to explain the content of the sources and assess their usefulness. He can use and share this information with others who may be less familiar with certain terms. A good researcher will gather sources, analyze them and discuss them with experts.

The bibliography is the key element of a thesis which is used to judge the quality of the work done by the researcher.  Therefore, use up-to-date resources and be sure you know how to cite the references. Please do not ignore the nuances of a bibliography. It exhibits your critical thinking, it proves you have read and understood your sources, it establishes your work as a valid source and you as a competent researcher, and it situates your study and topic in a continuing professional conversation. And lastly, your bibliography might stimulate other researchers to carry on further work on your chosen topic of research.