MGT5BRM: Assessment 4: Details And Instructions

Purpose/Rationale

The purpose of this assessment is to develop a detailed research proposal. Upon completion of this final assessment task, you should have a strong basis for developing a research project under supervision.

Task Details

This task is a full research proposal report. The research proposal will set out the research problem you are addressing, full detail and justification of the research method and design that you are using, and the likely benefits of the research. You will use accurate research-based terminology and theoretical concepts to describe and justify your chosen method/design. You will include a minimum of 15 academic journal articles in your proposal.

In most cases, you will use the topic and literature review that you developed in previous assessments as a starting point. However, you are allowed to select a new topic and complete a new literature review.

Please see further instructions for this assessment task below.

Instructions

This is an individual piece of work. You will write a 2,500-word research proposal. This assessment can draw on the work you have done in earlier assessments, as well as material covered in the weekly online and synchronous learning activities.

You must argue that you have identified an appropriate research question based on the literature. You must argue that your selected research method is an appropriate approach for conducting research to address your research question. You must also justify your research design as well as comprehensively explaining and justifying your chosen data collection method.

Assessment Format

The report should be approximately 2500 words not including: reference list, headings, table of contents. Please use standard fonts (Times New Roman, Calibri, Arial) and readable font sizes (10-point or larger) throughout, including in any graphics that you create. Use 1.5 or double spacing and 2.54cm (1 inch) margins. Please see Research and References for research expectations.

The format for this assignment is similar to that of a journal article reporting a single study. The obvious difference is that you are proposing a study rather than reporting on something already completed.

Suggested Headings

The following suggested headings and considerations may assist you in determining what to include throughout your proposal:

• Cover page
  
  Include report title, your name, and your student id number
  
  Cover page is not included in the word count

• Introduction
  
  Define the topic or problem
  
  Explain why this topic or problem is interesting and in need of further research

• Literature Review
  
  Discuss the existing research undertaken in this area
  
  Identify a research problem (or current gap in the literature) to be addressed

• Aims or Purpose
  
  Precisely state the purpose of the research
  
  Provide at least one specific research question (or hypothesis if appropriate)

• Proposed Research Method

  • Participants – Detail the proposed method of recruitment, inclusion/exclusion criteria

  • Procedure – Detail the steps to collect the data, including any specific measures, questions, or interventions

  • Throughout this section, justify and explain each decision

• Discussion and Conclusion
  
  Discuss the potential strengths and limitations of proposed study and method for answering the research question
  
  Discuss the value of undertaking the proposed research for this topic

Research and References

You are expected to cite a minimum of 15 academic and peer-reviewed articles other than the research sources provided in class. These articles can and should overlap with sources cited in earlier assessments.

Academic articles refer to articles published in academic, peer-reviewed journal articles. The academic research articles should be relevant to the topic, contemporary (i.e., published in the last 5 years) and of high quality (i.e., published in journals ranked by the Australian Business Dean’s Council or Australian Research Council as A*, A, or B). Depending on your proposal topic area and research design, you may include additional academic research articles that are older than 5 years (e.g., seminal or 'classic' studies), research review papers (e.g., systematic reviews, meta-analyses), or articles published in less prestigious journals.

Cite all sources in the main text of the document and include a separate reference page at the end of the document. The in-text citations and references should be formatted using the current APA edition.