The Research Design Section
Six requirements sit inside one row of the component table, and this section has to carry all of them. It is also where a contradiction documented across the supplied material stops being the source's problem and becomes yours.
One row, six requirements
That is one row of a thirteen-row table, and it is the densest row in it. Everything in the proposal before this point is argument. Everything from here is commitment.
THE SIX REQUIREMENTS AND WHERE EACH ONE GOES NEXT
| # | Requirement | Where it is used later |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Your understandings of the nature of knowledge, and how they affect your choice of research approach | Nowhere else in the proposal. This is the only statement of it you will make, and the rest of the design section is read against it |
| 2 | Description of, and rationale for, selection of participants | The ethics application's participants part, which asks who will be approached, the selection and exclusion criteria, and how you will recruit |
| 3 | Description of, and rationale for, data collection methods | The ethics application's methodology and data recording parts; the instruments themselves go into the appendices |
| 4 | Description of, and rationale for, analysis methods | The findings chapters, and the confidentiality undertakings you give about how data is handled during analysis |
| 5 | The procedures you will use to ensure ethical practice | The ethics application, more or less entirely. This is its first draft |
| 6 | A statement of delimitations (scope) | The limitations section of the finished work, and every argument about what the study did not cover |
Column two reproduces the supplied source. Column three maps each onto components and documents described in the same material.
The full table and the reasoning behind its order sit at Components of a Research Proposal. Read that page for the shape of the document; read this one for what this row costs.
The requirement that appears nowhere else
"Includes your understandings of the nature of knowledge and how this affects your choice of research approach." This is the only instruction in the entire supplied teaching dataset that tells a student to write their theory of knowledge down. Everywhere else the material discusses that theory as a concept to recognise. Here it acquires a deadline and a word count.
The understanding in question has a name. It is your epistemological position — your view of what counts as knowledge and how it comes to be produced — and it sits underneath every method you will name in the next three paragraphs. The concept is set out at Epistemology: How Knowledge Is Created; what follows is only about writing it down.
The declaration — the easy half
- States what you take knowledge to be, and how you think it is produced
- Can be written in two or three sentences
- Can be borrowed from a textbook and still be true
- On its own, proves nothing about your design
The consequence — the half that is graded
- States how that view affected the approach you chose
- Has to name a decision that would have gone differently under another view
- Cannot be borrowed, because it is about your study
- Is what the rest of the section is then held to
The conjunction "and how this affects" is what separates a declaration from an argument. A paragraph that names a position and then describes a method without connecting them has answered half the requirement and signalled that the position was chosen after the method, which is the wrong way round and usually visible.
Paradigm, assumptions, and a justification supported by the literature
This passage sits elsewhere in the material and is attributed to a different institution, but it lands on the same section. It contains three demands, and the third is the one most often missed.
- The paradigm you are working within should be clear
- The theoretical assumptions you are making — or questioning — should be stated
- The methodology must be justified, and the justification must be supported by the literature
"Supported by the literature" means the justification carries citations. Not citations for the topic — citations for the method: work that used this approach on this kind of problem, or work that argues for it. That is a different search from the one behind your literature review, and it is usually done late and badly.
Participants, collection and analysis — described and justified
The source's phrasing is "description of and rationale for", and the word carrying the weight is rationale. Three things are named, and each needs both halves. Naming a method is a description. Saying why it, and not the obvious alternative, is a rationale.
WHAT DESCRIPTION AND RATIONALE EACH ASK FOR
| Element | The description answers | The rationale answers |
|---|---|---|
| Selection of participants | Who, how many, from where, and by what criteria they are in or out | Why these people can answer this question, and why a different group could not do it better or more easily |
| Data collection methods | What instrument, administered how, over what period, producing what | Why this instrument suits the kind of evidence your stated position says counts, and what it cannot capture |
| Analysis methods | What will be done to the data once it exists, and in what order | Why this treatment is appropriate to that kind of data, and what a different treatment would have shown or hidden |
The requirement for both halves is the source's. The breakdown of what each answers is this page's.
One test catches most of the weak rationales at once. For each of the three, name the alternative you did not take and say what it would have cost you. A rationale that mentions no alternative is a preference with a citation attached.
The participants paragraph has a second life. The ethics application structure in the material asks who will be approached, the selection and where appropriate the exclusion criteria, how volunteers will be recruited, and how information about the study will reach them. Writing this paragraph with those four questions in view saves the work twice — see Writing an Ethics Application.
Procedures you will use to ensure ethical practice
The noun is procedures. Not principles, not intentions, not commitments. A proposal saying participation will be voluntary has stated a principle; a proposal saying who makes the approach, in what words, and what happens if the answer is no has stated a procedure.
The same material lists five ethical considerations to incorporate as the research is designed, and they cover more than the participants.
- Protecting the rights of the participant or subject
- Ensuring the sponsor receives ethically conducted and reported research
- Following ethical standards when designing research
- Protecting the safety of the researcher and the team
- Ensuring the research team follows the developed proposal
Items two, four and five are the ones proposals usually omit. The sponsor's entitlement to unbiased research is an ethical obligation here, not a commercial one. Researcher safety is a named right. And the fifth makes the proposal itself an ethical instrument — deviating from it later is a governance matter, not a change of plan.
A statement of delimitations, and why it lives here
The component table's last item is "a statement of delimitations (scope)", and the parenthesis is worth noticing: the source treats delimitations and scope as the same thing in the same breath. It also places the statement inside the research design section rather than giving it a row of its own.
That placement is an argument. A boundary stated in the introduction is a description of the topic. A boundary stated inside the design section is a description of what the design can and cannot reach — which is what a delimitation actually is. The full treatment, including the three questions the material uses to fix a boundary, is at Scope and Delimitation.
When the section shrinks: secondary research
The material draws a line between proposals for primary research and proposals for secondary research, and it changes what this section has to contain.
Primary research proposal
- You collect or create your own data — experiments, interviews, questionnaires, surveys, statistical compilation
- The proposal must include a methodology and research design section
- The source's words: these "must be accurate and detailed"
- You work out who or what you will access and how you will obtain the data, then say what you will do with it
- "You may need to apply for ethics approval"
Secondary research proposal
- You use existing data someone else collected, recorded and analysed
- "You will not need to include a detailed methodology or research methods section in the proposal"
- You still provide an outline of how you intend to approach the research problem
- You still state the theoretical framework you intend to use
- You still name the areas, issues or authors you intend to focus on
The exemption is narrower than it first reads. What is excused is the detailed methodology — not the approach, not the framework, and not the account of what you will access and why it is relevant. The nature-of-knowledge requirement is not withdrawn either; a secondary study rests on a view of what existing records can be made to tell you, which is an epistemological claim whether or not it is labelled as one.
There is also a terminology trap. The material's "primary sources" in that passage — original texts, records, letters, logs — is a different idea from "primary data" elsewhere in the same dataset, and the two are never reconciled. A secondary-research project uses primary sources without collecting primary data. Both senses are handled at Primary and Secondary Research Proposals.
Assembling the section, and checking it
An order that holds together
State the position, then its consequence
Your understanding of the nature of knowledge, and the design decision that followed from it. Two to four sentences. This goes first because everything after it is read against it.
Name the paradigm and the assumptions
What paradigm you are working within, and which theoretical assumptions you are making or questioning. The verb "questioning" is in the source and is an option: you may be interrogating an assumption rather than adopting it.
Justify the methodology, with citations
Why this methodology for this problem, supported by the literature. Cite work that used it or argued for it, not work about your topic.
Describe and justify participants, collection, analysis
Who, how many, on what criteria — then instrument, administration, period and output, then what happens to the data once it exists. Each with a named alternative you did not take.
Set out the ethical procedures
Mechanisms with actors and timing, not undertakings. Cover participants, the sponsor, and your own safety.
Close with the delimitations
The boundary, stated as what the design can and cannot reach. Check it against your questions before you stop.
Before this section goes anywhere
- Your understanding of the nature of knowledge is stated, and a design decision is shown to follow from it
- The paradigm is clear, and the theoretical assumptions are named as adopted or as questioned
- The methodology justification carries citations about the method, not about the topic
- Each of participants, collection and analysis has both a description and a rationale
- Each rationale names the alternative not taken and what it would have cost
- The ethical content is written as procedures — who does what, when — rather than as commitments
- Researcher safety and the sponsor's entitlement to unbiased research are both addressed
- A delimitations statement is present, and every research question sits inside it
- If the study is secondary, the approach, theoretical framework and focus are all still stated
What to carry forward
- Six requirements sit in this one row, and five feed directly into the ethics application. Writing it once well saves writing it twice badly.
- The nature-of-knowledge requirement is unique in the supplied dataset. Its second clause — how this affects your choice of approach — is the half that is assessed.
- If you cannot name a design decision that would have gone the other way under a different position, the position is not doing any work.
- The methodology justification needs citations about the method — a different search from your literature review.
- The material requires a paradigm declaration; ten examined published works give none. Write the section for your examiner, not for the journals.
- "Description of and rationale for" means both halves for participants, collection and analysis. Name the alternative you rejected.
- Procedures, not principles. A promise about voluntariness is not a procedure; a named person making the approach in stated words is.
- Secondary research is excused the detailed methodology only. The approach, the theoretical framework and the focus all remain.
Frequently asked questions
What does "your understandings of the nature of knowledge" actually mean?
It means your epistemological position — what you take knowledge to be and how you believe it is produced — written down in the proposal. It is the only instruction of its kind in the supplied teaching dataset. The second half of the requirement is the demanding one: you must also show how that position affected the research approach you chose.
Do I have to name a paradigm if the published work in my field never does?
The supplied material says your paradigm should be clear, and it is a requirement on the document you are submitting. Across ten published works examined for this library, not one declares a paradigm — so the field's practice cannot settle the question for you. The safe reading is that the requirement applies to your assessed proposal regardless of what journals publish, and that the form it takes is a question for your supervisor.
How detailed does the research design section have to be?
For primary research the source is explicit: the methodology and research design section "must be accurate and detailed". For secondary research it states you will not need to include a detailed methodology or research methods section, but still requires an outline of your approach, your theoretical framework, and the areas, issues or authors you will focus on. No word counts are given for either case.
Where do ethics go — in this section or in a section of their own?
In this section. The component table lists "procedures you will use to ensure ethical practice" as one of the characteristics of research design, and gives ethics no row of its own. That placement is deliberate: ethical procedures are properties of the design, and a design that cannot be conducted ethically is not a design that needs a separate ethics paragraph, it is a design that has to change.
Is a delimitation the same as a limitation?
The supplied material uses "delimitations" and "scope" interchangeably in the same parenthesis and does not define limitation against them here. The working distinction used across this library is that a delimitation is a boundary you chose and can defend, while a limitation is a constraint that was imposed on you. Both end up in the finished work; only the delimitation belongs in the proposal's design section.
What is the difference between a description and a rationale?
A description says what you will do — the instrument, the group, the procedure. A rationale says why that and not the obvious alternative. The source asks for both for participants, data collection and analysis, and the fastest way to tell whether you have written a rationale is to check whether an alternative appears anywhere in it.
References and source attribution
- Quinlan, C. 2011, Business Research Methods, 1st ed., Cengage Publishing — cited in the supplied source; the origin of the methodological pyramid that underlies the requirement to state your understanding of the nature of knowledge.
- Bryman, A. 2016, Social Research Methods, 5th ed., Oxford University Press, Oxford — cited in the supplied source as a general methods reference behind its treatment of paradigms and research design.
- O'Leary, Z. 2017, The Essential Guide to Doing Your Research Project, 3rd ed., Sage Publications, London — cited in the supplied source among the general research methods texts.
- Clarke, R. J. 2005, Research methods and methodologies — cited in the supplied source as adapted for its table of methodologies, pp. 35–45.
- An edited volume of master's degree research projects in project management, 2018, academic publisher, 378 pp. — the exemplar volume behind the observation that none of the examined works declares a research paradigm.
- The supplied teaching source: consolidated weekly teaching notes and slide material on developing a research proposal and on research ethics, including the component table attributed there to a university education faculty's study resources and the proposal guidance attributed to a university student learning centre.
Suggested questions for Ask KEVOS
- Write the opening paragraph of my design section stating my position on the nature of knowledge and the decision that followed from it.
- Read my design section and tell me whether my method was chosen before or after my stated position.
- For each of my participants, collection and analysis, name the alternative I did not take and what it would have cost.
- Turn my ethical commitments into procedures with named actors and timing.
- My field's published work never declares a paradigm. Draft a paradigm statement my examiner would accept.
- Check my delimitations statement against my research questions and flag any question that reaches outside it.