Developmental Research: Goals and Methodologies

Using information provided in today’s handout as well as that in pages 23-30 of your text, for each of the eight research questions listed below:

1) determine whether the primary goal of research designed to answer the question is to describe, explain, predict, or influence human development;

2) develop a hypothesis (your informed guess) regarding the outcome of a study dealing with the question;

3) develop a research strategy to investigate the question;

4) determine if the research method your strategy employs is longitudinal, cross-sectional, sequential, experimental, correlational, survey, case study, or naturalistic observation;

5) what are the advantages and disadvantages of the method you chose;

6) identify the independent and dependent variables in your study.

Research Questions:

1) Does family size affect children’s intelligence?

2) Does IQ remain constant form age three to eighteen?

3) What is the relationship between the amount of television viewed by children and their academic achievement?

4) What impact does preschool attendance have on later-life outcomes?

5) What suggestions do 7^th-graders have for easing the transition from elementary to middle school?

6) What differences exist in vocabulary between two-year-olds and five-year-olds?

7) Do college seniors use higher levels of cognitive reasoning than first-year students?

8) Which type of education program is most effective for second-language learners?

9) Do school-wide Youth Frontiers retreats improve school climate by decreasing disciplinary problems, suspensions, and incidents of bullying behavior?

10) Does birth order position affect sexual preference.