HSTM 4445 Research Project PURPOSE: The purpose of this assignment is to have you put together a research proposal for Sport and Fitness Management-related topic, bringing in much of what you have learned through the class in regards to research design and implementation. INSTRUCTIONS: You are to follow the outline below for putting together a research proposal. This must be typed into a Word document with 12-point, Times New Roman font and double-spaced throughout. You must follow correct APA 6th edition formatting and citation; a failure to do so will severely impact your grade. OUTLINE/STEPS: 1. PRELIMINARY LITERATURE REVIEW. a. You need to determine if the topic you have in mind is researchable. Doing a preliminary literature search will save you time in the long run. Based on your research interest, type up the following: i. Use the Troy Libraries’ databases to search for article content for your research topic of interest; you will need to have at least 8 peer-reviewed sources (i.e., journal articles) for your project, so make sure there is enough published research to complete your project. ii. State your study objective. Why is your study necessary and important? iii. State your potential research hypotheses. iv. Identify the variables (in particular, independent and dependent variables) that you will measure to complete the study. v. List a potential group (sample or population) of participants for the study. vi. List at least 3 keywords or short phrases that could be used in searching for literature that relates to your topic. 2. IDENTIFY THE PROBLEM OR QUESTION. a. Assuming that you have done a preliminary search, have sufficient literature, and have identified the research gap, identify the problem or question your research proposal aims to answer/investigate. 3. DEFINE THE PROBLEM OR QUESTION. a. Describe the problem with specificity. Why is this important? What value to either academicians or practitioners will this study have? 4. EXPLORE FOR ANSWERS. a. Ensure that your proposed research problem/question has not been addressed by other scholars already. If it has been investigated, discuss why more research is needed. 5. LITERATURE REVIEW a. Using the keywords identified in Step 1 as well as your preliminary literature results, use the Troy Libraries’ databases to conduct an extensive literature review on your topic of interest. This will take a lot of time. Once you have found articles on point, look to the articles cited in them; this will lead you to more articles. You must identify at least 8 peer-reviewed articles on your topic of interest. Newspaper and magazine articles do not count to this total. i. YOU CANNOT USE GOOGLE TO DO YOUR RESEARCH, SO DO NOT BOTHER! YOU MUST USE THE TROY LIBRARIES! ii. Aside from your peer-reviewed sources, you can (and should) use additional sources, such as newspaper articles and magazine articles. iii. Steer clear from websites as sources (i.e. Bleacher Report); they hold little to no academic value. iv. You do not necessarily need to stick to the journals listed in the article assignments, but they would be a good start. v. It is in your best interest to line up your Article Reviews with this research project, since you need to read through these articles anyways for your project. 6. DEFINE OBJECTIVES. a. State your research study hypothesis or hypotheses. i. These should tie directly back to your Research Question/Problem. b. Clearly identify the variables of your study: i. Independent variable(s) ii. Dependent variable(s) iii. Extraneous variable(s) 7. DETERMINE RESEARCH DESIGN. a. You will need to think carefully about this. Review the numerous research methods/designs we have examined this term in this course. Your Research Question/Problem should dictate the method(s) you choose. Make sure to identify, in detail, the design you plan on using (e.g., focus group, structured interviews, mail survey, observation, etc.). You should consider using a number of these in conjunction for your study. This needs to be detailed. b. If you plan on using a survey instrument, you need to identify how the survey will be developed. If using an already developed survey, make sure to identify it. c. You need to address the issues of internal and external validity outlined in Chapter 10. Which of these would apply to your study? How do you plan on addressing them? 8. DETERMINE DATA COLLECTION PROCEDURES. a. Discuss in detail your plans for collecting data for your research project. Make sure to address the following: i. Identify the population of interest. ii. Identify your sampling techniques. iii. Identify the protocol for collecting data (e.g., mail survey, observation, interviews, etc.). 9. DETERMINE DATA ANALYSIS PROCEDURES. a. Identify the data analysis procedures(i.e., statistical analysis) you plan on using in your research project (e.g., t-test, ANOVA, etc.). 10. TIMELINE a. Include a brief timeline for the research project. 11. REFERENCES a. You must include a reference list for sources used in this project. It must conform to APA 6th edition formatting. If you are not familiar with this formatting, you need to either purchase an APA manual (Amazon is a good, cheap place), check out a manual from a library, or use a variety of online resources dedicated to APA formatting: i. http://www.apastyle.org/ (look at the Tutorials here) ii. http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/560/01/ iii. http://www.vanguard.edu/faculty/ddegelman/index.aspx?doc_id=796 iv. http://www.liu.edu/CWIS/CWP/library/workshop/citapa.htm b. The formatting must be throughout the paper, including References. You will lose points for failing to use proper APA formatting. [Firstname Lastname] HSTM 4445 – T2 – 2013 [Date] [Research Project Title] [Note: Everything in brackets should be replaced, and you should delete all of the brackets] PRELIMINARY LITERATURE REVIEW [Text] IDENTIFY RESEARCH PROBLEM/QUESTION [Text] DEFINE RESEARCH PROBLEM/QUESTION [Text] EXPLORE FOR ANSWERS [Text] LITERATURE REVIEW [Text] RESEARCH OBJECTIVES [Text] RESEARCH DESIGN [Text] DATA COLLECTION PROCEDURES [Text] DATA ANALYSIS PROCEDURES [Text] TIMELINE [Text] REFERENCES [Text] 
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