Re: Graduate course on SPSS - clarification

[kim.barchard]

Hi Brian,

My intention is to create researchers who use statistics to answer research
questions.  Too often, I see researchers (students and faculty alike), who
use techniques that they have heard of, which are availble in the menu
system, whether or not those techinques answer their research questions.
Most of the people who come to ask me for help with their statistics do not
know what their research question is, and once they have figured that out,
do not know what statistical technique they would use to answer that
research question.  In our statistics and research methods classes, we can
try to teach students how to identify their research questions and how to
find statistical techniques that answer their research questions.  I'm
hoping that we can do a better job of this in the future.  But even so, if
researchers are limited to what's available in the menu system, they may
not be able to answer their research question.  In my own research,
however, I often find that I cannot answer my research questions with the
menu system - or if it was possible, it would be agonizingly slow.  I want
to create researchers who are freed from a dependence on the menu system,
so that they can answer the research question they are most interested in.

Best regards,

Kim



Brian Cooper <[hidden email]> wrote at 01/12/2007 07:16 PM:

Kim,

From personal experience is the purpose of your course to produce better
trained monkeys or persons who are able to take a data set and make sense
of
it, that is able to think with creativity about the data and explain it. I
have seen too many trained moneys get high salaries but have absolutely no
understanding of data or have the capacity to make sense of it, many have
PhD's. They end up often teach statistics.


Brian Cooper (Principal)
Community Planning and Social Mapping

[Art Kendall-2]

Although a large proportion of the people I taught had doctorates, in
short courses we had had a stated goal to help them understand that
research was better done by teams.   A major goal was to teach them how
to use the various resources in such a way that they could communicate
effectively and efficiently with consultants.

I felt we could not give a dozen years experience in a few days of a
short course.

Often it would be important to directly address the cultural assumption
that research was a solo activity and that it might be unethical to talk
to people with more specialization.  I would make the point that the APA
ethics code had an explicit expectation of seeking supervision or
consultation when outside one's area of expertise.  For example, a
clinician  who specialized in dealing with adult alcoholics when
presented with a child with reading difficulty would seek supervision or
consultation with someone with credentials in dealing with such
children.  The conclusion being that if one's primary activity were not
methodology and stat, it was not only more effective and efficient to
consult with someone else, it was ethical.

Art Kendall
Social Research Consultants


[hidden email] wrote:

>Hi Brian,
>
>My intention is to create researchers who use statistics to answer research
>questions.  Too often, I see researchers (students and faculty alike), who
>use techniques that they have heard of, which are availble in the menu
>system, whether or not those techinques answer their research questions.
>Most of the people who come to ask me for help with their statistics do not
>know what their research question is, and once they have figured that out,
>do not know what statistical technique they would use to answer that
>research question.  In our statistics and research methods classes, we can
>try to teach students how to identify their research questions and how to
>find statistical techniques that answer their research questions.  I'm
>hoping that we can do a better job of this in the future.  But even so, if
>researchers are limited to what's available in the menu system, they may
>not be able to answer their research question.  In my own research,
>however, I often find that I cannot answer my research questions with the
>menu system - or if it was possible, it would be agonizingly slow.  I want
>to create researchers who are freed from a dependence on the menu system,
>so that they can answer the research question they are most interested in.
>
>Best regards,
>
>Kim
>
>
>
>Brian Cooper <[hidden email]> wrote at 01/12/2007 07:16 PM:
>
>Kim,
>
>>From personal experience is the purpose of your course to produce better
>trained monkeys or persons who are able to take a data set and make sense
>of
>it, that is able to think with creativity about the data and explain it. I
>have seen too many trained moneys get high salaries but have absolutely no
>understanding of data or have the capacity to make sense of it, many have
>PhD's. They end up often teach statistics.
>
>
>Brian Cooper (Principal)
>Community Planning and Social Mapping
>
>
>
>