5.3 Research Design Essay

5.3 Research design
Research design can be considered as the plan of a research that sheds light on how the study is to be conducted. It illustrates how main areas of the research study– the population samples, measures, analysis, etc– attempt to address the research questions. It is similar to an architectural outline. Burns and Grove (2003) define a research design as “a blueprint for conducting a study with maximum control over factors that may interfere with the validity of the findings”. Yin (2009), describes research design as “the logical sequence that connects the empirical data to a study’s initial research question and ultimately, to its conclusions”. Parahoo (1997) describes a research design as “a plan that describes how, when
The limitations are identified as follows: firstly, there is risk that the data to be used may not be completely relevant for any other research apart from its originally intended purpose. Secondly, the data may not be relevant in answering the researcher’s questions because it is too old. Thirdly, the original sources used to come up with the secondary data may be difficult to find when trying to check for accuracy. And finally, some bias maybe introduced in the research if different secondary data is combined. In order to manage these limitations, the researcher will allocate ample time to searching for books, reports, peer reviewed journals and other references that will be most appropriate in providing accurate information that will help answer the research questions. The researcher will also be time conscious when selecting the
Content analysis is a research technique in which both content and context of documents are analysed (Ritchie and Lewis, 2003), it replicates and validates inferences from texts to the context of their use (Salkind, 2010). Researchers are motivated to use content analysis because the answers to the research questions cannot be found by direct observation instead they are inferred from available texts (Salkind, 2010). Books, reports and peer reviewed journals and other references which address the topic of sustainability, financial analysis, sustainability indicators and financial analysis indicators will be considered as materials for establishing a comprehensive theoretical model for this