Chapter 3: methodology

Research Design

Narrative, according to Squire (2013), Andrews (2013), Tamboukou (2013) is used descriptively
in popular discourse, as it is in academic humanities disciplines, to indicate the line of thematic and
casual progression in a cultural form such as a film or a novel. Like films and novels, a narrative research
design narrates data. In the research written by the authors given, it also stated that narrative can be
exciting, compelling, and insightful, but on the other hand can be over-complex, over-simple, too long,
and too conventional. In addition, it also stated that narrative research does not offer any automatic
starting or finishing points.

Our paper’s research design is narrative since it will only be about the perception of the
participants. The participants will be giving their answers in a narrative way, in short, they will only tell
us their answers through an interview. In a narrative design, the participants would be more free to
answer, although there is a possibility that the answers may be long, it would be much more reliable
since they would be giving more information or data. Narrative is the right fit to our research paper
since through this, we would be able to fully analyze or identify the data we will gather due to answers
given by participants through open ended questions. It may also be possible that we won’t have a
difficult time with analyzing since the data collected through a narrative research design is direct.

Sampling method

For our research paper, we have decided to do the simple random or sometimes known as the
fishbowl method for our sampling method. According to Kenton (2018) simple random is meant to be an
unbiased representation of a group. In simple random, a population has an equal chance for everyone to
be picked as a participant in a study. He also stated that there are a few methods in which researchers
can execute a simple random method. One of which is the lottery method, in this method each
member of the population is assigned a number, after which numbers are selected at random. Bhat
(2018) stated that simple random is a technique wherein every item in the population has an even
chance to be selected. He also stated that it is the main attribute of the method, that every sample has
the same probability of being chosen. He added that the selection of items completely depends on
chance or by probability.

We are applying the simple random method in our research since our research is all about
identifying the perception of the students towards our desired topic which is federalism. We have
chosen the said method since it isn’t biased and is more fitting to the data we hope to achieve. In order
to do this we are going to request the master lists of each section and put all the names in a bowl
specifically for the strand, for example, one bowl for HUMSS, one for STEM, so on and so forth. We will
then pick ten names from each bowl, giving us a total of forty participants.
Data Collection Method

Semi structured interview, according to Martic (2018) are interviews where some questions are
pre determined while there are some that will arise spontaneously in a free flowing conversation.
Morgan (2016) semi structured interviews are characterized by topic guides containing major questions
which are used the same way in every interview. The sequence however can be changed depending on
the interviewer, also the level of probing for information. Keller (2018), Conradin (2018) stated that semi
structured interviews are the most common form of interviewing people. They also stated that it is
conducted with a fairly framework which results to a focused, conversational, two-way communication.

With our research design, it is only fitting we do interviews, specifically semi structured
interviews. Through this method, we would be able to achieve a much trustful and reliable data. With
this kind of interviews the respondents would give off data or answers more freely and we interviewers
can insert some questions that are not in the interview schedule. When the participants are selected,
we would ask questions from our interview schedule and even ask questions spontaneously as if
initiating a normal conversation.

Research Instrument

Research instrument or interview schedule is a list containing questions according to Martin

(2016). These questions are structured and have prepared, it would serve as a guide for the
interviewers. According to Farooq (2013) it is a set of questions to guide the observer interviewer, it is a
plan or a guideline for investigation. Farooq also mentioned that according to Thomas Carson, the
schedule is nothing but a list of questions necessary to test the hypothesis.

Interview Schedule

What academic strand are you a part of?

What is federalism?

What is the concept of federalism?

What are the advantages of a federal government?

What are the disadvantages of a federal government?

What is the difference of federalism and our current government system?