Applied Population Research Methods

Learning Outcomes

Learning Outcomes

Having successfully completed this module you will be able to:

• Appropriately access and extract national and international population and demographic data from a wide variety of sources.
• Reflect upon the experience of fieldwork and recognise the impact of the process on the data collected
• Gain an appreciation of the influence of socio-economic and cultural context on the collection of data and its interpretation
• Identify and use appropriate statistical and analytical techniques and measures to adequately answer a research question
• Understand the benefits and drawback of data collection methods such as questionnaires and interviews.
• Design a research project that will address a set of well-defined research questions or hypotheses.
• Review work on population and demography as part of a literature review process.
• Demonstrate awareness of the ethical and practical issues which need to be taken into account when collecting data in the field
• Develop a suitable research question to be answered from a given set of data

Research questions; types of research project; primary and secondary data; qualitative and quantitative data; questionnaire and interviews; surveys; ethical issues in research; secondary data analysis; management and analysis of survey data; experience of data collection.

Teaching and learning methods

The module will consist of lecture/video sessions and web-assisted computer workshops given either face-to-face at the University of Southampton or on-line. During the field visits there will be further lectures, demonstrations and tutorials.

Learning activities will include learning from lectures, learning computer skills during workshops, presenting and discussing issues during the field visits, and learning about how to write an effective research report.

Resources & Reading list

Textbooks

Bryman, Alan (2012). Social research methods. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Field, A. (2013). Discovering Statistics Using SPSS. London: Sage.

David Silverman (2013). Doing Qualitative Research. Sage.

Assessment strategy

The assessment will be in the form of a written report and/or an oral presentation. There will be no formal examination.

Summative

This is how we’ll formally assess what you have learned in this module.

Referral

This is how we’ll assess you if you don’t meet the criteria to pass this module.

Repeat

An internal repeat is where you take all of your modules again, including any you passed. An external repeat is where you only re-take the modules you failed.

Repeat Information

Repeat type: Internal & External