Duncan Grant

Little research has been done on the way Business Masters students carry out research for their dissertations. This exploratory study examined the way data is collected and analysed; it reviewed a small sample of dissertations and found them overwhelmingly skewed towards questionnaires (used by 91% of students) with archival (secondary) sources largely ignored. Further examination of the findings showed that almost half (45%) had poorly analysed data from questionnaires exhibiting problems such as ‘voting on the facts’ and ‘crowdsourcing judgements’. By comparison, more experienced researchers showed a much lower dependence on questionnaires. To investigate causes for this, research methods texts were reviewed and generally found to have little focus on secondary data and often to show a negative attitude towards it.
The study concludes that there are issues in the way students gather data and that this can have adverse impacts on quality.

As part of a study skills workshop, first year undergraduate students participated in an active learning exercise on remembering; this involved watching a video and later being tested on how much they could recall. The students watching the video were divided into three groups with different approaches to note-taking and subsequent review; afterwards the test results were fed back to the class. Subsequently, a survey was carried out of the students' approach to note-taking and review, both before and after the workshop.
The results during the classes clearly demonstrated to the students the learning benefits both of taking notes and of subsequently reviewing them and the questionnaire results confirm the students' behaviours in this area were positively impacted by the workshop. The theoretical basis for these results in terms of the impact of note-taking and review on information processing are also discussed. Additionally, a number of barriers to effective note-taking were identified which can be addressed in the future.