Clinical Social Work Research

Hi Everyone

Well, you should all have at least one problem done on the examination by now. And many of you have noticed that question two duplicates question 1. So, do not do question 2. Remember, do not let the test wait for the weekend. Do one question per day. Save Sunday to go over the whole test and make sure you have everything completed and checked. Remember, CITI examination certificates are due this week as well. And, re-read chapter five of the text book. I will be available for questions whenever you need. Feel free to call, email, stop over at the office, make an appointment, whatever.

Take care
Tarynn

Posted by tmwitten at 08:34 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hi Everyone-

We will continue to meet in the Trani Center Room 104 Smart Room. Please read Chapter 5 for the next lecture and focus on completing your CITI examinations. Remember, we are getting very close to deadline. At this point, you should be familiar with all of the following items:

(1) Summation notation : How to read a summation notation, what the symbols mean and how to write them out so that you can actually calculate a summation that you are given.

(2) Distributions and their properties : frequency, probability/fraction, and percentile distributions for both exact and grouped data. How to read a cumulative distribution. Measures of central tendency/clustering for exact and grouped frequency data - mean, median, mode, min/max. You should also be familiar with the concept of range, class, class limits and class boundaries, class width and how to calculate them. You should understand the properties of symmetry and skewness and what they mean, be able to comment on them for a particular distribution, and use them to provide insight into the data.

(3) You should be familiar with different styles of data presentation : Line graph, area graph, frequency plot, dot plot, bar graph, clustered bar graph, pie chart and how to interpret them.

(4) SPSS : You should be able to import an SPSS .sav file and an Excel .xls file. You should be able to enter variable names using the variables tab in the SPSS data file. You should know how to save a file to a given file name. You should know how to export a graph/chart as a JPEG image file and inport it into an MS Word document. You should then know how to align it and resize it appropriately. And, of course, you should know how to save the document. You should know how to use the functions we covered under File, Edit, Graphs and Analysis in SPSS.

(5) Research You should be able to address the basic steps of formulating a research question, hypothesis and alternate hypothesis. You should understand concepts like dependent and independent variable. You should understand the problems of sample size (experimental design), measurement, and ethics in social work research. You should be able to address issues such as feasibility, what is a theory, problems in recruitment, etc. You should understand some of the problems surrounding literature searching.

Have a great week
Tarynn

Posted by tmwitten at 04:07 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hi Everyone -
We will be meeting in the SMART board Room 104 of the Trani Center again this coming week. Now, let's catch up on what we have now covered in Chapters 1-5 of the textbook. In our last lecture we reviewed a number of concepts and introduced a few more. So let's summarize:

(1) We reviewed the idea of a distribution and we introduced the relationship between the count/frequency distribution, the probability/fraction distribution, and the percentile distribution. We also reviewed the cumulative frequency/percent/probability distribution and what it meant.

(2) We reviewed the major properties of a distribution (a) Central Tendency or Clustering, (b) Dispersion or Spread, (c) Skewness or Tailness, (d) Symmetry.

(3) We reviewed summation notation and did a few new types of problem to make sure everyone new how to use the summation notation.

(4) We reviewed measures of clustering/central tendency and how to compute them for frequency data when the data is not grouped: (a) Mean, (b) Median, and (c) Mode.

(5) We reviewed the properties of max, min, and range as well.

(6) We then reviewed all of the previously covered SPSS functions under File, Edit, Graphs, and Analysis. We also reviewed how to import an Excel spreadsheet into SPSS and how to add the Labels to the variable columns.

(7) We covered how to export a graph/chart as a JPEG image file to a MS Word document. We also covered how to make changes in the document once it was pasted into the document. We covered how to align it (left, center, right) and we covered how to resize it.

You should all have been working on the Worksheet 1 problems and be bringing them to class with you. In preparing for the first test, you should know that I will feel very comfortable in asking you to do any of the SPSS, Excel, and MS Word items above. You should also be reviewing all of the Chapter 1-5 material for the examination. Please make sure to ask any questions you might have in the class.

(8) We discussed the status of the IRB Step 1 documents. All individuals should now be reviewing the comments on those documents and making sure that they understand them.

If you have any questions on your IRB Step 1 paper, please make sure to either see me before/after class or make an appointment to go over the material with me right away.

(9) CITI Exam Certififications are due 24 October 2005. Please make sure you complete this asap. I am still missing some CITI certificates.

(10) Everyone should now be reviewing the guidelines for the IRB Step 2 paper. You should be looking over the IRB sample packet handout and beginning to construct your answers to all of the items in the packet. You should also have downloaded blank forms for yourself so that you can begin to fill them out.

Have a great week
Tarynn

Posted by tmwitten at 10:54 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hi Everyone-
Well, we all had a new experience as we began using real mathematics. Hopefully people didn't get too scared about it as we began to see how it is just a foreign language like any other language. Remember, we will be meeting next week in the Trani Life Sciences Building Room 104 classroom again. So please come directly there. WARNING: You have until this Friday at 5pm to hand in your Step 1 paper, if you have not done so.

Let's summarize what we need to take home from today's class.

(1) We went over the idea of a distribution and its properties. We talked about "count" or "frequency" distributions. We discussed how a distribution might arise and why it would be of interest to us. And we mentioned the idea of percentile and probability distributions and why we would wish to use one of them rather than a frequency/count distribution. [Chapter 2]

(2) We talked about three major properties of distributions: (a) Central Tendency or Clustering, (b) Dispersion, and (c) Skewness and we illustrated what these properties meant. [Chapter 4]

(3) We went over "summation notation" and how it works. We realized that summation notation is just a short hand way to tell us to do a particular set of mathematical operations. And we were reassured that this was about as hard as the mathematics was going to get. [Chapter 4]

(4) We talked about measures of clustering/central tendency and then defined the following properties of a variable/distribution: (a) Median and (b) Mean. We also defined the Mode and the Range of a distribution. [Chapter 4]

(5) Using SPSS, we illustrated how sampling variation can make a difference in how we interpret our results and discussed how this might impact the way we go about deciding how to do our sampling for our research projects. [Chapter 1]

(6) We illustrated how to use some of the basics of SPSS. In particular, we examined how to use some of the elements in the File, Edit, Graphics and Analysis elements.

(7) In the File element, we examined: (a) New and the sub-option data, (b) Open and the sub-option data, (c) Save and Save As, (d) Recently Used Data and Files.

(8) In the Edit element, we examined Copy and Paste.

(9) In the Graphs element, we reviewed a number of items: (a) Gallery - which provides information on all of the different options available for graphing data and provides help as well, (b) we used the Bar Graph, Line Graph, Pie Chart and Histogram to illustrate our data. We talked about why one would use one choice over the other and some of the "lies" of illustrating data incorrectly. [Chapters 2, 3]

(10) In the Analysis element, we reviewed how to use the Descriptive Statistics component. And, we examined the frequencies and descriptives sub-options within that component. [Chapters 2, 4]

With this lecture, Chapters 1-4 of the textbook should be beginning to coalesce into a more sensible state for you. We are currently off by one lecture. So please re-read the material in Chapters 1-4 of the book. If you wish to get ahead, read Chapter 5. We will be focusing, next time, on the remainder of Chapter 4 and the beginning of Chapter 5.

Have a great week
Tarynn

Posted by tmwitten at 08:20 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)