This book is concerned with both how to conduct research and how to write a thesis or a dissertation. Graduate students, I have found,face difficulties not only in actual research but also in writing up theirtheses/dissertations. This book addresses questions that have actuallybeen experienced by myself and my students. For example. How can Iselect a suitable topic? Which research design should I employ? What isthe best time for me to collect data and in which way? Should I analyze the data quantitatively or qualitatively? What is the difference betweenreporting a result and discussing a result? What should be covered by aliterature review?

"Give a man a fish and he eats for a day. Teach him how to fish and heeats for a lifetime. "

Doing research is a mystery to many graduate students and secondlanguage teachers in China. This book aims to demystify the process ofcarrying out research in the field of applied linguistics, particularly inthe area of second language acquisition and teaching. This book iswritten for those who have no previous research experience at all orthose who have done some research without formal training. It isparticularly useful for graduate students of applied linguistics, secondlanguage teachers and teacher-trainers.

Preface

Part I Introduction

1. What is research?

 Definition of research

 Visualizing the research process

 Classifications of research

 Summary

 Discussion questions

2. Fundamental concepts

 Hypothesis, theory and model

 Population and sample

 Variables

 Levels of measurement

 Operationalization

 Summary

 Discussion questions

Part II Researching

3. Developing research questions

 Procedures

 Problems in question formation

 Summary

 Discussion questions

4. Reading the literature

 Sources of literature

 Procedures for reviewing the literature

 Deciding the scope

 Summarizing the information

 Summary

 Discussion questions

5. Selecting research designs

 Quantitative and qualitative

 Links between question and design

 A mono-design or a mixed design?

 Complexities in classifying designs

 Summary

 Discussion questions

6. A survey study

 A brief description

 Instrument designing, questionnaire

 Scaling techniques

 Selecting subjects

 Administering the questionnaire

 Summary

 Discussion questions

7. An experimental study

 What is an experimental study?

 Causality

 Validity in experimentation

 Types of experimental studies

 Procedures for an experimental study

 Summary

 Discussion questions

8. A ease study

 What is a case study?

 Selecting the subjects

 Collecting data

 Summary

 Discussion questions

9. Basic statistics

 A brief description of statistics

 Descriptive statistics

 Inferential statistics

 Summary

 Discussion questions

10. The analysis of quantitative data

 Overview of SPSS for windows

 Questionnaire data analysis

 Analyzing data from an experiment

 Summary

 Discussion questions

11. The analysis of qualitative data

 Choices in analyzing qualitative data

 Data preparation

 Qualitative analysis

 Validity and reliability

 Summary

 Discussion questions

Part III Thesis Writing

12. An overview of thesis writing

 Definitions

 The structure of a thesis

 Summary

 Discussion questions

13. Writing up a thesis/dissertation

 Writing an introduction

 Writing a literature review

 Describing methodology

 Reporting results and discussion

 Writing the conclusion chapter

 Summary

 Discussion questions

14. Writing style

 Academic writing style

 APA writing format

 Summary

 Discussion questions

 References

 Appendixes

 Appendix one：A Survey Study

 Appendix two：An Experimental Study.

 Appendix three: A Case Study

 Appendix four: Questionnaire Description

 Appendix five: Random Numbers

Subject index

Author index