Qualitative Methods
PBAF 599/SOC 590
Fall 2006
Guidelines for Proposal Write-up
Due December 15 at noon
The following provides you guidance on the format, length, and content of your proposal.
This assumes that you will be presenting a proposal that provides a substantive
motivation, but is primarily focused upon the methodology for the proposed research.
This means that the heart of your paper should present a justification and description that
answers the following questions, not necessarily in this order:
1. What is the substantive reason for why a qualitative study is necessary for
answering your research question or understanding your topic? (Chapter 8 in
Lofland provides some heuristic guidelines for this)
2. What is your proposed and justified study design, sampling approach, field work
plan?
3. What will be the content (instrumentation, questions, points of observation)
approach to getting an answer to your research question? (consider the heuristic
outline suggested in Chapter 7 in Lofland)
4. What have been the results of any pilot work you have completed? Describe the
pilot work, the results of the pilot work, and how it affects the answers to
questions 1-3.
You should be able to answer these four questions by following the format proposed on
the next page (your document should be double-spaced, 12 pt. font, 1 inch margins, and
include title on first page, your name, date).
Suggested Proposal Outline
A. Introduction (1-2 pages)
a. Answer these questions in this section: What is your research question,
why is it important, how will you answer your question (methodology),
why do we need this type of study at this time? This can be done by doing
the following, not necessarily in this order:
i. State the problem
ii. State the research question
iii. Provide an empirical motivation or justification
iv. Provide a policy motivation
v. Provide a methodological motivation
b. Provide a brief roadmap for how the paper will proceed from this point
B. Background Literature Review (this is an elaboration of a.iii-v above) (5
pages)
a. Restate the research question and problem with some elaboration
i. What are the policy or bigger picture reasons for why we should
care about this topic?
b. What do we already know about this topic?
i. At what stage of intellectual development is the research on your
topic? Is it a new field, an old one, but with persistent puzzles?
ii. What are the key facts and do any of them suggest puzzles?
iii. What are the outcomes that have been studied? And, what do we
know empirically?
iv. What are the explanations that have been studied? Does the
evidence support the explanations? Are there contradictory
findings?
c. How have people studied this topic?
i. What kinds of methods have been used?
ii. What kinds of samples? Representativeness?
iii. How might the methodological approaches have limited
conclusions, contributed to contradictory findings on inconclusive
findings?
d. Based on the review in a-c – how would you summarize what is needed
next in a study? (Hint: a-c should be used to set the stage for why your
study is needed and in this section you summarize that argument and
logic)
C. Methodology (this is the heart of your paper and should follow natural from
the argument you’ve made in section B (above)) (10 pages)
a. Overall justification for your qualitative methodological approach: What is
the substantive reason for why a qualitative study is necessary for
answering your research question? (this should be an elaboration of the
preceding paragraph)
b. Field work plan and justification
i. Study design
ii. Sample (who and how will you find them, gain entrée, grow your
sample?)
c. What will be the content (instrumentation, questions, points of
observation) approach to getting an answer to your research question?
(consider the heuristic outline suggested in Chapter 7 in Lofland)
i. What is your unit – why this unit?
ii. What is the aspect(s) – why?
iii. Exactly how will you elicit your data? (through a questionnaire? If
so, which questions? Through a guided interview form? If so,
what are the guiding topics? Observation? What elements will you
observe and pay particular attention?
D. Preliminary Results (2-5 pages)
a. Describe any field work you’ve done to date
b. Summarize the findings, observations
c. Reflect on what you’ve learned from the field work that might change
your approach or focus more specifically your approach
E. Conclusions (2 pages)
a. Restate your research question or topic and why it’s important to study
b. Summarize the current state of the knowledge in the literature/research on
this topic
c. Restate the case (in brief) for your qualitative study on this topic
d. Provide a time line for your study, including details on the field work
F. References
Use the citation guidelines provided.
G. Appendices
a. Lists of organizations or places for developing your sampling frame
b. Questionnaires – Topic Guidelines
c. Your field notes