Hopefully, you have had a chance to watch the latest quantitative webinar on an overview of  SPSS that was posted last week.

This week, I want to focus on the importance of identifying the input, and especially the output, of any survey instrument used in a dissertation. I have recently read many dissertations that attempt to quantify one survey's output with another's. For example, one survey may ask how many miles an athlete ran in a week, and another may ask how many liters of water were consumed. A correlational analysis can then be created between one behavior (drinking water - the dependent variable) and the other (running - the independent variable). In this way it's very clear to all readers what will be answered, and how it will be answered. Although this is a very simplified example, it is often the case the most studies can be reduced to one input (running distance) and one output (consuming water in this case). Most importantly, be sure that you are actually familiar with the survey instruments before you start your dissertation research! In fact, try a test case in SPSS or some other statistical software. This will help you walk through all the steps with "made up" data - and this process will help you to write a stronger dissertation in regard to its clarity and the hypothesis tests! Happy writing.

Dr. Daniel J. Smith, MA, MBA, PhD

480-861-8851 (cell)

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