Research Design and Methods

Research Design and Methods: An Applied Guide for the Scholar-Practitioner by Gary J. Burkholder, Kimberley A. Cox, Linda M. Crawford, and John H. Hitchcock, is written for students seeking advanced degrees who want to use evidence-based research to support their practice. This practical and accessible text addresses the foundational concepts of research design and methods; provides a more detailed exploration of designs and approaches popular with graduate students in applied disciplines; covers qualitative, quantitative, and mixed-methods designs; discusses ethical considerations and quality in research; and provides guidance on writing a research proposal.

Gary J. Burkholder is senior research scholar and senior contributing faculty at Walden University. He graduated from the University of Rhode Island with a PhD in experimental psychology and his MA and BA degrees in psychology; he also earned a Bachelor of Science in engineering degree from the University of Washington. Gary has been on the faculty at Walden University, a distance education institution focused primarily on graduate, scholar-practitioner students, since 2001. He has served in several senior academic and business administration roles at Walden University and other institutions including program director, director of online studies, assistant dean, dean, college vice president, and vice president for academic affairs. In his faculty role, Gary has mentored over 90 doctoral dissertation students in the social and behavioral and the health sciences. His research focus spans qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods including multivariable statistical analysis and instrument development. Gary has conducted research in topics that intersect psychology and public health, including those involving exercise and diet behavior change and adherence; predictors of substance use, sex risk, and HIV risk among youth and adults. More recently, Gary’s research interests have involved retention and persistence in tertiary education as well as online pedagogy. He has served as author on approximately 70 peer-reviewed publications and collaborated in over 70 conference presentations; several publications and presentations have involved his doctoral students.  He is active in the American Public Health Association, serves as a peer reviewer with the Higher Learning Commission regional accreditation body, and serves as a reviewer for several professional journals in education, psychology, and public health.

Linda M. Crawford, professor emerita at Walden University, received her doctoral degree from the University of Minnesota with emphases in curriculum and educational administration. In her most recent position as director of academic quality and accreditation for Laureate Education, she conducted quality assurance reviews, both domestically and internationally, at institutional, program, certificate, course, and service levels, including reviews for schools in Saudi Arabia, Ecuador, and Switzerland. She also advised institutions extensively on the faculty perspective related to academic initiatives, including development of new faculty orientation programs, faculty governance, and faculty models. Prior to her work in quality assurance, Linda held both teaching and administrative positions at all levels of education, including P-12, undergraduate, and graduate education. While serving as an assistant superintendent for a large, metropolitan area school district, Linda provided direction for research, evaluation, and assessment; P-12 curriculum and instruction; special education; instructional media and technology; state and federal programs, including desegregation, family service cooperatives, and all federal Title programs; policy development and maintenance; and community education. She also initiated online learning within the P-12 environment with a focus on serving homebound students or students otherwise missing school attendance and on providing low enrollment courses across districts. Involved in online education for two decades, Linda developed and taught courses for multiple universities in the areas of research, measurement and evaluation, curriculum theory and design, instructional practice, and educational law. She has published and presented locally, regionally, and nationally on topics of research, curriculum, educational philosophy, administration, and mentoring doctoral students. Her current research centers on mentoring graduate students and building a sense of community among students in the online environment. Linda is a two time recipient of the Walden University Bernard L. Turner Award for excellence in mentoring dissertation students and has also received the Walden University Richard W. Riley College of Education and Leadership Extraordinary Faculty Award. 

Kimberley A. Cox earned her PhD in social psychology from Claremont Graduate University and her master’s degree in psychology from Pepperdine University. She received her undergraduate education at the University of California, Irvine where she earned a bachelor’s degree in psychology and a bachelor’s degree in criminology, law, and society. For the past 10 years, Kimberley has been a faculty member at Walden University where her work is dedicated to teaching and mentoring future scholar-practitioners. During this time, she has mentored 45 doctoral students to dissertation completion. Kimberley is a past recipient of Walden University’s Bernard L. Turner award for excellence in mentoring dissertation students and the Presidential Research Fellowship in Distance Education. She currently teaches doctoral-level courses in research design and methods and applied social psychology. Kimberley has served as a subject matter expert in the design of several online courses in subject areas such as research design and methods, social psychology, and instructional design. Most recently, her academic interests include the application of social psychology principles and theories to social problems and environmental issues with a focus on topics that intersect social psychology, health, and the environment. Prior to her teaching career in higher education, Kimberley held various academic and applied research positions, including as a research associate in the Department of Psychiatry and Human Behavior in the College of Medicine at the University of California, Irvine, as a research associate at the Rand Corporation, and as a doctoral research fellow at the NASA Ames Research Center.

John H. Hitchcock, Ph.D. (University at Albany, State University of New York, 2003, Educational Psychology) is an associate professor of Instructional Systems Technology within Indiana University’s School of Education, Bloomington, Indiana, USA. He is also the Director of the Center for Evaluation & Education Policy. Dr. Hitchcock’s research focus is on the use of mixed methods and other types of designs to evaluate interventions and policies that focus on helping students with specialized learning needs. He has served as a principal investigator, methodological lead and content expert for the What Works Clearinghouse (WWC) at the Institute of Education Sciences (IES) at the U.S. Department of Education, to complete a systematic review of interventions designed for children with emotional-behavioral disorders. He also served on a panel that drafted standards for assessing the causal-validity of Single-Case Design studies for the WWC. Dr. Hitchcock has served as a co-principal investigator of two large scale randomized controlled trials to assess the impact of reading and math curricula. He has contributed to efforts to develop programs that promote psychological well-being in Sri Lanka since 1998, and he is currently an Associate Editor for School Psychology Review.