Biomedical subjects
Publications and source records attributed to M Giuffre.
This manuscript presents some of the basic concepts of science and scientific reasoning. Whether you are reading research or planning to do a Master's thesis, understanding these concepts will be important. How theories differ from beliefs and their ultimate practicality are discussed.
It is often the assignment of the perianesthesia nurse to critique a research article to evaluate a suggested procedure or instrument for implementation the patient care area. Although details of what should appear in each section of the research article have appeared in past reports in this series, this article will present an outline for critiquing the entire research manuscript.
Explore the source record for details and available documents.
Surveys are essential for discovering the incidence, distribution, and interrelationship of variables within a population. As such, it is important that we are able to critically read published surveys. This manuscript is the first of two dealing with survey research. Sampling and external validity are covered in this manuscript.
The readers of this journal are frequently confronted with statistical analysis that includes analysis of variance (ANOVA) and multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA). This article discusses what the authors are really telling you when they use these techniques.
The research design is the overall plan or structure of the study. The goal of a good research design is to insure internal validity and answer the question being asked. The only clear rule in selecting a design is that the question dictates the design. Over the next few issues this column will cover types of research designs and their inherent strengths and weaknesses. This article discusses ex post facto research.
Surveys are essential for discovering the incidence, distribution, and inter-relationship of variables within a population. As such, it is important that we are able to critically read published surveys. This manuscript is the second of two dealing with survey research. This manuscript deals with the advantages and disadvantages of different types of surveys and what the reader should be looking for when reading survey research.
This manuscript presents the beginning portions of a research project as well as a critique of the design and methods. Although it is not a complete proposal, this article may given those readers who are thinking of doing research some idea of how easy it is to make fatal flaws in the design of a project. Suggestions for how a research novice might avoid these classic mistakes are made.
The American public is being overwhelmed with scientific sounding claims for products to be ingested and/or applied to the body that have no research support. To protect ourselves and our patients from potential harm or unnecessarily wasting their resources, we need to be aware of the problem. In addition we need to apply the standards we have learned for critiquing research to the claims made by the purveyors of these products.
This article presents issues to be considered when planning to conduct research, specifically ways to avoid critical errors in writing the research proposal. It concludes with an outline for writing research proposals.
Multiple regression is an analysis tool used much more frequently than bivariate regression analysis in the research we are reading. This article is designed to help the reader understand multiple regression analysis and confidence intervals.
The goal of research is to discover new knowledge to improve patient care. Research is essential because of its ability to establish causal relationships. This article discusses the minimum requirements a research report must meet to establish a causal relationship.
The discussion section of a research manuscript is the last thing we read and often the section that leaves the most lasting impression. It is important to know what to reasonably expect to be in the discussion section. This article presents the areas that are usually covered. Over-interpretation of the results of a research project occurs all too often. This article will help you avoid being taken in by this problem.
The article explains what to look for when an investigator compares data from two distinct groups. The most common statistical methods of doing these evaluations are the chi-square test and the t test. Both tests are explained.
Statistical tests you have heard of, designed primarily to characterize relationships between and among variables within a data set, are correlations and regressions. Tests designed to analyze the difference among groups on a particular variable are the chi-squared test, the Student's t Test, and the analysis of variance. This article will explain the interpretation of simple relationships in research data, specifically correlations.
Meaningful measurement of events in a research study depends on the use of valid and reliable measurement tools. This article discusses the nature of validity, types of validity, and how researchers demonstrate the validity of their instruments to the reader.
Accurate measurement of research variables is necessary so that research consumers can trust that it is the research intervention that affected the change in the outcome variable, not some extraneous error component. Reliability is the accuracy with which the research instruments measure the variable that they are designed to measure. A number of known threats to instrument reliability should be anticipated by the researcher and looked for the consumer. These threats are presented in this article.
Nurses in PACUS as well as other areas of nursing are increasingly being asked to incorporate research into their clinical practices. Unfortunately, many nurses have limited formal education in research and are not adequately prepared to critically analyze the quality of the research they are reading. This is especially true when it comes to the statistical analysis section of the published research report. This article lays the foundation for understanding the statistical analysis most commonly seen in results sections of research publications in nursing journals.