IRB Application: q. 1-11

 

The IRB application is available on the IRB website. It is a scary document for many students, with questions that may not seem clear. We are going to spend some time examining each of the questions and see if we can clear it up some for you. All studies require an application, which is submitted after the proposal defense. You may not collect any data until you have IRB approval. Let's work our way through q. 1-11 today.

q. 1 is your name

q. 2 is your student ID

q. 3 – you must submit a certificate showing you have completed Human Research Protection training. This question on the application provides some web sites. I suggest that you do the NIH training. Check the box when you have completed it and save the certificate.

q. 4 is your email address

q. 5 list your committee chair

q. 6 list your chair's email address

q. 7 is your program affiliation (be specific, e.g., health psych, social psych)

q. 8 is the title of your dissertation

q. 9 is the type of study you are doing

q. 10 indicate the type of research method(s) you will be using 

q. 11 is the first tough question- you need to list your research questions, what instruments you will use, what data will be collected, who provides the data, and your data analysis. The IRB will be looking for an alignment for these. It may be easiest to understand with some examples. Here are some from a mixed methods study on students' views of the dissertation process. 

Research Question List each research question (RQ) in a separate row below.	Data Collection Tools List which instrument(s) are used to collect the data that will address each RQ.	Datapoints Yielded List which specific questions/variables/scales of the instrument will address each RQ.	Data Source List which persons/artifacts/records will provide the data.	Data Analysis Briefly describe the specific statistical or qualitative analyses that will address each RQ.
RQ 1: (quant) Do students feel academically prepared for dissertation?	q. 17-21	How prepared academically were you for (Content, research method, understanding the dissertation process)	Psychology dissertation students	Correlation /regression with other variables
RQ 2: (quant) How satisfied are students with the current dissertation process?	q. 22-27	Rate your dissertation experience with (each step) How satisfied are you with your dissertation progress?	Psychology dissertation students	Correlation /regression with other variables
RQ3: (qual) What expectations did students have about the dissertation before they enrolled in the dissertation class?	Student interview questions	Questions 1-4	Psychology dissertation students	Coded, themes assessed
RQ4: (qual) What were the expectations of students for the dissertation classroom?	Student interview questions	Questions 5-7	Psychology dissertation students	Coded, themes assessed

 Next time we will continue examining the IRB application, with q. 12. Do you have an issue or a question that you would like me to discuss in a future post? Would you like to be a guest writer? Send me your ideas! leann.stadtlander@waldenu.edu