UNIVERSITY OF SARGODHA

NOON BUSINESS SCHOOL

COURSE OUTLINE

Course Title: Research Methods in Business

Credit Hours:03

Instructor: Shahzad Hassan

Email: shahzad.hassan@uos.edu.pk

DESCRIPTION AND OBJECTIVES

This course provides beginning B.com students an overview of research, various research techniques
and methodologies used to carry out academic and applied research. The course is designed to
provide a broad exposure to its numerous literatures, an understanding of its central concepts, and
the opportunity to develop ideas for how you might contribute to this field. I will pursue these goals
by examining a mix of theoretical and empirical research, thinking critically about their strengths and
limitations, and creating a forum for you to test your own conceptual and empirical ideas.
Research methods are a range of tools that are used for different types of enquiry, just as a
variety of tools are used for doing different practical jobs. It is necessary to know what the
correct tools are for doing the job, and how to use them to best effect. This course provides
students with the basic information about the tools used in research, the situations in which they
are applied and indicates briefly how they are used by giving practical examples.
Following are main objectives of the course of research
 To explain why research in the organizational behavior and management areas is
essential
 To dentify the steps in the research process.
 To Identify problem areas that are likely to be studied in organizations.
 To state research problems clearly and precisely.
 To develop relevant and comprehensive bibliographies for any organizational research
topic.
 To write a literature review on any given topic, documenting the references in the
prescribed manner.
 To trace and establish the links among the variables and evolve a theoretical framework.
 To understand the different aspects relevant to designing a research study.
 Identify the scope of any given study and the end use of the results.
 Decide for any given situation the type of investigation needed, the study setting, the
extent of researcher interference, the unit of analysis, and the time horizon of the study.
 To know how and when to use the different forms of rating scales and ranking scales.
 To identify the use of appropriate sampling designs for different research purposes.
 To create a data file.
 Use SPSS or Excel or other software program for data entry and data analysis.
INTENDED LEARNING OUTCOMES
After the completion of course students will be able to enhance the understanding of various
elements of Business Research, applicability of research methods, and the use of data analysis
tools in real business world settings.

COURSE CONTENTS

Introduction to research
The excitement of research and why managers should know about research, types of business
research, managers and research.
Scientific investigation
The hallmarks of scientific research, purposiveness, rigor, testability, replicability, precision and
confidence, objectivity, generalizability and parsimony. The building blocks of science in
research, deduction and induction, the hypothetico-deductive method.
The research process
The research process for applied and basic research , broad problem area, preliminary data
collection, nature of data to be gathered, theoretical framework, the components of the
theoretical framework. Hypotheses development, definition of hypothesis, statement of
hypotheses, directional and non-directional hypotheses, null and alternate hypotheses.
Elements of research design
The research design, purpose of the study: exploratory, descriptive, hypothesis testing (analytical
and predictive). Types of investigation: causal versus correlational, extent of researcher
interference with the study. Study setting: contrived and non-contrived, unit of analysis:
individuals, dyads, groups, organizations.
Experimental designs
Lab experiment, control, manipulation of the independent variables, internal validity, external
validity or generalizability of lab experiments. Trade-off between internal and external validity.
Factors affecting internal validity. History effects, maturation effects, testing effect.
Scale, Likert scale, semantic differential scale, numerical scale, itemized rating scale, fixed or
constant sum scale, Other Scales, Ranking Scales. Goodness of measures, item analysis,
reliability, stability of measures, internal consistency of measures.
Sampling
Population element, population frame, sample, and subject, population, element, population
frame, sample, subject sampling , reasons for sampling, representativeness of samples,
normality of distributions, probability and nonprobability sampling, probability sampling,
unrestricted or simple random sampling, restricted or complex probability sampling,
nonprobability sampling, convenience sampling, purposive sampling, examples of when certain
sampling designs are appropriate. Sampling in cross-cultural research, Issues of precision and
confidence in determining sample
Data analysis
Analysing data by using softwares like SPSS, Mendeley, Amos etc.
Research report

COURSE SCHEDULE

Week Topics and Readings Books with Page No.

1 The excitement of research and why managers should Uma Sekaran, p 1

 know about research, types of business research, Ranjeet Kumar, p 1
managers and research.

2 The hallmarks of scientific research, purposiveness, rigor, Uma Sekaran, p 19-22

testability, replicability, precision and confidence, Ranjeet kumar, p 10
objectivity, generalizability and parsimony. The building
blocks of science in research, deduction and induction, the
hypothetico-deductive method

3 Types of research Uma Sekaran, p 5

Ranjeet kumar, p 11
4 Data collection, procedure, process Uma Sekaran, p 112, 210
Concepts of validity and reliability Ranjeet Kumar, 211
5 Data collection methods Uma Sekaran, p 112
Ranjeet Kumar, p 192
6 Sampling: Probability and nonprobability sampling, Uma Sekaran, p 239
probability sampling, unrestricted or simple random Ranjeet Kumar, p 225
sampling, restricted or complex probability sampling,
nonprobability sampling, convenience sampling,
purposive sampling, examples of when certain sampling
designs are appropriate. Sampling in cross-cultural
research, Issues of precision and confidence in
determining sample

7 Data analysis, introduction Uma Sekaran, 274

Ranjeet Kumar, p 311
8 Mid Term
9 Guest speaker, data analysis
10 Introduction to SPSS, measurement of central tendency, Uma Sekaran, p 302
hypothesis testing. Ranjeet Kumar, p 264
11 Hypothesis tesing, linear correlation, regression, factor Uma Sekaran, p 302
analysis Ranjeet Kumar, p 264
12 Data analysis/ cluster analysis, multivariate analysis, Uma Sekaran
ANOVA

13 Research project, research proposal Uma Sekaran, 354

14 Research Report and writing, Reseach team and profile Ranjeet Kumar, p 353

15 Final research paper presentations

16 Final research paper presentations
 RESEARCH PROJECT
Individual or group research projects (major assignments); each individual is required to
complete a project. Feel free to choose a topic or area which covers some aspects of total
quality management, Business management, Marketing, Accounting and Finance. Kindly be
creative to choose an area of research or topic that relates to business.

An appropriate literature review is expected from each student individually. As you are
supposed to have learnt subjects of research methods, quantitative techniques, inferential
statistics, the methodology used by each student should demonstrate variety of techniques,
i.e. interviewing, questionnaires, focus groups etc.

ASSESSMENT CRITERIA
Midterm: 30
Sessional: 20
Project:(5)
Presentation: (5)
Quiz and assignment: (10)
Final exam:50