Reference no: EM133986458

ASSESSMENT ITEM 1: This individual assignment will be delivered in two parts. In Part A, you will be required to first select a research topic aligning with your chosen specialisation in the course and then develop a research question after initial literature review. In Part B, you will develop a full research proposal.

ASSESSMENT ITEM 2: This individual assessment will have multiple deliverables. You will be required to write a mock research paper and a self-reflective journal in the report. The research paper will include an abstract, literature review and a brief description of methodology that you have proposed to adopt in your research topic.

ASSESSMENT ITEM 3: In this individual assessment, you will be required to give a 10-minute presentation to fellow class members as well as a panel of academics. There is no physical submission, you will be solely graded on your presentation and ability to answer questions from the panel.

Introduction
Students will need to consider a research problem in Information Technology or Information Systems. The problem could arise from many different fields, for example, medical, business, science, engineering, hospitality, banking etc. ... The selection of the research problem will need to take place early, in session 1 or 2 as the first deliverable is in session 3. This is necessary given the nature of the subject. All the remaining work throughout the semester will stem from the basic research problem. The idea is that this Unit of Study will mimic the research process and provide you with the understanding and tools to undertake future research. In the first session, we will extensively discuss finding research problems and from there formulating research questions. This then gives us the foundation for proceeding with the remainder of the unit.

Deliverables

Below is a brief explanation of each of the deliverables including submission guidelines and deadlines, though the deadlines have already been given in Table 1 above.

Topic Selection/Initial Literature Review/Research Question (10 Marks - Due session 3)

The research question lies at the heart of your research project. After considering a research problem (whatever the field of study) from there you will develop the research question. We will discuss formulating research questions in sessions one and two, but within the research problem, the research question focuses specifically on one aspect of the problem that you will undertake as part of the research programme.

Even if you have a good idea of your topic, you still need to read the existing literature to build background knowledge and narrow down your ideas. In sessions 1 and 2 we will discuss how to find research papers and identify the gaps in your selected area. You need to narrow down a broad topic to specific questions. There are many ways to present the research question, and these will be discussed during the sessions. Submit your assignment in one document file by the due date and time to the assignment drop- box.

Full Proposal ( 10 Marks - Due session 5)
The full proposal is a document that contains your entire proposal for the research to be undertaken. These documents are normally required by academic departments before students are admitted to undertaking research degrees such as a master's research degree or a PhD. This document will contain your research question from the previous submission but integrated into a coherent document along with other components that will be discussed in class. A selection of references that you will use in developing your research paper will also be included at this stage.

Assessment Details for Assessment Item 2:

Introduction

The Introduction of the research report contains a full introduction to the research you have undertaken. The Introduction normally contains a statement of the problem (including the initial research question, the Significance of the problem, some historical background. The purpose, or goal to be gained from a better understanding of the research question, statement of hypothesis, any assumptions, and limitations as well as any possible ethical considerations. Perhaps also a brief overview of the methodology.

The format of the Introduction can be found in the example document (Report Introduction.doc). Use this document as a starting point to develop your Introduction (add and delete sections as appropriate).

Submit this chapter by the due date and time to the assignment drop-box.

Literature Review

The literature review gives the reader (and the examiner) the necessary background to understand the study by citing the investigations and findings of previous researchers and documents the researcher's knowledge and preparation to investigate the problem. Studying the existing literature is one of the essential preliminary tasks when you undertake a research study. This enables you to acquaint yourself with the available body of knowledge in your specific area of research. "The literature review is an integral part of the research process and makes a valuable contribution to almost every operational step" (Kumar, R. Research Methodology: a step-by-step guide for beginners, 3rd ed, Sage 2011). The literature review will be discussed in class and examples are given, the literature review would normally constitute Chapter 2 in a research report, see suggested guidelines in (report.doc, chapter

2).
The submission for the Literature Review has been divided into several sections so the Unit lecturer can gauge the student's progression on this important topic early.

Methodology

In this section, you clearly outline what methodology you used in your research i.e. what you intend to do and how you intend to do it. It must be written clearly so that it would be easy for another researcher to duplicate your research if they wished. Most researchers will use one or more of many well documented and acceptable methods understood by the research community. We will discuss several research methodologies in different sessions, but there will be many others you can choose from. You will choose a type of research design (e.g. experimental, correlational, descriptive etc.) and the methods to conduct the research (experiment or survey etc.)

The structure of a methodology chapter will be discussed in class and examples given. The Methodology would normally constitute Chapter 3 in a research report, see suggested guidelines in (report.doc, chapter 3).

Full Research Paper

In this submission, you incorporate the previous three submissions into a final document and submit by the due date and time. This submission will incorporate the Introduction, The Literature Review, and the Methodology chapters into one document. This will give you a chance to take on board any comments given by your instructor in the previous submissions, make corrections and possibly recover some marks which may have been deducted in the previous submission. Get AI-free online assignment help by the best tutors.

Your submission also contains the full abstract. This is an extension of the initial abstract submitted with the proposal document and summarizes the report including the hypotheses, procedures, and major findings (you will not be conducting the research, so you won't have any findings). The Full abstract should be no more than one page.

Assessment Details for Assessment Item 3:

Introduction

Presentation

For this component, you will be required to give a 10 - 15 minute presentation on your research report and answer any questions from the audience. The presentations will be conducted in a symposium type setting after the end of the semester, typically in week 15. There is no submission for this component of assessment, you will be graded on your presentation and ability to answer any questions put to you. The structure of the presentation will be discussed during the semester and a suggested format for the presentation will be made available in a sample set of PowerPoint slides, see (presentation.ppt).