Assignment: Research review
Purpose: The purpose of this assignment is to provide students with an opportunity to search journal data bases in the library on a particular topic relevant to the Alcohol and Other Drugs Counselling field. Students will critically evaluate the research findings on their selected topic across three academic research studies in terms of the quality of the research and gaps in knowledge, and synthesise the findings.
Process: Search the library databases using search terms relevant to your selected topic. One way of doing this is to select a drug (eg: methamphetamines), select a population (eg: young adults) and select a context (eg: nightclubs). From the search results obtained, select three contemporary articles on your topic. At least one of the selected articles will be Australian. The introduction to this assessment will include the search terms used and the data bases searched.
Read each article in depth to understand:
- What was researched (which drugs/s, population studied, context, location)
- What was the size of the sample studied?
- How was the research conducted? (qualitative, quantitative, mixed methods)
- What were the major findings of each article?
Write a summary of the research studies which includes the above points. Outline the differences and similarities in method and findings across the three studies. Evaluate the quality of the research (for example, size of sample, how rigorous and generalisable is the research method?).
Write a conclusion that evaluates the contribution of the research findings to the evidence base of Alcohol and Other Drugs Counselling and their relevance to practice. Synthesise the research findings, for example, combine the results from the three studies to create a new perspective, apply the findings to the AOD field, or make recommendations for the AOD field based on the findings.
Look at the three example research articles uploaded into the class space on methamphetamine use in nightclubs. How might you compare these articles? Can you find three articles that are of a similar quality and range that may be compared?
DO NOT USE the articles given as samples in your own assignment.