3 thoughts on “Research Design Presentation”

  1. Hello Price,
    Your proposed research is fascinating, and I commend you for the depth of thought you have put into it. I will simply place my comments in the order in which they appeared in your presentation. First, the wording of your research question is a little clunky, and could perhaps be refined to “… decision to adopt or withhold from adopting…” to smooth it out (although you may have merely forgotten a word on the slide, in which case, your question is fine as intended). Second, I love the use of Hofstede’s insights and Edward Hall. I would recommend, however, that you actually define ‘high context’ and ‘low context’ as they are used in intercultural communications, so that your audience knows what this means and understands why it makes sense as a variable. Along the same vein, it might help to provide a quick, basic definition of ‘semiotics’ in your introduction, just so that everything you address afterwards is even more clear. Next, your case variation is one of the strongest points of your research; it was particularly smart that you have included a case in which no national anthem was adopted at all. If I were selecting cases, I may have chosen two in which an anthem was adopted and two in which it was not, but I also understand that in reality, case outcomes do not always emerge symmetrically and evenly.

    Furthermore, your indicators for ‘adoption of national anthem’ are a bit confusing–I understand what you are trying to get at here, but you are not testing the truth or falseness of anything; rather, you’re testing the presence or absence of a national anthem.

    Your table was well laid-out, and your reasoning for why it is not fully filled in yet makes perfect sense; it is clear that you will need further, more in-depth research in certain categories.

    Finally, regarding the presentation itself, your verbal presentation was clear and concise, although the visual aspect lacked a bit of pizzazz. Overall, however, this definitely piqued my interest, and I look forward to seeing the final result.

  2. Hi Price,

    I really enjoyed your research design presentation. One of the places I thought it was strongest was in your decision making when choosing each of your cases. Having the case of England, and thus some variation in the dependent variable, is probably necessary for the typography approach you have proposed to be effective. I also thought that having the different levels/flavors of fascism between Italy and Portugal was a really effective way of taking a variable that I thought might be operationalized as just a dummy fascist/not fascist and adding making it more reflective of the actual cases you have chosen.

    In discussing your dependent variable, you mentioned the additional nuance of the length of time between a nation/government’s founding and when it implemented as a way to add to the dummy has/does not have an anthem variable. I think it may actually be possible to have that nuance reflected in the variable’s operationalization by having the options: No Anthem, Anthem passed at the nation/government’s founding, Anthem passed significantly after the nation/government’s founding.

    Finally, I was a bit confused with the Level of Cultural Context variable. From what I understood, it is the level of difficulty in understanding/being culturally fluent. I had difficulty in understanding the connection it had to national anthems. This is not to say the variable is at all bad, just it is one of the places in the design that is most complicated and tricky for someone who has not spent a lot of time with the literature to easily grasp (or maybe I’m just dumb).

  3. Hi Price,

    I really enjoyed watching your research design presentation! You have a really intriguing question and I can’t wait to see what you do with this project next semester! At first I was a little unsure how a small-n analysis would work in relation to your specific puzzle and question, however, your presentation effectively justified your methodological approach. I feel as though you presentation and your specific methodological approach provides an interesting lens to your puzzle that I personally wouldn’t have thought of!

    In regard to your presentation, you did a really effective job explaining the existing conversation and translating them into your dependent variables. However, while I felt as though you did a detailed job justifying and explaining why you chose Cultural Context as a variable, I felt as though the other variables lacked that same explanation/justification in your presentation leaving me with questions at the end.

    I also think you did a good job explaining your justification for your case selections (deviants). However, while you explained why England and Portugal were chosen, I’m still confused about Italy and the U.S.. I understand based on the dependent variables and the nature and historical context of those countries, but felt as though a more detailed discussion of why would’ve made things a little more clear. Furthermore, I noticed that all the countries you had chosen were European or the U.S. and was wondering if this was an intentional choice or why the deviants geographically landed there. This makes me also ask questions about countries with different natures and historical contexts and whether or not these same exact dependent variables chosen would effectively produce an answer.

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