Subject of the paper: Welfare attitudes towards migration
In this assignment, you will write a research paper about the topic you previously selected. The assignment covers the whole research cycle: reading up on the topic, formulating a research question, deciding on the methods to use, collecting your data/sources, conducting data analysis, and writing up your findings. The course labs will help you with the methodology and data analysis stages of the paper. The in-class exercise from week 4 can help you to write a sensible research question, so refer back to that if you need inspiration.
Depending on whether you are following the quantitative or qualitative track, you will write either a qualitative or quantitative paper. The following rules apply to each:
Qualitative research paper
Choose a type of qualitative data analysis (use lecture 4 as an inspiration for choosing the type of qualitative data analysis).
You will conduct a search for data sources. use a minimum of 10 sources in your analysis. When you have selected your sources, you will conduct the data analysis in Atlas.ti. The written report should include:
1. An introduction to your topic and your research question.
2. A methodology section where you describe which 10 texts you selected (how and why did
you pick these 10?), which data analysis you conducted (and why? How does the method
‘match’ the research question?).
3. An analysis/findings section. Use quotations, pictures, figures etc. to support your
analysis. Whilst analysing your qualitative data, make sure that you do not just analyse each source separately, but synthesize, compare, and contrast them to (try to) read between the lines. Make sure to check that your analysis matches your methodology.
4. A conclusion based on your findings, where you answer your research question. In the conclusion you should also discuss the main strengths and limitations of your research. You can also reflect on what future research on this topic should look like, or reflect on how your own beliefs and background might have influenced your interpretations. It is not necessary to reflect on whether you liked the assignment, or found it difficult or not.
5. Appendix. Not mandatory, only include it if it is needed for the reader to understand your findings.
Quantitative research paper
In this assignment you will use data from the European Social Survey (ESS) – the course labs will introduce you to the data set. You will select relevant variables from the ESS dataset that will help you answer your research question. You will analyse the data using SPSS. The course labs will help you with this. The written report should include:
1. An introduction to your topic, including your research question and hypothesis (what do you expect to find?).
2. A methodology section where you describe the dataset, the sample, the variables selected for your analysis and the type of analyses done.
3. Your analysis of your selected data. This section needs to include 1) a descriptive section in which you describe means and standard deviation for each individual variable (univariate) and 2) a section where you test your hypothesis. This second section should have 2 subsections (2a) a bivariate analysis (determining the effect of your independent variable on your dependent variable) and (2b) turn the bivariate analysis into a multivariate analysis by repeating the model from step 2a while adding at least 3
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demographic control variables. For the reporting of your analysis, check the APA 7th edition
standards at https://apastyle.apa.org/instructional-aids/numbers-statistics-guide.pdf
4. A conclusion of your findings, where you interpret your findings and answer your research question. In the conclusion you should also discuss the main strengths and limitations of your research. You can also reflect on what future research should look like on this topic. It is not necessary to discuss whether you liked the assignment or found it
difficult or not.
5. Appendix: include the syntax you used for the analysis. It is *not* needed to include
all your output.
Important information for both tracks.
This paper is an individual paper. The writing and analysis should be done by you personally, and the resulting paper should be unique to you, without overlap with the papers of the others. The research paper is max. 2000 words (Times New Roman, font 11, line spacing 1.5) excluding front page and bibliography). Do not try to sneak in extra words by using Figures, Tables, or the Appendix. Figures and Tables will be counted in the word count. The appendix should only be used for ‘extras’ – all the key information should be in the main text. Sources should be referenced in- text and accompanied by a full bibliography, both of which must adhere to the APA 7th edition referencing style as used throughout the Security Studies programme. Use headings to clearly structure your paper but be sparing with sub-headings.
