Course

code	MD324
credit_hours	3
title	Research methods for media
arbic title
prequisites	MD314
credit hours	3
Description/Outcomes	This course provides a comprehensive coverage of both quantitative and qualitative social science methods used in research about the media and its role in society. The course will help show students exactly how to design and implement meaningful small-scale research, covering experimental research methods in Social Psychology. Students will learn and experience research effectively through actually using the research process. Research design, data collection, analysis, validity, and report writing will all be covered. A substantial part of the course requirements are written. The format of the course will be mixture of lecture and discussion, writing, and demonstrations.
arabic Description/Outcomes
objectives	This course intends to: rn• Help students explores both qualitative and quantitative approaches of research in order for them to understand and be able to choose the right approach for a particular problem rn• Help students identify basic mass communication theoriesrn• Allow students to be fimiliar with key terms in scientific research such as hypothesis and independent variable rn• Teach students how to identify appropriate data collection technique(s) for a given research problem rn• Allow students to understand ethical situations that might arise in mass media research rn• Help students to design a research project - indicating hypotheses, best data collection method, best way to analyze datarn• Help students do basic statistics procedures using SPSS (Perform simple statistical tests on a provided dataset using SPSS and Interpret results of statistical tests) rn
arabic objectives
ref. books	-Frankfort-Nachmias, Chava and David Nachmias. 2000. Research Methods in the Social Sciences. NY: Worth. Purchase or copy this text.rn-Miller, Delbert C. and Neil J. Salkind. 2002. Handbook of Research Design and Social Measurement. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications. rn-Arthur Asa Berger (2000), Media and Communication Research Methods: An Introduction to Qualitative and Quantitative Approaches, Sage Publications, Inc 1 edition rn-Barrie Gunter (2000), Media Research Methods: Measuring Audiences, Reactions and Impact, SAGE Publications Ltd, University of Leicester, UK
arabic ref. books
textbook	Priest, Susanna Hornig (2010), Doing Media Research: An Introduction, Saga Publication, Inc., California, U.S.rn
arabic textbook
objective set
content set

Course Content

content serial	Description
1	Introduction to Media Research methodology (Chapter 1)
2	Foundational Discipline (Chapter 2)
3	Mass communication as a research field (Chapter 3)
4	Developing a research Question and Reviewing the literature (Chapter 4)
5	Exploring Data Sources and Defining Research variables (Chapter 4)
6	Designing Quantitative analysis: Surveys, Experiment, and Quantitative Content Analysis (Chapter 5)
7	7th Week Exam
8	Designing Qualitative analysis: Participant Observation, Interviews, Focus Groups and Qualitative Content Analysis (Chapter 6)
9	Describing a Numerical Data set and Making Inferences (Chapter 7)
10	Testing Hypothesis and Exploring other Relationships (Chapter 8)
11	Qualitative Analysis: Identifying Themes and Writing Meaningful Summaries (Chapter 9)
12	12th Week Exam
13	Research Horizon: Challenges and Opportunities (Chapter 10)
14	Writing and Presenting the Research Report (Chapter 11)
15	Data analysis (SPSS) and interpretations
16	Final Presentation