Dissertation research and writing for construction students

224 Pages·2007·1.21 MB·English

by  S G Naoum

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Dissertation Research and
Writing for Construction Students
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To my mother,Rose
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Dissertation Research and
Writing for Construction
Students
Second edition
Dr S. G. Naoum

AMSTERDAM • BOSTON • HEIDELBERG • LONDON • NEWYORK • OXFORD
PARIS • SAN DIEGO • SAN FRANCISCO • SINGAPORE • SYDNEY • TOKYO
Butterworth-Heinemann is an imprint of Elsevier
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Butterworth-Heinemann is an imprint of Elsevier
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First edition 1998
Reprinted 1998,1999 (twice),2001 (twice),2002,2003 (twice),2006
Second edition 2007
Copyright © 2007,Dr S.G.Naoum.Published by Elsevier Ltd.All rights reserved
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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
Naoum,S.G.(Shamil G.)
Dissertation research and writing for construction
students.– 2nd ed.
1. Dissertations,Academic 2. Technical writing
I. Title
808’.066624
Library of Congress Control Number:2006 929340
ISBN–13:978-0-7506-8264-0
ISBN–10:0-7506-8264-7
For information on all Butterworth-Heinemann publications visit our
website at www.books.elsevier.com
Typeset by Charon Tec Ltd,(A Macmillan Company),Chennai,India
www.charontec.com
Printed and bound in the UK
07 08 09 10 11 11 1 0 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
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Contents
Preface ix
Acknowledgements xiii
1 Introduction 1
Rationale for conducting a dissertation 1
The meaning of research 2
Purpose of the book 2
The plan of the book 3
Part One Preparing the Ground and Reviewing the Literature
2 Selecting a topic and writing the dissertation proposal 11
Choosing the topic 11
The dissertation proposal 14
Summary 17
References and additional reading 17
3 Reviewing the literature 18
Rationale for undertaking a literature review 18
Knowing the sources of information 20
Understanding how the library works 25
Note-taking 27
Organising the literature review 28
Critical appraisal of literature review 29
Summary 33
References and additional reading 33
Part Two R esearch Design and Methodology
4 Approaches to data collection 37
Research strategy 37
Approaches to data collection 43
Secondary data collection 48
Summary 50
References 51
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vi Contents
5 Techniques for data collection 52
Postal questionnaire 52
Personal interview 55
Sampling 58
Summary 62
References and additional reading 62
6 Questionnaire construction 63
How to construct a questionnaire 64
Types of questions 68
A pilot study 85
Covering letter 85
Summary 86
References 87
Part Three Analysis and Presentation of the Results
7 Measurements and probability 91
Level of measurement 91
Probability statement 95
Summary 96
Additional reading 97
8 Analysis of the results 98
Exploratory data analysis (open-ended questions) 98
Coding open-ended questions 99
Recording the information 101
The descriptive statistics method 103
The inferential statistics method (also known as bivariate
statistical analysis) 110
Summary 129
References and additional reading 130
9 Structuring and writing the dissertation 131
Typical dissertation structure 131
Writing the abstract 133
Writing th e introduction chapter 133
Writing the literature chapters 134
Writing the chapter on questionnaire design and methodology 138
Writing the chapter on analysis of the results 141
Writing the conclusion chapter 153
Writing the references/bibliography 153
Summary 159
References and additional reading 160
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Contents vii
10 Dissertation supervision and assessment 161
Getting started 161
The role of the supervisor 162
What is not the role of the supervisor? 163
Planning your dissertation 163
Dissertation supervision log 165
Dissertation assessment:Qualities in assessing at MSc level 165
Summary 169
Reference 170
Appendix 1 Examples of dissertation proposals 171
Appendix 2 Construction management and economics list of journals 187
Appendix 3 London South Bank University:Example of a questionnaire 191
Appendix 4 Statistical tables 198
Appendix 5 Construction industry employee injury statistics 202
Index 203
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Preface
This book has grown out of my involvement in supervising BSc and MSc
dissertations as well as my accumulated experience of teaching research
methods to postgraduate students at London South Bank University.Over the
years,I became convinced that construction students needed something akin to
research methods lectures,in addition to tutoring,that could provide them with
guidance on basic research techniques and how to write a dissertation.There have
been an enormous number of text books which presented research design and
methodologies but few,if any,are related to built environment studies.
This book approaches dissertation research and writing as a process,involving
a sequence of learnable activities. Each activity prepares the student for the
next step and some steps are best taken before others. I have divided the
process of dissertation research into three parts,which are best carried out in
the order presented.
Part one is ‘preparing the ground’.It involves:
1 Identifying the problem (including narrowing and clarifying the problem);
2 Writing a proposal (including the aim, objectives, hypothesis and/or key
research questions;
3 Reviewing the literature (including critical appraisal of literature).
Part two is ‘research design’.It involves:
4 Approaches to data collection (deciding whether to use a survey or a case
study);
5 Techniques for data collection (deciding whether to use the post or go for
interviews);
6 Constructing and sampling the questionnaire.

Part three is ‘analysis of the results’and producing the dissertation.It involves:
7 Measurement of data;
8 Analysis of data (including interpretation and discussion of results).
9 Structuring and writing the whole dissertation;
10 Dissertation supervision and assessment.