Pickard’s best-selling handbook on research methods updated

CHICAGO — Fully updated for today’s research environments, the long-awaited second edition of Alison Jane Pickard’s best-selling “Research Methods in Information,” published by ALA Neal-Schuman, includes brand new coverage of online research methods and techniques, mixed methodology and qualitative analysis. The first primer to focus entirely on the needs of the information and communications community, it guides would-be researchers through the variety of possibilities open to them under the heading “research” and provides students with the confidence to embark on their dissertations. While Pickard summarizes the philosophy and theory of research to provide context, she focuses squarely on a practical exploration of the research process, offering examples and exercises tried and tested over a whole teaching career. This book takes readers through each aspect of the research process, including:

• The major research paradigms;
• Reviewing the literature;
• Defining the research;
• The research proposal;
• Sampling;
• Research ethics;
• Methods, including case studies, surveys, experimental research, ethnography, Delphi study, action research, historical research and grounded theory;
• Research data management, examined in a new chapter contributed by Professor Julie McLeod, Sue Childs and Elizabeth Loma, which applies evidence from the recent JISC-funded “DATUM” project;
• Collection techniques, including interviews, questionnaires, observation, diaries, focus groups, usability testing, qualitative and quantitative data analysis;
• Software for analysis;
• Virtual research;
• Presenting the research.

Pickard is head of information and communication management and director of quality and student experience in the School of Computing, Engineering and Information Sciences at the University of Northumbria, UK, where she is also program leader for the new Professional Doctorate in Information Sciences. She teaches Research Methods in Information and Communication Management, Information Sciences, as well as other subject areas, and has managed a number of JISC and AHRB research projects.

ALA Store purchases fund advocacy, awareness and accreditation programs for library professionals worldwide. Founded in 1976 by Patricia Glass Schuman and John Vincent Neal, ALA Neal-Schuman, now an imprint of ALA Publishing, publishes professional books for librarians, archivists, and knowledge managers. Contact us at (800) 545-2433 ext. 5418 or editionsmarketing@ala.org.

Related Links

"Research Methods in Information, Second Edition"

"Digital Libraries and Information Access: Research Perspectives"

"Managing Research Data"