Focus
Climate action research is a social endeavor linking physical processes in the environment with human concerns for health, prosperity, and safety. In this unit, you will orient yourself in developing climate action projects according to academic disciplines and practices, as well as through personal and cultural worldviews, including Indigenous perspectives. You will review how questions underpin all research, and how effective questions can inform ethical research design that respects research participants and ensures the integrity of your research process and the communication of research findings. The unit will finish by exploring how approaches to research methods form the basis for designing research projects and shape the findings, as demonstrated in published literature
Activities and Assessment Overview
In this unit you will commence Assignment 1: Reporting participant-observer field notes (individual) which will be ongoing until a final report is due in week 9. You will partner with another student to discuss Assignment 2: Identifying influence of worldview in research design (individual), which will be submitted individually.
For this course, you need to develop a reference library using referencing software such as Endnote (purchase student version) or Zotero (free and supported by RRU) and set up your file system to organize data. Both options offer desktop and online libraries and allow you to maintain and organize your growing library of high quality articles and reports. You will know it is ready to use when you can write a simple paragraph citing five different sources, with all in-text citations and the reference list generated through Zotero or Endnote software. Mendeley is another options, however it is no longer supported by library services.
Please note that each unit includes learning activities which are different from Assignments. Learning activities are required but not marked, although your reflections on these activities are recorded in your field notes as part of Assignment 1.
Week 1
This is the most current detailed scheduled for Week 1 of the course. Please consider this a living document. In week 1, you will explore the importance of researchers’ and participants’ worldviews when designing research projects. You will gain a general introduction to the purpose and process of developing a climate action proposal, focus on setting up your research library and explore how worldviews can affect key decisions regarding project purpose, design and methods.
Learning Activity 1: Inhabit your worldview
View these short videos that draw on an image of London and examples from Star Wars and the Marvel Universe to illustrate Critical Theory and Constructivism worldviews. Describe another city of your choice in the context of Critical Theory and Constructivism. Begin your Assignment 1 Participant Observer Field notes by recording your insights from all learning activities in your fieldnotes.
Week 2
In week 2 you will meet with the instructor in a synchronous session to focus on ethical issues affecting how and what climate action projects are conducted. The unit will start with an opportunity to review your learning from the introduction to ethics in the CALCON course (CIHR et al., 2022) and the SSHRC Indigenous Research Statement of Principles. You will consider ethics in working with people and respect for Indigenous knowledge by exploring how climate action projects can be structured to minimize power differentials when conducting actions and research on social issues.
Learning Activity 2: Ethical actions
Review key sections of the TriCouncil Policy Statement: Ethical Conduct for Research Involving Humans – Chapters 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 9, 10 (qualitative).
With a focus on Chapter 9, reflect on Article 9.6 on Recognizing Diverse Interests within Communities to consider how a research question might be inclusive rather than dividing interest groups; or expands the coverage of a project to multiple communities. Consider Article 9.12 on Collaborative Research to describe four steps in the community engagement process aiming to ensure project participants experience 1) respect, 2) relevance, 3) reciprocity, and 4) mutual responsibility. What special considerations might be needed when engaging with an indigenous community?
Week 3
In week 3, you will focus on what shapes a research question, starting with watching the video Research Design (in 3 minutes) to consider how some small part of your interest in climate action can be expressed as a researchable question. A climate action project might look closely at some phenomenon or behavior, exploring What if? or How come? questions or aim to draw attention to something unexpected to benefit a community. In Learning Activity 3 (see below), you will take a deep dive into case study methodology to see how your research question shapes the overall research framework and guides the method of data collection and analysis within the case study to address a particular climate action research question or project.
Assignment 2 Identifying Influence of Worldview on Research Design is due this week.
Learning Activity 3: Questions informing research design – A case study
Read the short paper on the case study approach by Crowe et al., (2011) which sets out three main types of case studies as intrinsic, instrumental and collective. Choose one of the four examples described in the paper and write a short statement (200-300 words) that 1) articulates their research question, 2) outlines their methodology linked to one of these case study types and 3) explains why this approach is suited to the stated objectives. For a deeper exploration of research traditions and disciplines guiding methodology, also read the chapter, Methodological Frameworks and Sampling in Qualitative Research (Liamputtong, 2019).