INTRODUCTION TO FAMILY STUDIES

Family Trend Research Project

Family Trend Research Project

FOLLOW ALL DIRECTIONS carefully!!!!Print out and READ the directions USE the group pages on the wiki to

communicate with your group membersAll materials under the Project Folder on wiki

Project Directions in Word Sample Line chart in Excel Sample graded project Evaluation forms

Group Project on Family Trend

For this group project – you will choose a family-related rate such as

Teen pregnancy rateDivorce rateMarriage rateThen you will choose a demographic characteristic

for comparison:Blacks vs. AsiansH.S. degree vs. college degreeMen vs. womenUnder age 20 vs. over age 20

Group Project on Family Trend

Next you will find data for three years for the rate:

i.e. 1995, 2000, 2005You will need to find this rate for the total

U.S. population ANDfor the two comparison groups

Family Research Project

SummaryChoose a topicFind data on-line for three different years (i.e. 1995, 2000,

2005)and two categories (i.e. black vs. white)Review the literatureState a testable hypothesisGraph the data in excelDescribe the relationship between the two variablesSupport or reject your hypothesisDescribe your findings and how they fit or do not fit with your

original hypotheses

Doing Family Research

Family researchers ask: Q: How do we do family research? A: We use the scientific method.

Q. What is the goal of family research? A. Validity: to conduct research that

leads to valid conclusions about families and the social world they live in.

Social Research

Family researchers ask:

1) How and why do families operate and how do family trends change over time or vary by a demographic characteristic? (race, age, education level)

2) Are the conclusions we reach correct?

Many researchers seek to understand what causes factors a family or social trend

Social Research

What separates social research from other ways of knowing is that it uses the scientific approach

Research uses the scientific method to transform ideas hunches and questions –sometimes called hypotheses – into scientific knowledge

Steps in the research process

1) Select a topic – i.e. a general area of study – fertility and race

Narrow or focus your topic - i.e. does your race have an effect on the whether or not you will have a teen birth?

2) Conduct a literature review what research has been done previously? what were the findings?

Steps in the research process

3a) Develop a theory Specify an answerable research question The clearer your question, the clearer the answer

3b) State a CLEAR hypothesis:Clear: I expect that African Americans will have

higher rates of teen childbearing than Whites

Unclear: I expect race to be associated with teen childbearing

Steps in the research process

4) Design the study – i.e. what method will you use to answer your research question- for this project you will use survey data found on-line

5) Analyze the data – manipulate your data, look for patterns, use statistical analysis

Steps in the research process

7) Interpret the findings – what do the findings mean and are they similar or different from the proposed hypothesis?

7) Inform others – write a research report or book describing the entire process and findings

For this project you will create a PowerPoint presentation

Steps in the research process

Develop a hypothesis

A hypothesis proposes a relationship between one or more concepts

AND

Hypotheses describe the form of that relationship

For example:African American teens have a higher rate of

teen births than White teens in the U.S.

Steps in the research process

Developing a hypothesis

Hypotheses are causal explanations When a researcher empirically tests a

relationship between two VARIABLES it is called a hypothesis

VARIABLES in this project are a rate like marriage, divorce teen pregnancy rate and a demographic category like race, age. Sex.

After many researchers carefully test a hypothesis, and confirm it, THEN the scientific community begins to develop confidence that the idea is true

Steps in the research process

Causal explanations are used to establish whether one variable:

RACE causes another variable:

TEEN PREGNANCY

For one variable to “cause” another, it must be established before the other

For example: In the case of teen births and race:

your race is set before you give birth

Steps in the research process

Causal explanations2) Association – two variables are associated

if they occur together in a patterned way or appear to act togetherFor ex. African American teens have higher rates of teen pregnancy than white teens

Survey research

Family researchers often use survey data to study the social world

Analysis of survey data often focuses on: the relationship between two or more

variables (divorce rate and race) and testing a hypotheses about this

relationships

Survey Research

Second, we may want to look at the association between two or more variables

A simple method that shows this association is a by graphing it an excel chart

For the paper you will choose one dependent variable and one independent variable

Survey Research

You will choose a dependent variable or an outcome variable that interests you, such as:

1) teen birth rate

2) divorce rate

3) poverty rate

4) abortion rate

Survey Research

Next, you will choose an independent variable also called a predictor variable

In this project: your independent variable – should be a demographic variable such as sex, race/ethnicity, education level, income etc.

Again!

Your independent variable needs to occur before your dependent variable

Think of your independent variable as the cause and the dependent variable as the effect

Survey Research

Your family trend or dependent variable depends on your race, education, gender etc.

Your likelihood of having a teen birth DEPENDS ONyour race

Having a teen birth could not cause your race

So remember that your independent variable needs to occur before your dependent variable

Using excel to show a family trend over time

First: Choose a family trend that interests you such as thedivorce rate teen birth ratePoverty rateCesarean rate

Second: Choose a demographic variable and think about how you think the rate varies by this demographic characteristic

Find trend data on the internet (for three different years, most recent 2000 or later)

Enter data in excelMake an excel chartYour chart must be a line graph!!!

You must have three lines on your chart!!!

Finding Family Trend Data On-line

National Center for Health Statistics Health, United States, 2007Data on Infant Mortality Rates by Racehttp://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr59/nvsr59

_06.pdf Table B (page 4). Infant, neonatal, and postneonatal

mortality rates, by detailed race and Hispanic origin of mother: United States, selected years 1995–2007

Don’t copy a chart that is already been created

Graph

Present the graph as the first or second slide of your Results section

Label the graph and put the source of data used in graph at bottom of slide

02468

101214161820

1985 1995 2004

Dea

th p

er 1

,000

Infant Mortality by Race, 1985 to 2004

All Races

White

Black

YearSource : National Center for Health Statistics, Health, United States , 2007

Tips on making your excel chart

See the example excel worksheet and chart on the wiki in the PROJECT folder.

Make sure to choose the line chart example that is in the second row of choices and on the far left

When you highlight it, it should say: line with markers displayed at each data value

Make sure your raw data matches with your line graph data

Finding Data on Families on the Census

www.census.govScroll down to section on “Special Topics”Click “Statistical Abstract”Statistical Abstract has data for many years on many family-

related topics:

http://www.census.gov/compendia/statab/

Scroll down to “Population” link on left panel

Choose “Marital Status and Living Arrangements” from menu

Click on top link to pdf.:

“56: Marital Status and Living Arrangements”

Finding Data on Families on the Census

www.census.gov

Statistical Abstract:Table 56. Marital Status of the Population by

Sex, Race, and Hispanic Origin: 1990 to 2008

Scroll down to rates of marriage, divorce etc.

Data are available by race and for several years.

www.cdc.gov/nchsData on births are part of the Vital Statistics

collection programhttp://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data_access/VitalSta

tsOnline.htmIn the search box try: Trend Teen Birth RatesClick on NCHS 2007 Press releasehttp://www.cdc.gov/nchs/pressroom/07newsreleases/teen

birth.htmClick on pdf version for reportTable 3: Data for four years by race and Hispanic origin

Data from National Center for Health Statistics

Other on-line data sources

Alan Guttmacher Institutewww.guttmacher.orgAGI was formerly the research institute for Planned

ParenthoodData on teen childbearing and abortion ratesYou could compare teen pregnancy rates or abortions by

race for three different years

Cite your Source

Make sure to put the source of your data on the chart AND provide full citation on last slide (see last slide of this presentation for examples)

On chart:Source: National Center for Health Statistics, 2007

Reviewing the Literature

Arguments are always stronger when existing literature is cited to support your own hypotheses and conclusions.

You must locate two scholarly sources and one MUST be from an article from a scholarly journal

You MUST cite the two sources within your presentation.

AND you MUST provide a full reference for each source at the end of the presentation

Using the Library

From the MSU home page, click on the library link on the left side panel

Click on “Articles & More”Click “Psychology/Sociology”Try “Sociological Abstracts” or “Pschinfo”Try GeneralType in keywords related to your topicFor example: teenage childbearing and race

APA Style

APA: American Psychological Society formatting of references

Every field uses a particular styleIn Family Studies we use APA

References

National Center for Health Statistics, (2007). Health, United States, Table 19. Retrieved on March 3, 2009.

Luker, K. (1996). Dubious Conceptions: The Politics of Teenage Motherhood. Cambridge MA: Harvard University Press.

Colen, C.G., Geronimus, A., & Phipps, M. G. (2006). Getting a piece of the pie: The economic boom of the 1990s and declining teen birth rates in the United States. Social Science & Medicine, 63, 1531–1545.

Searching on the U.S. Census Bureau homepage

You can search -- but you need a few tipsTry typing “marriage by race”Nothing is foundThat is because the census refers to this as Living

Arrangements“Living arrangements race”Scroll to bottomClick on The 2008 Statistical Abstract, Marital Status and

Living Arangementshttp://www.census.gov/compendia/statab/tables/

08s0055.pdf

Writing this project

A large deduction will be taken off if you do not use a family, sociology, or psychology journal peer-reviewed article – this is a part of the assignment!

Cite using APA format: http://apastyle.apa.org/

Cite two sources within the presentation (Smith, 2005)

Provide full reference to scholarly sources and data sources on last slide of presentation in APA format.

Helpful Suggestions

Pregnancy and birth rates are not the sameRace and ethnicity are not the same. Make sure to be consistent in use, and make sure the data

matches your topic, etc.The word "data" is plural

PROOF READ - DON’T JUST SPELLCHECK!!!

A Census of the population is not the same as a national survey:

A Census attempts to collect data from EVERY person in the country, a survey is base don a sample of the population that is representative of that population.

Submitting the Project & Grading

Submit presentations through the ASSIGNMENT feature on Blackboard

BE SURE to include an e-mail address that you use – preferably your MSU e-mail account on first page of presentation

Many of the hotmail and Yahoo account see MSU mail as SPAM

I will e-mail you back your graded assignment with comments and grades page inserted on the second page of your PowerPoint

Family Research Project

SummaryChoose a topicFind data on-line for four different years and two categories

(i.e. black vs. white)Review the literatureState a testable hypothesisGraph the data in excelDescribe the relationship between the two variablesSupport or reject your hypothesisDescribe your findings and how they fit or do not fit with

your original hypotheses