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Unit Overview
Unit Overview
Citizen social scientists are especially empowered to tell their community's data story. As members of the community speaking with and for their families, neighbors, friends, and local influencers, citizen social scientists are uniquely positioned to highlight commonalities in experiences. Because of this, citizen social scientists are able to suggest strategies for action that bridge differences in view and address key issues in the community.
Your method and style of communication will need to reflect the different purposes your data story serves and the various audiences you'd like to reach. These are numerous, and there are likewise many effective, creative communication strategies. Here, we will focus on written communications intended for two purposes: 1) informing the community of the findings of your research, and 2) recommending data-driven policy action. We'll start with general guidelines for research writing and examples of the sentence structure to use for reporting the results of your statistical analysis. Then we'll move on to the logistics of assembling your report document and checking its accessibility for diverse readers. What a party!
Key Terms
Key Terms
Alternative text: descriptive text added to figures and images in a document so that a screen reader may relay visual content for a vision-impaired reader.
Document tags: identifying information for the content of a document, organized into a hierarchy, or "tree," that creates a logical document structure to direct the path of assistive technologies, such as screen readers.
Problem Statement: provides a clear, concise roadmap that describes the issue in need of study.
Research Brief: concise research summaries focusing on only one or two key findings from the research
Research Writing
Research Writing
You will assemble your class report using Canva, a document design tool.
Use the buttons below to 1) draft your section of the report, and 2) edit the final class report in Canva.
[Insert button links to shared work spaces, such as a Google Drive folder and/or Canva document]
Food for Thought
Food for Thought
Below you will find three examples of research briefs summarizing studies conducted by researchers from the Carsey Research Institute, the Ruckelshaus Institute, and Cornell University. While the studies featured in these documents are different from your research, their structure may provide inspiration for how you might assemble your own brief.
Drug Overdose Rates Are Highest in Places With the Most Economic.pdf2020-growing-resilence.pdfPolicy-Brief-Feb-16-draft05.pdfWriting Your Statistical Results
Writing Your Statistical Results
Select the downward pointing arrows on the right side, below, to view written examples of reporting your statistical results. Refer to the models appropriate for your analysis as you write the results section of your brief.
Reporting Descriptive Statistics, Percentages
Reporting Descriptive Statistics, Percentages
Example: Eighty percent of survey respondents indicated that enjoying scenic beauty was an important water-based activity. Canoeing/kayaking/boating and viewing birds and wildlife were also ranked as important water-based activities by 68% and 61% of respondents, respectively. Fewer respondents (49%) were interested in picnicking and family activities.
Reporting Descriptive Statistics, Means
Reporting Descriptive Statistics, Means
Example 1: Mean scores for most impairments were in the moderate to severe range, with concern about E. coli (Mean = 3.7) and sedimentation (Mean = 3.5) perceived as being particularly severe.
Example 2: Mean scores for most stewardship values were in the agree to strongly agree range, with importance of personal property management behaviors (4.7) and importance of water quality to quality of life in one’s community (Mean = 4.5) perceived as being particularly important.
Reporting Crosstabs
Reporting Crosstabs
Basic format: X2 (degrees of freedom, N = sample size) = chi-square test statistic value, p value.
Example 1: A chi-square test of independence was performed to examine the relationship between gender and the importance of boating. The relationship between these variables was significant X2 (2, N=311) = 23.7, p < .05.
Example 2: To take a closer look at whether respondents' perceptions of vegetated streambank characteristics match definitions used by conservation planners, we cross-tabulated respondents who said they are currently maintaining a vegetated streambank against their descriptions of the type of vegetation surrounding the waterway on their property. Most respondents (64%) said their riparian zone consisted of grasses that are occasionally or rarely mowed, and only 8% described their riparian zone as a lawn that is regularly mowed. This suggests that most respondents who said they are implementing a vegetated buffer have a fairly good understanding of this practice.
Reporting Correlations
Reporting Correlations
Basic format: (r = Pearson's r test statistic value, p value).
Example 1: Both distance to a public access site (r=-.20, p<.01) and the respondent’s opportunity zone score (r=.17, p<.01) are significantly correlated with the frequency of their visits to Muskegon Lake. Respondents who live farther from the lake visit less frequently.
Example 2: We assessed correlations between items measuring the intentionality of riparian zone management decisions. Respondents who intentionally mow vegetation in their riparian zones are also more likely to say they intentionally plant or maintain trees along their streambanks (r=.37, p<.001), and they are less likely to agree that their riparian zone has simply “been that way” (r=-.19, p<.05).
Reporting T-Tests
Reporting T-Tests
Basic format: (M = mean for group 1, SD= standard deviation for group 1); (M = mean for group 2, SD= standard deviation for group 2); t(degrees of freedom) = t-test statistic value, p=(p value).
Example: There was not a significant difference in trust in information from the Conservation District between residents in the Macatawa Watershed (M=3.1, SD=0.8) and residents in the Pigeon River Watershed (M=3.1, SD=0.9); t(449)=0.49, p=(0.62).
Document Accessibility
Document Accessibility
After you have created your research brief in Canva and exported it as a PDF, you'll need to verify that your document is set up to be correctly viewed by a reader with vision impairments who may be using a digital screen reader to review the document. Screen readers rely on document tags to guide the reading flow. The presentation at right guides you through the process of using Microsoft Word to run an accessibility check and add alternative text to images.
Summary
Summary
At last, you've arrived to the end of the final learning unit! We hope the work you've put into defining questions, analyzing data, creating visualizations, and summarizing your results has given you some insight about the complexities of the research process, as well as providing opportunities to hone a variety of digital professional skills along the way.
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