The initial reflection was focused on finding the optimal financial distribution for my daughter’s school enrolment. In that way, proper budget management and alternative options involving taking out grants and loans were highlighted as the best options. Still, this presumption, although based on credible theoretical knowledge, must be proven through empirical research. One effective method of measuring the impact of additional financial support includes conducting an experiment.
The investigation of the research problem falls under the quasi-experiment category. A quasi-experiment is a research design that is conducted in less controlled conditions (compared to a true experiment) with the participation of comparable participant groups (Bachman & Schutt, 2019). The particular research method proves to be more suitable for the issue as it allows for the more selective recruitment of participants. Moreover, a non-equivalent control group design would offer more practical results for investigating the different money management strategies.
In the quasi-experiment, the control group would comprise a group of students paying the school fee without additional financial support. The participants would form a group of 6-10 people from different schools but with relatively similar tuition. Presumably, the age of the group members would remain similar as well, although slights variations would have minimal impact on the course of the study. In that way, the control group serves the purpose of demonstrating the financial state of students without external budget support.
Furthermore, the treatment group includes those participants who referred to additional resources to support their education. The number of participants would have to be the same to match the control group. Moreover, to ensure maximum practicality, the original fees and loan amounts of each participant must remain within a narrow range. The main point of the particular group is to openly demonstrate the usefulness or lack thereof of various budget-based strategies.
The process of selecting the participants follows the structure of aggregate matching. The term refers to a method of selection that is based on participants with similar characteristics that would be valuable for the research purpose (Bachman & Schutt, 2019). In this way, the comparison and treatment groups share similar educational backgrounds and financial states, but only one would utilize more than one source of income. Moreover, the selection method does not involve random sampling, as the participants are chosen based on predetermined attributes related to the investigation’s main aims.
As with any research design, certain threats to validity must be discussed. Firstly, the samples size of the research design severely limits the generalizability of the results to real-life situations. In order to improve the external validity, the number of participants would have to be increased, although realistically, that would become more difficult to manage. Secondly, a threat to the internal validity of the study could result from external factors affecting the financial state of the participants rather than then loans or grants used. To improve the internal validity, the researchers would have to instruct and then debrief the participants clearly.
The purpose of the experiment is to investigate the effect of the independent variable on the dependent variable. In this case, the independent variable is represented by the loan sum taken by each participant, measured in USD. The effect of the independent variable on the financial state of each participant is the dependent variable, measured in the total sum of USD left after paying the school fees. Hence, the two variables will aid in highlighting the optimal method of maintaining one’s budget in cases of mandatory fees.
Reference
Bachman, R.D., and Schutt, R.K. (2019). The practice of research in criminology and criminal justice. Sage.