PL2131 Module Review

PL2131 Research and Statistical Methods

AY2016/17 Semester 1

Taught by Dr Stephen Lim

Textbook – Irrelevant

Ok I know I said it was irrelevant but I still studied it. But we really weren’t tested on anything in it that wasn’t taught in lectures. 

Was really worried since this was a 2k module and I was in my first semester but I realised that the module level doesn’t really make a difference in terms of difficulty.

I saw the word statistics and thought JC math would be able to carry me through. It didn’t, mainly because it’s so much easier than JC math that it didn’t matter. I know there are other Profs out there who would probably pick your brain a bit more stats-wise. For those who want to go into research those might be of some benefit. The PL2131 experience I got was really more conceptual than technical, although we did still learn some practical skills (especially basic SPSS).

The course covered research methods (i.e., the basics of designing experiments well) and stats (how to use statistics as a common language to interpret research results).

Dr Lim is a really fun professor. His passion for research is invigorating and contagious (at least to me, results may vary).

I really thought more of this class as fun than work. Tutorials involved learning how to use SPSS in the computer lab, which I thought was cool (sue me). Lecture slides and readings were pretty light. 

There was a 30% 60-question MCQ + T/F midterm which was easy, a bit too easy. This was my first real worry about the bell curve (the mean for midterms was 51/60, forgot the SD). Considering how easy it was, I was honestly disappointed that I didn’t get a perfect score. Exacerbating this was the fact that many, if not most, of the cohort scored well for the 20% group assignment (solving some SPSS problems and answering a few short answer questions, nothing to write home about, my group did it after class one day without any hassle). The bulk of the variance in the distribution came from finals (probably, I don’t know the exact distribution). The final exam was similar to midterms, except that it also contained several short answer questions. Standing out in particular was one that described a problem facing a researcher asking you to design an experiment using our newly-acquired arsenal of research methods.

I probably botched that question. Thankfully, I managed to get an A.

Most importantly, I learned that confounder isn’t a word. It’s confound or confounding variable.