Once a researcher has chosen a topic to study, the first steps of the scientific method are to formulate a research question and hypothesis. For example, if a researcher wants to study the effect of exercise on grades, s/he might formulate a question of “is regular exercise associated with better academic performance?” and a hypothesis of “students who regularly exercise have better academic performance.” How s/he defines exercise and grades can be very important. For example, what is meant by regular? Is it exercising once a week every week or exercising 5 days a week most weeks? What is defined as exercise? Does vacuuming count? Lastly, how is academic performance defined and measured? Is it GPA or classes passed or school attendance? How the variables are defined and measure can greatly impact the study results and outcome.

Choose a topic of interest (you can use the same topic you used for the week 1 discussion if you want, but do not have to). With this topic,

1. Formulate a research question and hypothesis
2. Operationally define the variables you will use in this study
3. Discuss what scales of measurement you would want to use to measure these variables
4. Discuss how you would assess the reliability and validity of your study and your study measurements.