This Assignment is designed to demonstrate your current mastery of the following Learning Outcomes:

i.   Communicate statistical concepts, analyses, and arguments in an accurate and scholarly manner;

a.    Apply vocabulary to describe statistical concepts, procedures, and ideas;

b.   Justify the choice of statistical procedures (e.g. selected study designs).

ii.   Design sampling and study procedures to collect relevant data addressing a research question;

a.    Identify issues associated with sampling and study design (e.g. bias, validity, confounding).

To achieve these objectives, students will need to draw on course material from the topics on PPDAC: a Scientific Inquiry Framework, and Sampling Designs & Considerations.

How this Assignment ‘works’

This Assignment is the first of three (3) Assignments in the course. All three Assignments are designed to sequentially  progress  through  the  PPDAC  Framework  for  a  particular,  authentic  scenario;  this  first Assignment  involves  elements  from  the  Problem  and  Plan  stage  of  PPDAC.  Consequently, this  first Assignment instruction file has a lot of information, as it sets the scene for the remaining Assignments in the course.

The section below, Research Background is meant to briefly emulate the type of literature review or context that a researcher would conduct when initially setting up a research program. That is, it provides background to understand the main vocabulary and motivation for the field of study. The background provided  is  also  meant  to  provide  sufficient  information/vocabulary  for  you  to  get  started  on  this particular Assignment. The background should provide you with ideas or keywords that you could use if you wish to do some further research to help you complete this Assignment, but additional research is not required (nor will it necessarily provide any additional benefit). Note: if you do use additional research to answer an Assignment Question, and use that information explicitly in your Assignment, you should include a References list at the end of your Assignment (which doesn’t contribute to your word count), and use a proper in-text citation style of your choice  (e.g. APA, footnotes, following your ‘favourite’ citation format, etc). But again, there is NO expectation that you do any additional research to complete the Assignments in this course, nor is there any incentive to do so.

The Research Prompt will provide you with a Research Objective that will serve as a broad connecting ‘theme’ for the three Assignments in the course. As we move through the three Assignments, each will deal with a particular Research Question that relates in some way to the Research Objective. The Research Questions may change from Assignment to Assignment; I do this so we can explore different types of questions, and also to help keep the content being evaluated on each Assignment —and the subsequent grading—fairly independent. Note that having a Research Objective is quite common, i.e. researchers often have interest in a particular field or large objective, and then conduct several research projects that address different questions or concepts related to that objective; the idea of having different Research Questions across these three Assignments also emulates that idea.

For this Assignment, you will take on the role of a researcher at a University of your choice, who has a research program described in the Research Prompt section. You are in the process of designing a new study to collect data to answer a Research Question (which aligns with your interests as a researcher).

Of course, this  is still  an Assignment in  Biol/Stat  2244 for which you  are trying to  obtain  credit  by demonstrating  your   proficiency/mastery   of  some   course  concepts   and   learning   outcomes.  This Assignment will be graded based on the degree to which your submission meets the criteria listed in the Grading for Assignment 1 section,  which   is   provided  after  the Assignment Question section. Consequently, while you are free to be creative as the researcher and use your personal ideas/critical thinking to address aspects of the Assignment Questions, always keep in mind that you are trying to demonstrate what you are learning of the material and ideas taught in Biology/Statistics 2244.

Research Background

Concern for the environment and the subsequent impact of environmental degradation on human          health has been widespread since at least the 1960s with the publication of Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring1 . Environmental concerns like climate change (i.e. long-term changes in temperature and              weather patterns), declining ozone layer (i.e. reduction in the amount of ozone (O3) in the atmosphere, generally thought to result from ozone-depleting chemicals like CFCs), and deforestation (i.e. clearing of forested landscapes for agriculture, expanding cities, industry, or wood harvesting) are just a few issues that we often see in the news. As a society, we general accept the fact that many environmental              concerns are partially a result of human action, i.e. unchecked use of natural resources, pollution from   industry, and other consequences of modern lifestyles (e.g. air pollution resulting on the reliance of gas- powered transportation, food waste contributing to expansion of agriculture land).

Given that human (in)actions contribute to environmental concerns, taking action to increase awareness of environmental issues, and potentially increase individual commitments to more sustainable practices may help reduce or slow environmental degradation. The question is: how do we promote environmental awareness and commitment to positive behaviours? Previous research suggests that          seeing positive actions taken by other people may promote similar behaviours in ourselves2 .  However,   most people don’t regularly share their opinions on and lifestyle choices relating to environmental           concerns with others3; consequently, some method of communicating information about environmental concerns and positive behaviours with the general public could be beneficial.

School science curriculum— particularly for so-called “school-age children” (i.e. ages 5 through 12    years) — has changed in recent decades to include topics that introduce environmental concerns and raise awareness. Older children (e.g. secondary school) also see school curricula related to environmental concerns, but some of this is dependent on their choice of classes. Adults are more likely to engage with public service announcements and advertising from government and non-governmental organizations (e.g. radio or TV announcements and programming, media stories, roadside billboards or  bus shelter posters promoting awareness or action, etc.; see example in Figure 1). These methods of environmental messaging may help support awareness of, and commitment to, behaviours that reduce environmental degradation (such behaviours might include shopping locally at farmers’ markets, using   curbside recycling, taking public transit or walking/biking rather than driving personal cars, choosing       energy-efficient home appliances, etc.).

Figure 1. Example of a roadside            billboard advocating for public             awareness and action related to a       legal policy for managing coal dust in  Newcastle, NSW. The billboard uses    an image of a child as a potential         ‘voice’ for the message. The industrial image may be a local location of coal  mining for this town.

Image: "CTAG Billboard and supporters, Newcastle, NSW" by Beyond Coal and Gas is licensed under CC BY- NC 2.0.

Unfortunately, there is not a lot of research on the actual impact of such environmental messaging, or,   what factors may influence the effectiveness of such messaging. While research in psychology suggests  that making others aware of social norms (i.e. unwritten ‘rules’ about behaviours and beliefs that are      considered acceptable in a given social group or context) can potentially influence environmentally-        positive choices2, it’s not clear how best to ‘pitch’ this messaging for the greatest impact. For example,   does it matter whether the ‘voice’ of the messenger is familiar to the target audience of the messaging, by using someone of the same age, or culture, or other demographic characteristic as the target               audience, or even by having an individual that the audience will recognizes (e.g. government official,       local or regional celebrities/athletes, teacher/friend/family member, etc.) communicate the message? Is the environmental messaging more likely to be positively received and remembered if the target              audience recognizes or is familiar with the locations described or illustrated in the messaging (e.g. by      relating the concepts to landmarks or environments that are local to the target audience)? And, when    thinking about the target audience of the messaging: what characteristics influence how receptive           individuals are to such environmental messaging: do political views matter? Age? Socio-economic            status? Something else?

Since much remains uncertain about the impact of, and factors influencing the effectiveness of   environmental messaging, this is an active area of research for some researchers in public policy, psychology, and environmental science.

Research Prompt

You are a researcher with the Department of Environmental Policy at University “X” (whatever                  university you want— it’s not particularly important). You regularly collaborate with other researchers at your university (and potentially elsewhere), including those with interests in Psychology, Information      Science and Media, and Politics. Your research interests and expertise are related to public                        environmental awareness and concern. You have previously conducted some research on using public    service announcements (as environmental messaging) related to promoting curbside recycling, use of     public transit, and methods of reducing food waste.

You have a research lab (with graduate students and research fellows who can help you with your research, e.g. as individuals helping to collect data if necessary) with funding that you are using to conduct research to further the following Research Objective:

Understand factors that influence beliefs about, and commitment to behaviours related to environmental concerns.

Assignment Questions

a)   What is the population of interest based on the Research Question?

b)   What is/are the explanatory variable(s) (factor(s) of interest) and response variable(s) based on the Research Question?

c)    (i) Identify an appropriate sampling frame for the research question. (ii) Provide a brief                explanation of why you chose that particular sampling frame (i.e. justify your choice). (iii) Briefly discuss both a positive and a negative consequence of your selected sampling frame in terms of generalizability to the population of interest.

d)   (i) Describe an appropriate sampling design that you will use to obtain a sample to address the Research Question; your description should provide an overview of how the design will be

implemented. (ii) In your description, provide a clear explanation (i.e. justify your choice) of why you chose that particular sampling design, including why the approach and choices you made     is/are relevant/necessary for the Research Question.

Try to keep your entire answer to around 400 words or fewer; we won’t be marking word count          officially. This suggested maximum word count is to give you a sense of potential detail.  As you make choices in your sampling frame and sampling design, try to be as realistic as possible (i.e. based on      common sense experience on what will be ‘possible’ and what information may be available to you).

You are free to organize your answers to these questions in a manner that seems logical to you.          However, keep in mind that it is easier for us to grade answers when it is clear which part of the          questions you are addressing. So, separating your answers by (a), (b), (c), (d) can be very helpful to us AND makes it more likely that we are able to grade your work accurately.

Grading for Assignment 1

For this Assignment, there will be several potential ways to answer the questions. This is meant to           emulate working in science: there will often be many ways to Plan a sampling design to collect data to    answer a Research Question. However, that does not mean that all research Plans are equally good or    feasible. We must think about, and balance, the competing pressures and constraints on research (e.g.   resource availability, accessibility, the nature of and access to our study units, etc.) with a prioritization for accurate, valid, and reliable data (i.e. “good quality” data). We must also think about communicating our Plan clearly in a way that makes other individuals understand the choices we’ve made, why they are appropriate, and ultimately, could visualize/understand how the study is being conducted.

General Overview of Grading

Your answers to the Assignment Questions will be graded based on a 4-level rubric (on page 8), which   focuses on your ability to demonstrate mastery of the course-level learning outcomes listed at the start of this instructions file. What that means is that, when the graded Assignment is returned to you, you    will receive three letters that indicate which level on the rubric your submission received for the three  Learning Outcomes being evaluated. As an example, you might receive:

• P for Vocabulary, indicating that your submission demonstrated proficiency for the learning outcome, “Apply vocabulary to describe statistical concepts, procedures, and ideas; distinguish among common sampling designs”, and,

• M for Justification, indicating your submission demonstrated mastery of the learning outcome, “Justify the choice of statistical procedures”, and,