Essay on Research Design: Observation Method

The case involved a situation at Akrons children hospital where they needed an efficient communication strategy that could convey its commitment to children and to distinguish itself as offering quality medical advanced care. The management-research question hierarchy used by the researcher involved six steps. Marcus started by identifying management dilemma which was consumers perceptions and went on to develop management and research question that addressed the consumers decisions in selecting hospitals in the market. He further investigated the question through observation method and measured it through listening, watching and recording interactions of patients with nurses, physicians, and other employees. He concluded by arriving at a management decision of branding the hospital.

The researchers used observational study because it best fits the situation. To make the hospital competitive, several activities such as interaction among its occupants, how staff observes quality standards such as doctors services, actions of the staff, food and other facilitys services that focus on kids must be observed. Observational study extensively addressed but insufficient without the help of other methods because of chances of biases and unreliability.

The observational study was also selected because it is useful when it comes to peoples observation. The consumers make decisions mainly because of emotions and survey can be too rational for emotion study. This is because emotions are just too understated and complicated to establish by answering a survey.

Observational method is important because it accesses situations where other methods of data collection are inappropriate to use. It all accesses people in real life situations and is good for explaining something in its context. Moreover, it provides an in-depth understanding of a situation and also its validity (Cooper and Schindler, 2014).Nevertheless, observation study is advantageous because it is convenient to get primary data of patients interaction with other hospital personnel by just watching them. The data gotten will be reliable, real and insightful.

However, the observational method has several negative impacts. The method can be viewed as too subjective and is time-consuming. In addition to that, it greatly depends on the role of the investigator its openness may affect the situation and validity of its results. Furthermore, it contravenes ethical principles and can result in role conflict for various researchers (Cooper and Schindler, 2014). Moreover, it can be challenging when analyzing because various researchers need to be organized into the same format for integration convenience. It is also hard to differentiate and quantify emotions to achieve a scientific research result. Lastly, the method can be affected by individual perceptions.

Parents Decision Process

When the children fall sick, the parents carefully choose which health facility to take their young ones. Their medical facility should be a reputable institution with good facilities. The parents choose a high-quality hospital that is equipped with necessary equipment such as CT scan, screening machines and dialysis center. In addition to that, the hospital must meet quality standards and be of excellent hygiene. The children rooms must be clean, orderly and comfortable.

Moreover, parents are attracted by good doctors and the hospital employee. Very kind and welcoming staff is an attracting attribute that makes the parents trust their services. The hospital should have adequate highly qualified employees who can treat their young ones faster and more efficiently. Lastly, reasonable costs are another crucial factor when deciding which hospital to choose.

The primary driving factor behind their decision is quality service for their children. For the children to recover quickly, the hospital should have quality equipment and services. Quality care entails being served by trained doctors and being administered with genuine and effective medicines. However, their biggest concern involves the health safety of their children. Parents fear consequences of medical errors on their children or possible infections in the hospital.

Parents think that the major childrens hospitals have good childrens care segments and specialized practice areas for operations. These hospitals can offer cancer support programs for children thus being beneficial to the parent.

Reference

Cooper, D.R., and Schindler, P.S. (2014). Business Research Methods. New York: McGraw-Hill Irwin.