Qualitative Critique Examples

The research question and hypothesis are not clearly stated within the article.

Critique of research questions and hypothesis. While the authors clearly state that the purpose of this study was to expand upon existing research to explore the benefits of a VSM intervention on increasing social engagement in young children with ASD, a research question and hypothesis are not clearly stated. Implications for readers are that we are left to assume the research questions and hypothesis. The development of a good research question and hypothesis provides readers with a definition of the parameters of what is being investigated, as well as a framework for what is necessary to conduct the study. Without a clear description of the research question

Roger was 4 years, 4 months and is diagnosed with pervasive developmental disorder-not otherwise specified (PDD-NOS). His communication consisted of single words and a few echolalic three word phrases. Dylan was 5 years, 1 month and diagnosed with autism. His communication consisted of 2 to 3 word phrases, which were mainly echolalic. Both participants were given their diagnosis from a prior multidisciplinary clinic specializing in autism, where the assessment included areas in cognition, developmental interviews with parents, adaptive behavior measurements, observations, and autism-specific measures. The school system appraisal team confirmed the diagnosis of Roger and Dylan. Both participants were described as withdrawn. They also exhibited limited verbalizations and nonverbal engagement with peers and adults. Roger and Dylan received speech and language services throughout their school district prior to the research

Both participants, Dylan and Roger, were selected from the same half-day public preschool program, which is known as convenience sampling. Random sampling was not used, which may introduce a variety of threats to internal and external validity. Since this sampling method does not represent the entire population of children with autism spectrum disorders, it cannot be generalized to the population. This threat to external validity is known as generalization across participants. One of the threats to internal validity that occurred due to the sampling method was differential selection. The participants in this study were different in a multitude of ways, causing the independent variable to react differently based on the participant. If random sampling was used, this threat would be less likely. For example, Dylan was able to speak in two to three word sentences, whereas Roger only used mainly single words.

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