Free Paper Sample: Final Project Part I Milestone Two, Research Design

Numerous past research studies have portrayed that there is a close correlation between perinatal exposure of a fetus to a psychologically disturbed environment and the development of mental problems in children, later on in their lives. Even though past research have justified that genetics plays a critical role in the development of mental illness in the children after birth, such illnesses can also be determined by other biological processes. Such are the biological processes that determine the genetic combinations of genes in a zygote formed by the genetic materials from both parents. This activity entails the selection of an appropriate research design, which will be used in finding answers to the research question on how genetics determine the mental and psychological outcomes of children.

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There exists a gap in this field of social psychology because there is no recorded empirical evidence that portrays the relationship between genetics and mental illnesses development. In order to investigate this phenomenon, a correlation research design will be employed. This is because it will not be possible to manipulate or control the independent variables of the research. The research design will be appropriate because the independent variables can only be measured. The choice of this research design is based on the initial research ideas in the module two discussion pertaining the relationship between perinatal mental disorders and the risk of developing psychological problems among children

In the module two discussion, several variables were identified, which included perinatal mental disorders, care giving difficulties and social, economic status. The variables were analyzed with a view of ascertaining whether they have any role in influencing the psychological outcomes of children. Since there is no way that such variables could be manipulated, I decided to use the correlation research design in the concurrent research study focused on establishing the connection between genetics and mental illnesses in children.

There are two elements that are added for consideration when performing the research study. First, mental disorders always encompass more than one gene. Past research studies have supported that mental disorders are caused by different genes, situated in different chromosomes in different persons. Secondly, the genes associated with mental illnesses do not always illustrate the same level of penetrance among persons. In this case, penetrance is the frequency with which a specified gene develops its effects in a specified grouping of persons.

The research design will be implemented by conducting a random survey of women who have had at least one mentally ill child in the past. A questionnaire instrument will be employed to collect data from the women pertaining their knowledge of their genes’ contribution in the mental illnesses of their children. There will be one principal strategy that I will employ in managing the issue of ethics in the proposed research question. Since mental illnesses in children is a sensitive issue among numerous parents, an open-ended questionnaire will be issued to the research participants. This way, they will be in a position to fill in all responses they are comfortable with, especially those pertaining their mentally sick children.