Includes bibliographical references and index.

The fundamentals: The nature and tools of research -- Focusing your research efforts: The problem: the heart of the research process -- Review of the related literature -- Planning your research project -- Writing the research proposal -- Quantitative research: Descriptive research -- Experimental, quasi-experimental, and ex post facto designs -- Analyzing quantitative data -- Qualitative research: qualitative research methods -- Historical research -- Analyzing qualitative data -- Mixed-methods research: Mixed-methods designs -- Research reports: Planning and preparing a final research report -- Appendix A: using a spreadsheet: Microsoft Excel -- Appendix B: Using SPSS.