Includes bibliographical references and indexes.

Introduction -- Developing a research question -- Questions originat ing in library and information practice -- Descriptions of phenomena or settings -- Testing hypotheses -- Questions related to theory / Chad M organ and Barbara M. Wildemuth -- Case studies / Songphan Choemprayong and Barbara M. Wildemuth -- Naturalistic research / Abe J. Crystal and Barbara M. Wildemuth -- Longitudinal studies -- Delphi studies / Lili L uo and Barbara M. Wildemuth -- Quasi-experimental studies / Carolyn Han k andBarbara M. Wildemuth -- Experimental studies / Barbara M. Wildemut h and Leo L. Cao -- Sampling for extensive studies -- Sampling for inte nsive studies / Barbara M. Wildemuth and Leo L. Cao -- Studying special populations / Carol L. Perryman and Barbara M. Wildemuth -- Historical research / Chad Morgan and Barbara M. Wildemuth -- Existing documents and artifacts as data -- Transaction logs / Laura Sheble and Barbara M. Wildemuth -- Think-aloud protocols / Sanghee Oh and Barbara M. Wildemu th -- Direct observation -- Participant observation -- Research diaries / Laura Sheble and Barbara M. Wildemuth -- Unstructured interviews / Y an Zhang and Barbara M. Wildemuth -- Semistructured interviews / Lili L uo and Barbara M. Wildemuth -- Focus groups / Barbara M. Wildemuth and Mary Wilkins Jordan -- Survey research / Carolyn Hank, Mary Wilkins Jor dan, and Barbara M. Wildemuth -- Measuring cognitive and affective vari ables -- Developing new measures / Songphan Choemprayong and Barbara M. Wildemuth -- Content analysis / Kristina M. Spurgin and Barbara M. Wil demuth -- Qualitative analysis of content / Yan Zhang and Barbara M. Wi ldemuth -- Discourse analysis / Barbara M. Wildemuth and Carol L. Perry man -- Analytic induction / Kristina M. Spurgin and Barbara M. Wildemut h -- Descriptive statistics -- Frequencies, cross-tabulation, and the c hi square statistic -- Analyzing sequences of events -- Correlation -- Comparing means : t tests and analysis of variance / Abe J. Crystal and Barbara M. Wildemuth -- Putting it all together.