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PICO PROCESS: HOW TO DO STUDY PROTOCOL FOR UNDERGRADUATE PROJECTS

May 19, 2020. imperial writers

PICO simply stands for:

P – Patient, Problem or Population.

I – Intervention

C – Comparison, control or comparator

Study protocol is very important to fill the gap in the research sector. The research environment is becoming dynamic by the day; more ideas are being rolled out every day. There are lots of undergraduate project topics that one can do a study protocol on. When I say study protocol I did not mean you can just pick a topic and carry out a study protocol on it.

        Every student in a higher institution in Nigeria that is ready to carry out research on his/her final year project topics must have an idea what study protocol is all about. Like I said earlier that you do not just go ahead with any topic and call it a study protocol; we normally carry out a study protocol in areas that are under-researched. The essence of study protocol is to fill the gap in the research environment. There are so many reasons to carry out a study protocol on a research topic, some of these reason could be to either seek for sponsorship to solve a situation; it could also be to bring more research project topics to into the education system.

        There are some topics that are still under-researched in Nigeria; some of them are athletic foot, corona virus, law of extradition, money marriage etc. Now let us carry out a study protocol on one of the keyword mentioned above. Let say we carry out a study protocol on “how to use adult education to control the prevalence of money marriage in Nigeria” the title of your research topic when carrying out a study protocol is usually different from the normal undergraduate research project work. The title for study protocol usually depicts a call for action or solution to a particular problem.

        When carrying out a study protocol on “how to use adult education to control the prevalence of money marriage in Nigeria” the following research questions should guide the research work:

  1. Are people aware of money marriage?
  2. Do we have a team that will counsel people especially those in the rural areas on the dangers of money marriage?
  3. Are funds for mobilization made available for the team that will go into money marriage counseling
  4. Do we need media campaign on how to stop money marriage in Nigeria?

Now you can see from the research questions, I am trying to solve the issue of money marriage in Nigeria and also a way demand for fund to carry out the action. PICO research is more like a kind of advanced project proposal. It is will carry the objectives of the study, the research questions, the significance of the study but the research methodology will be different those in the same format.

        The research methodology for study will be a practical approach to solving the issue of money marriage. The methodology will have the following:

  1. Research design
  2. Area of the study
  3. Population of the study
  4. Sample size
  5. Method of information collection
  6. Method of data analysis

Research design

Here you tell your PICO research coach the kind of research design you want to use, it could survey or otherwise. Then provide justification for using the research design you wish to apply to the study

Area of the study

Every research work must have area of the study; here you look for the area that have the problem your wish or want to solve. Tell your PICO research coach all the information about the area.

Population of the study

Of course you cannot carry out a PICO research (study protocol) on the whole Nigeria; it is time wasting and money consuming. You will have to pick the targeted population that your budget can handle and work with it.

Sample size

The sample size you will use here should be derived from the population of the study. There are so many ways to determine sample size. One of the most popular methods for sample size calculation is the TARO YAMANE sample size calculator. This formula will help you get the sample size from the population you choose to work with.

Method of information collection

There are so many ways one can collect information from his or her respondents; it can be via interview or a well structure questionnaires. Any of the method you use to collect your information is very ok.

Method of data analysis

Here you have to tell your PICO research coach the method you want to use to arrive at a complete solution to a particular problem. The best method that is normally recommended for PICO research is usually the non-parametric test.

 

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