PUBH 6330 WEEK 1 ASSIGNMENT
How do public health professionals determine which study design is most effective for informing public health practice?
When making this determination, health professionals determine study designs using the following questions: What is the research question? Who is the population of interest? What information needs to be obtained? What is the expected duration of the study? What are the total costs associated with the study?
For this Assignment, you are provided with a worksheet that describes a number of scenarios related to public health research to practice identifying the most appropriate study design. Review this week’s Learning Resources and reflect on the types of study designs and variables demonstrated in each scenario.
To prepare:
Review the following examples of each study design:
Cohort:
Mirzaei, M., Salehi-Abargouei, A., Mirzaei, M., & Mohsenpour, M. A. (2018). Cohort profile: The Yazd Health Study (YaHS): A population-based study of adults aged 20–70 years (study design and baseline population data). International Journal of Epidemiology, 47(3), 697–698h.
Case-Control:
Leiva-Gea, I., Sánchez-Alcoholado, L., Martín-Tejedor, B., Castellano-Castillo, D., Moreno-Indias, I., Urda-Cardona, A., Tinahones, F. J., Fernández-García, J. C., & Queipo-Ortuño, M. I. (2018). Gut microbiota differs in composition and functionality between children with type 1 diabetes and MODY2 and healthy control subjects: A case-control study. Diabetes Care, 41(11), 2385–2395. https://doi.org/10.2337/dc18-0253
Cross-Sectional:
Sagherian, K., Steege, L. M., Cobb, S. J., & Cho, H. (2020). Insomnia, fatigue and psychosocial well‐being during COVID‐19 pandemic: A cross‐sectional survey of hospital nursing staff in the United States. Journal of Clinical Nursing, 1–14. https://doi.org/10.1111/jocn.15566
Ecological:
Bixby, H., Hodgson, S., Fortunato, L., Hansell, A., & Fecht, D. (2015). Associations between green space and health in English cities: An ecological, cross-sectional study. PLoS One, 10(3), e0119495. https://doi.org/10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0119495
Download and review the following:
Document: Glossary of Terms Key from PUBH 6036: Public Health Research Methods (Word)Download Glossary of Terms Key from PUBH 6036: Public Health Research Methods (Word)
Document: Study Design and Variables Worksheet (Word)Download Study Design and Variables Worksheet (Word)
Complete the optional practice problems at the end of each chapter:
Sullivan, L. M. (2023). Essentials of biostatistics in public health (4th ed., R. Riegelman, Ed.). Jones & Bartlett Learning.
Chapter 2, “Study Designs” (pp. 22–23)
Chapter 4, “Summarizing Data Collected in the Sample” (pp. 65–67)
The Assignment
In this Assignment, you will complete the Study Design and Variables Worksheet to reinforce the concepts associated with study designs, types of variables (independent, dependent), and levels of measurements (categorical, ordinal, continuous). This Study Design and Variables Worksheet will provide you with different scenarios that require you to determine the type of study design presented and explore concepts associated with the study presented