Unit Synopsis
Research forms the foundation of high quality, evidence-based clinical practice. As a health professional, it is important that you understand how to develop, analyse and use research to facilitate improvement in health outcomes. In this unit, you will develop the knowledge and skills necessary to ethically design a health research project. You will extend your critical thinking and analytical skills through exploration and evaluation of the current health literature to identify a clinically relevant research question. This unit requires you to demonstrate responsibility and accountability for your own learning and work collaboratively with others to develop your research methodology and begin data collection. You will also be required to apply academic conventions to oral and written communication of your research plan. You will finalise your research project in a subsequent term in your capstone research unit - Research Project for Health Professionals 2.
Details
| Level | Undergraduate |
|---|---|
| Unit Level | 4 |
| Credit Points | 6 |
| Student Contribution Band | SCA Band 2 |
| Fraction of Full-Time Student Load | 0.125 |
| Pre-requisites or Co-requisites |
Students must have successfully completed 96 credit points of study within CB66, CB84 or CB87 courses. As part of those 96 credit points, students need to have successfully completed ALLH12006 Evidence Based Practice for Health Professionals. Students enrolled in the Bachelor of Speech Pathology (Honours) need to have successfully completed SPCH13011. Alternatively, students admitted into CC71 are also eligible to enrol in this unit. Important note: Students enrolled in a subsequent unit who failed their pre-requisite unit, should drop the subsequent unit before the census date or within 10 working days of Fail grade notification. Students who do not drop the unit in this timeframe cannot later drop the unit without academic and financial liability. See details in the Assessment Policy and Procedure (Higher Education Coursework). |
| Class Timetable | View Unit Timetable |
| Residential School | No Residential School |
Unit Availabilities from Term 2 - 2026
Attendance Requirements
All on-campus students are expected to attend scheduled classes - in some units, these classes are identified as a mandatory (pass/fail) component and attendance is compulsory. International students, on a student visa, must maintain a full time study load and meet both attendance and academic progress requirements in each study period (satisfactory attendance for International students is defined as maintaining at least an 80% attendance record).
Recommended Student Time Commitment
Each 6-credit Undergraduate unit at CQUniversity requires an overall time commitment of an average of 12.5 hours of study per week, making a total of 150 hours for the unit.
Assessment Tasks
| Assessment Task | Weighting |
|---|---|
| 1. Research Proposal | 40% |
| 2. Research Assignment | 60% |
This is a graded unit: your overall grade will be calculated from the marks or grades for each assessment task, based on the relative weightings shown in the table above. You must obtain an overall mark for the unit of at least 50%, or an overall grade of ‘pass’ in order to pass the unit. If any ‘pass/fail’ tasks are shown in the table above they must also be completed successfully (‘pass’ grade). You must also meet any minimum mark requirements specified for a particular assessment task, as detailed in the ‘assessment task’ section (note that in some instances, the minimum mark for a task may be greater than 50%).
Past Exams
All University policies are available on the Policy web site, however you may wish to directly view the following policies below.
This list is not an exhaustive list of all University policies. The full list of policies are available on the Policy web site.
Feedback, Recommendations and Responses
Every unit is reviewed for enhancement each year. At the most recent review, the following staff and student feedback items were identified and recommendations were made.
Source: SUTE comments
Students reported that they were well supported in completing their research projects.
It is recommended that the unit coordinator continues to provide support to students via weekly tutorial discussions and encourages supervisors to meet with their students fortnightly for discipline specific support.
The unit coordinators have continued to provide support to students via reflective and conversational weekly tutorials, and have furthered communication with research supervisors to ensure students receive appropriate discipline-specific support.
Source: Student email correspondence and SUTE comments
The students found it very challenging to fit their research protocol into a 10-minute presentation.
It is recommended that the unit coordinator updates the research protocol presentation to a written protocol. This will allow students to provide a more detailed description of their research protocol.
Assessment Task 1 was redesigned as a written proposal to better support research development, student understanding, and presentation of proposed research details. This redesign was well received by students and supervisors.
Source: Student SUTE Feedback
Students highlighted the value of learning materials being up to date and aligned with the unit structure, assessments and research progress.
It is recommended that the unit learning content be reviewed regularly and updated when required, to ensure all learning content is aligned with the structure of the unit, assessment expectations, and research processes.
In Progress
Source: Student SUTE Feedback
Students note the inherent difficulties regarding group work and assessments, and the associated impacts on assessment and research progress.
It is recommended that the unit coordinators continue to provide clear advice regarding facilitators and barriers to successful management of group work early in the term. Unit coordinators may also explore additional methods of providing group work advice and consultation throughout the term.
In Progress
Source: Student SUTE Feedback
Students reported lower satisfaction with the usefulness of the knowledge and skills developed in the unit.
It is recommended that the unit coordinator further highlight the relationship between research and practice, discuss research skills within evidence-based practice and use research examples with clear links to clinical practice.
In Progress
On successful completion of this unit, you will be able to:
- Appraise and synthesise relevant theory, knowledge and evidence to develop and support a research question relevant to health
- Design and conduct a research project applying ethical principles relevant to your health discipline and the Australian context
- Adapt communication to describe and justify your research design in different formats
- Critically reflect on the relationships between theory, research, and clinical practice
| Assessment Tasks | Learning Outcomes | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | |
| 1 - Research Proposal | • | • | • | |
| 2 - Research Assignment | • | • | • | • |
| Graduate Attributes | Learning Outcomes | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | |
| 1 - Communication | • | • | • | • |
| 2 - Problem Solving | • | |||
| 3 - Critical Thinking | • | • | • | |
| 4 - Information Literacy | • | • | ||
| 5 - Team Work | • | |||
| 6 - Information Technology Competence | • | • | ||
| 7 - Cross Cultural Competence | • | |||
| 8 - Ethical practice | • | • | • | |
| 9 - Social Innovation | • | • | ||
| Assessment Tasks | Graduate Attributes | ||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 10 | |