What's included?

Comparisons of methods and designing studies in practice

On this Master’s level course, you will compare methodologies and methods, such case study
approaches, ethnographic studies, quantitative cross-case analysis, experiments, and how they relate to different types of research problems in the realm of environmental science. Methodological issues such as case selection, various types of data collection and the analysis, validity, possibilities for generalisation, etc., are discussed and related to general research design strategies. You will learn to evaluate, select and argue for suitable methods and methodological approaches to a particular environmental research problem and to critically assess studies within environmental science from a methodological
perspective, as well as to make assessments of scientific, methodological, and ethical aspects related to a given research problem.

Course design

This course is structured around lectures and seminars and is assessed through oral presentations during seminars and individual written reports, including designing a study which contains an analysis of an environmental problem using a scientific method. The teaching staff are active researchers.