Department of Psychology at Ibn Haldun University has organized a workshop to increase the knowledge and skills about the methods of research which is considered very essential for a research university like Ibn Haldun. Associate Professor Bircan Erbaş from the School of Psychology&Public Healty in the College of Science, Health and Engineering at La Trobe Universtiy, Australia, who is also considered to be one of the best in the world in methodolgy is invited to lead the workshop. On the first day of a week long workshop, how to develop a research question was on the agenda. Associate professor Bircan Erbaş underlined that the most important part of a research is to develop a relevant question and said "A hypothesis could be well developed with a research question that can be tested and that way a researcher can meet the expectations." Stating that a research thesis should adress a mass of international audience, Erbaş emphasized that academic research should be done in groups and the results should be shared out globally. Erbaş said, "Researches are done in groups in Australia and the research questions are developed in those groups." Dr. Erbaş stressed that it is very vital to review the literature to evaluate the research question and to develop it in maximun impartiality. To determine the headline of the research and the methodology and reviewing literature will also be evaluated during the week of the workshop. Introduction to qualitative research, strength of evidence and evidence in practice, different research designs in qualitative research, introduction to quantitative research methods and design, data source and data collection, data types and preliminary investigation are the other subjects that will be discussed during the workshop.
Associate professor Erbaş is accepted one of the leading academics in research methodology in the world. She is a biostatistician with a masters degree on statistics and a PhD from University of Melbourne in biostatistics. She was invited to the National Institute of Environmental Health Services, North Carolina, USA as a result of her doctoral work. For the past couple of years she has worked at the interface between modern statistical methods, environmental epidemiology, asthma and allergic disease in both children and adults and other chronic diseases. In 2008, Dr. Erbaş and her colleagues were awarded an NHMRC project grant to assess the relationship between environmental pollen, fungi and the admission of children with poorly controlled asthma. Dr. Erbaş is also a chief investigator on several competetive (NHMRC and other) funded projects on environmental and respiratory health. She has received a fully funded prestigious Harvard fellowship from the International Union Against Cancer – UICC. She was shortlisted as a potential awardee fort he European Respiratory Society (ERS) Prestigious Paediatric Research Awards and in 2010, she was awarded the Vice Chancellor Award for Excellence in Research – La Trobe University. Dr. Erbaş has co-authored over 50 academic referee publications mostly in high quality international journals.
