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BUILDING A RESEARCH
Abstract
This research is intended to explore the influence of sleep quality on the general health
and wellness of medical students knowing that sleep is the key to their tough academic and
professional lives. The intervention group (n=100) will be selected randomly from among the
medical students at Yale University and will be required to adhere to a structured sleep
improvement program while the remaining 100 will act as the control group adhering to their
regular sleep pattern. The randomized controlled trial design with internal validity helps
eliminate biases and confounding factors that may mask the causal relation between health
outcomes and sleep intervention. The research uses a mixed-methods approach which involves
the application of quantitative surveys and qualitative techniques such as in-depth interviews and
focus groups. This combination aims at a holistic analysis of the relationship between sleep
quality and the welfare of medical students, that takes into account the statistical significance, as
well as the lived realities and subjective experiences associated with sleep and health. The study
envisages valuable outcomes to be used to develop interventions that are designed to address the
distinctive hurdles students of medicine face in the process of remaining healthy.
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BUILDING A RESEARCH
Building a Research Design Template
Approved Research Question
How does sleep quality impact medical students’ overall health and well-being?
Experimental Design (Experimental, Quasi-experimental, Correlational)
In the experimental group participants will participate in a structured activity to improve
sleep quality whereas in the control group, they keep their normal sleep habits. Thus, this
structure will make it possible for us to discover the causality relationships between the
independent variables (sleep quality intervention) and the dependent variables (health and well-
being).
Participants
The study will be carried out on the 200 medical students, which is a clear and specific
population of Yale University. Participants will be selected using a random sampling method to
provide representativeness of the whole medical school population. The inclusion criteria will
mainly entail medical students from different years of study and both genders, to reflect the
diversity in the medical student community. Participants will be asked to provide written,
informed consent and continue adhering to the study protocol, which involves taking part in the
sleep quality intervention or following their regular sleep patterns if they belong to the control
group.
Methodology
The methodology used for this study is a blend of quantitative and qualitative techniques.
The qualitative aspect contains the use of qualitative methods such as in-depth interviews and
focus groups to explore the contradictions, tensions, and meanings attached to sleep by the study
participants. In addition, a qualitative phenomenological perspective will also be adopted to
appreciate the subjective experience of medical students on sleep and the effects of the
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BUILDING A RESEARCH
phenomena on their well-being (Alotaibi et al., 2020). Phenomenology aims at a profound
understanding of a certain attitude and emotional world. Two different approaches were
developed to ensure the understanding of the complex link between the quality of sleep and the
general well-being of medical students.
Data Collection
A structured method will be used to collect the data which consists of both quantitative
and qualitative instruments. The quantitative component will ask respondents to take surveys to
measure different parameters, specifically, sleep quality, health status, and well-being at different
time points for pre and post-comparisons. The sleep-related aspects can be monitored by
technology-oriented solutions such as wearables (Cazolari et al., 2020). The data, in qualitative
form, will be obtained from a semi-structured interview that will be done with a focus group,
with the purpose of uncovering subjective realities concerning sleep and health. Both qualitative
and quantitative data produce richer insights into the research context due to the possibility of
analyzing both statistical significance and lived student experiences.
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