Levels of Depression in West Massachusetts Capstone Project

Running head: DEPRESSION AMONG OLDER IMMIGRANTS DEPRESSION AMONG OLDER IMMIGRANTS 32Depression among Older Immigrant African Women in Metro West MassachusettsLiterature Review SummaryThe data collection methodology that will be used for the research study will be discussed in this section. The methodology will be semi-structured interviews, which will give the researcher an opportunity to explore the participants responses further in order to provide clarification of an answer given. Semi-structured interviews make use of open-ended questions that require an explanation and not just a yes or no answer. Data collection will be done using interviews and the study participants will comprise of social workers working in Metro West Massachusetts. All the interviews will be conducted using internet services like GoToMeeting, skype, Zoom, or any other web-based service due to the current pandemic of Covid-19. Only 10 questions will be asked. The reason for using social workers is for the researcher to get information that is credible and to also be able to get varied insights as the social workers will be dealing with numerous clients. The study participants will be social workers who have been working in the area for a minimum of three years. The idea for this criterion is to ensure that the researcher only interviews social workers who have enough knowledge, and they have been attending to clients in the area for some time. The researcher anticipates to have at least 10-12 social workers taking part in the study. It is assumed that this number will be representative of the population and it is an easy number to work with. Having a large number of participants would result in a lot time spent conducting the interviews and data analysis, which may not offer any considerable difference in the results.The data analysis process will begin with transcription of the audio tapes. The researcher aims at uncovering patterns and making codes for use in the themes that they will discover. The researcher will try to assign each code to a particular theme if possible. However, the researcher is aware there are some codes they will not be using. The data analysis process will comprise of familiarization with the data, assigning preliminary codes for describing the content, searching for patterns in the codes, reviewing themes, defining and naming themes, and producing the report. These steps will be followed systematically to ensure the study does not miss out on anything vital.This researcher has analyzed the ethical procedures that will be used to ensure they safeguard the interview participants and the research study is ethical. The researcher will seek approval of the IRB since they are using human subjects in this study. This is a requirement for all studies that will be involving human subjects. Once they get the approval, the researcher will need to get written consent from the potential participants before they can begin data collection. During the consent seeking process, the researcher will discuss with the participants the role they will play, the purpose of the study, the benefits, risks, and alternatives to participation. It is the duty of the researcher to ensure the potential subjects understand the information given and the participants can ask questions to clarify anything they did not understand. While the researcher might be time pressed, they will give the potential subjects adequate time to review all the information presented before they sign the consent forms. Only after they have signed can they be included in the study. The study participants will have a right to withdraw from the study at any time and they will be provided with all the data collected up until the point…

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…given a written consent form. Once the subject is certain they are willing to participate they will sign the form and hand it back to the researcher.Limitations, Challenges, and/or BarriersRecruiting of the social workers will be a huge challenge for this research mainly due to having no prior relationship with prospective participants. Getting them to trust the researcher will be an uphill task as the nature of their work is sensitive and their discomfort sharing patient information. Another challenge is time limitation, as the social workers might be unavailable for the interviews. Another challenge that might occur is some social workers might have an emergency and, as a result, might have to cancel their interview. This will result in attrition and reduce the number of study participants. This researcher estimates he will have an attrition of less than 5%, which will not have a huge impact on the study results. However, if the researcher notices the attrition is higher than 6% then there is a possibility of attrition bias. To reduce or eliminate attrition bias, the researcher proposes to follow-up with the study participants who cancelled their interviews and encourage them to reschedule the interview. Face-to-face interviews may not be feasible due to COVID 19. To overcome this challenge the researcher proposes to make use of internet services like GoToMeeting, skype, Zoom, or any other web-based service. Some social workers may not be familiar with these technologies.SummaryAccording to Saeidimehr, Geravandi, Izadmehr, and Mohammadi (2016), reducing the causes of depression is beneficial to society due to a reduced number of people who need mental health services or are living with mental conditions. Results from this investigation can benefit the social workers as they will get insights into strategies, they can use to assist older immigrant African women who are suffering with depression…