CHAPTER III

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

This chapter presents the research design, setting, information on the

respondents and sampling procedure, data gathering procedure, scoring and

the statistical treatment used in analyzing and interpreting the data gathered in

the study.

RESEARCH DESIGN

A descriptive comparative research design will be utilized for this study. It

involves gathering the data that describes events, organizing, tabulating,

depicting, and describing the data that will be collected. It is aimed at finding

out "what is," that is why observational and survey methods are frequently used

to collect descriptive data (Glass & Hopkins, 1984). The researchers believe that

making use of the survey technique is suitable for the study because it is a non-

experimental research. On the other hand, acomparative study is a type of

descriptive research design which involves comparing and contrasting two or

more samples on the basis of selected attribute at single point of time. The two

mentioned research design is appropriate for this studybecause the

researchersaim to describe the respondents level of awareness in terms ofthe

HIV/AIDS basic information, HIV/AIDS mode of transmission, HIV/AIDS prevention,

HIV/AIDS testing, and lastly HIV/AIDS availability of healthcare services. Another

goal of this research is to compare the level of awareness and perception of the

respondents from public and private high schools.

SETTING

The setting of the pilot study and the final study will be focused on the

Senior High Schools located within Cagayan de Oro City. The researchers

agreed that Xavier University-Ateneo de Cagayan Senior High School and

Cagayan de Oro National High School will be appropriate for the study. The

selections were based on the following criteria first; the setting should be

convenient for the researchers, it should be located within Cagayan de Oro City

and near Xavier University College parameters. Second; the school must have

the appropriate number of students that will yield adequate representation.

Third; the location of the school should be in locations that promote various

activities which influences the studentssexual behaviours.

Xavier University-Ateneo de Cagayan is private institution run by the

Jesuits and has a population of one thousand three hundred seventy-seven

senior high students. On the other hand, Cagayan de Oro National High School

is a government owned institution with a total of four hundred thirty-four senior

high students. The inclusion of both public and private school students and given

that Xavier is a catholic institution while City High School is not would allow the

researchers to get varied samples which would properly represent senior high

students coming from the two major types of schools commonly found here in
Cagayan de Oro namely: Public and Private schools. Cagayan de Oro National

High School is just 800 meters away from the Xavier University Campus with this; it

would be convenient for the researchers to conduct the study due to the close

proximity of the two schools. In addition, the researchers believe that the two

schools have the appropriate number of senior high school students to support

the study. The schools are also located near to the testing centers of the city

such as Northern Mindanao Medical Center also known as NMMC and City

Health Office; the researchers believe that this proximity with testing centers may

have significance effect on the results of the study.

RESPONDENTS AND SAMPLING PROCEDURE

The criteria for inclusion of the respondents in the study are the following:

The inclusion criteria of the respondents of the study specifically pertains

to the following: only a total of five hundred six Grade 12 students in both

selected Senior High Schools, they must be currently attending their respective

tracks (ABM, HUMSS, STEM, GAS, TVL-EIM, TVL-HE-COMBI and TVL-ICT strands) in

this school year 2017-2018, a male or female, able to understand English

medium, was eighteen years old on the day of the data gathering. On the other

hand, the study excludes their cultural differences as it will not greatly affect and

deviate the results simply in fact that the respondents lived in the same island

and shared the same culture as Filipinos. Another exclusion is the respondents
civil status of being single or in a relationship as the study will not focus on the

sexual practices of the respondents. This study will greatly benefit various group

such as follows: for the local government and the Department of Health on this

Region as this will serve as a basis on knowing the level of awareness on

HIV/AIDS among this age group and to evaluate among themselves on what

further actions to do in addressing this concern, for the Senior High School

students as this will help them know what extent of knowledge and important

aspects must be focused in teaching them. On the positive side, there were no

potential risks identified in the process of this study as it will only intend to

determine the respondents level of awareness on HIV/AIDS and the questions

given were thoroughly examined from various validated questionnaires and

selected only those items which are appropriate to the respondents level of

understanding and within the limits. The questions does not provoke their private

acts or practices to sexuality as it will only test their extent of awareness. Consent

forms were ensured and given to the respondents and to their

parents/guardians validating that they affirm in participating and was

knowledgeable on the process of this study.

Participants were drawn from a purposive sampling or also known as

judgement sampling. According to Polit and Beck (2008), in this particular

method the researchers will decide purposely to select subjects who are

judged are particularly knowledgeable about the issues under study (p.343).

The respondents will be randomly hand-picked only to those who are eighteen
years old on the day of the final data gathering. In addition, it gives focus on

particular characteristics of a population that are of interest, which will best

enable to answer the research questions. This study was a sensitive one which

pertains to HIV/AIDS awareness and it will be more acceptable to be answered

by eighteen years olds since by law, this age is when someone is officially and

legally treated as an adult and was mature enough to make important

decisions without the guidance of a parent or other adult. In calculating the

appropriate sample size from the population, Slovins formula n = N / (1 + N e2)

with the margin of error at 0.05 will be draw on yielding the sample size of three

hundred one respondents from Xavier University Ateneo de Cagayan Senior

High School and two hundred five respondents from Cagayan de Oro National

High School. Letters containing the purpose of the study and permission to

include the senior high school students in the study will be sent to the schools

respective principals; Ms. Minda S. Rebollido, PhD of Cagayan de Oro National

High School and Dr. Rogelio Gawan, PhD of Xavier University Ateneo de

Cagayan Senior High School.

DATA GATHERING INSTRUMENT AND PROCEDURE

Data collection will be done through an instrument strategically structured

to meet all the goals of this research. Most of the questions found in the

questionnaire are formulated by the researchers themselves and some are

adopted from questionnaires in other similar research by Carey, M. P., &

Schroder, K. E. E. (2002). The tool is divided into two major parts, the first section

contains the profile of the respondent which includes the gender, type of

school, age, estimated monthly income of parents or guardian, and the most

influential information source they have about HIV/AIDS. The second part

contains statements about HIV/AIDS and is subdivided into four parts. The

statements can be answered by three choices: Highly Aware, Less Aware, and

Not Aware. Their answers will depend on their overall awareness regarding

HIV/AIDS. The first subpart contains questions that will determine the

respondents level of awareness regarding the basic information of HIV/AIDS.

The second set of questions tests the respondents level of awareness regarding

aids prevention. The third section will determine the respondents level of

awareness in the transmission of HIV/AIDS and lastly the availability of healthcare

and testing services.

The respondents will be given sufficient time to answer the questionnaires

in order for them to fully understand the statements and reflect on their answers

well. It was found out that it will take approximately 5 minutes to answer the tool.

Neither fees nor will payment of any form be collected from the respondents

throughout the study. Any personal relation of the researchers with a respondent

will not affect the study in any way for another researcher who has no relation

with the respondent will be tasked to facilitate the survey and would ensure to

keep the said respondents anonymity. Before distributing the questionnaires,

researchers will distribute consent forms containing all the needed information
that the students and parents need to fully understand the study. The consent

form also ensures anonymity and confidentiality of all the respondents personal

data. The tool will be answered wherever the respondent feels comfortable.

Also, the researchers will remain with the respondents to address concerns and

clarifications. The data collected will be secured inside the College of Nursing

Faculty room, where only the administration and the faculty members could

gain access to it.

VALIDITY AND RELIABILITY

To ensure the reliability of the instrument, in the first week of classes (June

2017) a pilot test will be conducted to a total of one hundred thirty-eight

respondents from Xavier University Ateneo de Cagayan Senior High School and

forty-three respondents from Cagayan de Oro National High School. After the

pilot study, Cronbachs Alpha will be used to determine the consistency and as

well as the reliability of the questionnaire. This is commonly used in researches

that utilize multiple Likert-questions in studies like this. The chosen students for the

pilot study will be excluded from the final data gathering respondents group.

The instrument will be examined by HIV experts; Dr. JoselitoTeodolfo Retuya, the

Social Hygiene Clinic Physician at City Health Office, Ms. Cheryl Berdos Larios,

the level IV Infection Control Nurse at Northern Mindanao Medical Center, Ms.

Pheobe Joy Parel, a HIV Project Nurse at City Health Office, together with Mr.
Eric Jose S. Rudinas, a statistician at Xavier University to ensure the validity of the

tool. The final data collection will be on July 2017.

SCORING PROCEDURE

For this instrument, the first part containing the demographic data of the

respondents will have a simple scoring procedure due to the nature of the

questions and the type of data that will be gathered. This part will be used to

determine the factors that contribute to the level of awareness. These factors

are: gender, type of school, age, estimated monthly income of parents or

guardian, and the most influential information source they have about HIV/AIDS.

A modified-Likert scale will then be utilized in the second major part of this

questionnaire. This scale is widely used in scaling responses in research survey

questionnaires especially when it comes to studies like this where awareness is

measured. This type of data gathering procedure will enable the researchers to

effectively measure the level of awareness since it provides three levels. With

these three levels, the researchers will be able to effectively get the most

accurate responses from the respondents. In the modified Likert-scale

respondents will choose between three answers (Highly aware, less Aware, and

Not Aware) with corresponding point systems based on the nature of the

questions. The highest score that a respondent can get from each question is 3

points and the lowest is 1 point. This method will provide a more organized data

collection and will enable easy computation and interpretation of the scores.
 A computed scoring range is provided through the Grouped Frequency

Distribution method. This is done through finding the smallest and largest values

in the data, and calculating the range. Then an approximate group size is

calculated, by dividing the range by the number of groups (3). The ranges

computed with their corresponding category labels are: 2.4-3 (Highly Aware),

1.8-2.3 (Less Aware), 1.2-1.7 (Not Aware). The table below will show a clearer

picture of the range computed.

POINT MEAN LEVEL OF DESCRIPTION

SYSTEM SCORE AWARNESS
INTERVAL

3 2.4-3 Highly Aware Individuals who are fully aware exhibit maximum
levels of awareness with regards to the HIV/AIDS
basic information, prevention, transmission, and
availability of health care services.

2 1.8-2.3 Less Aware Individuals have very little awareness about the
HIV/AIDS basic information, prevention,
transmission, and availability of health care
services.

1 1.2-1.7 Not Aware Individuals are not aware with the HIV/AIDS basic
information, prevention, transmission, and
availability of health care services.

Table 1. Scoring Range

STATISTICAL TREATMENT

Various statistical treatments are used in order to effectively analyze the

data gathered. In our 1st problem statement, the frequency and percentage of

all respondents responses with regards to their profile namely: age, gender,

socio-economic status, access to information, and type of school will be

computed through the frequency and percentage method. The frequency will

enable the researchers to determine the most common responses and the

responses with the least number in each variable. This method will provide a

clearer result which will yield to simple data interpretation. Also, according to Ari

Read (2017), frequency distributions, are one of the most common methods in

presenting descriptive data. She also stated that variations or trends in a data

can also be easily seen using this method.

For our 2nd problem statement, each of the respondents corresponding

scores in the modified Likert-scale will be tallied. When all the individual scores

are tallied the researchers will then determine the sample mean score. This

method is easy to work with and researchers can further use the data it will yield

for further analysis (Macroption, 2017). Also determining the mean score will

enable the researchers to easily interpret the data gathered because it provides

a general estimation of the level of awareness of the respondents with the

mean score.

Along with the mean scores, the median scores will also be determined.

This is done by arranging all the scores in chronological order. And by finding the
middle array (if the observations is odd) or finding the two middle values (if the

observations is even). This will divide the respondents Likert-scale scores into two

equal parts. This will allow the researchers to observe the values in the upper

and lower limits which results in a more comprehensive data interpretation.

For our 3rd problem statement, since two populations will be compared in

this study, the statistical treatment that will be utilized is the Hypothesis Testing for

Two Population Means. A t-test will be utilized since the standard deviation is not

known. This method will determine whether or not there are significant

differences between the level of awareness of HIV/AIDS among public and

private senior high students and as well as their age and gender. Since there will

more than 2 data that will be collected in the respondents socioeconomic

status, and access to information, an F-test (ANOVA) will be used to determine

whether or not these variables have significant differences.