The course will cover the following topics: - How to find good research questions. - How to write a thesis and research proposal. - General writing rules. - Field research methods. - Social surveys, including sampling, questionnaire design and analysis. - Secondary data. Experimental methods. - Impact studies. - Introduction to the STATA statistical package. - Introduction to literature search.

In this course, students should be able to find and present a researchable topic within economics and to write a research proposal for their thesis. In order to write a research proposal they need to be able to: - Demonstrate command of existing knowledge within their research topic. - Use existing knowledge to explore the issue of interest formulate researchable research questions and hypotheses. - Identify relevant data sources either existing data sources or through a plan to collect their own data and understand the methods used to compile and analyse the data.

Lectures and presentations with group discussion. Individual supervision while writing the research proposal for the master thesis.

Students will be allocated a supervisor for their MSc thesis in the beginning of this course. The supervisors will discuss research topics and give close supervision during the writing of the research proposals.

Selected journal articles and book chapters.

Fundamental knowledge of economic theory and method, e.g. ECN212 Microeconomics or ECN210/211 Microeconomics II and ECN222 Economics II, ECN201 Econometrics.

Preliminary research proposal. Stata exercise. No re-examination. Mandatory activity is valid until the next time the course is offered.

The semester assignment (research proposal) is due in April, and makes up 100%of the final grade.

150 hours

Minimum requirements for entrance to higher education in Norway (generell studiekompetanse).

ECN351, 5 ECTS. The same reduction for other similar courses.

Classes during the 6 weeks of the term (2x2 hours per week). Proposal to be submitted in April.

The course gives an inttroduction to research methods that are relevant for the Master thesis. It is particularly useful for students planning to collect own data, but it also covers research methods more generally. The project description is the first step in the work on the Master thesis.

External examiner will control the quality of syllabus, questions for the final examination, and principles for the assessment of the examination answers. Internal examiners will be used to assess the semester assignment.