Report: Dissertation Critique of Saba's ESL Writing Study

This report provides a critical analysis of Maggie Saba's 2013 dissertation, "Writing in a New Environment: Saudi ESL Students Learning Academic Writing." The critique examines the study's purpose, research questions, theoretical framework, and its place within existing literature. It assesses the appropriateness of the qualitative case study approach, focusing on data collection methods like interviews and observations, and addresses ethical considerations. The analysis delves into the data analysis process, including thematic analysis, and discusses the study's findings in relation to existing research and recommendations for future studies. The report concludes by evaluating the dissertation's overall structure, methodology, and its contribution to the field of ESL writing, highlighting its strengths and potential limitations in meeting research standards. The report underscores the dissertation's value in understanding the challenges faced by Saudi ESL students and its implications for teaching practices.

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Saba, M. S., 2013. Writing in a New Environment: Saudi ESL Students Learning Academic
Writing. Virginia: Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University Dissertation Critique
Student’s Name
University
Course
Date
Instructor

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Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................2
Purpose and questions/objectives of the study................................................................................2
Theoretical framework.....................................................................................................................2
Situation of the study within the literature already conducted in the field......................................3
Research Approach..........................................................................................................................4
Research methods............................................................................................................................5
Analysis and discussion of results and recommendations...............................................................6
References........................................................................................................................................8

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Introduction
Critique is an element of academic research through reviewing the different elements of the
study to justify their effectiveness in the research. This means that the focus is on each of the
elements of the study justifying the reasons why the researcher adopted one method and not the
other one (Vance, et al., 2013, p. 69). This report analyses Saba, M. S., 2013. Writing in a New
Environment: Saudi ESL Students Learning Academic Writing to assess the ability of the
research to meet the requred research standards.
Purpose and questions/objectives of the study
The purpose of a study explains what the researcher seeks to achieve by explaining how
the research question will be answered. The purpose of Saba (2013, p. 63) study has been clearly
defined and is supported by the introduction and the problem statement. The introduction offers
an overview and background information of the study by offering the existing literature on the
topic, to identify gaps in research that need to be addressed. The purpose of the study has also
been broken down into objectives and research questions that will be studied. When carrying out
a study, the researcher is supposed to have clearly defined objectives that are developed from the
research topic variables and the purpose of the study (Atmowardoyo 2018, p. 199). This means
that the objectives and the research question utilize the variables to breakdown the purpose of the
study into researchable questions that when answered respond to the study. The research also
used a problem statement to offer a clear concise description of the issues that are addressed in
the study, the gaps in existing research and how the research will answer the problem and
contribute to existing research.
Theoretical framework

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The study used a theoretical framework by integrating two theories: the theory of
intellectual and ethical development and theory of women’s ways of knowing. This provides a
rationale for researching investigating a research problem. Huggins & Johnston (2015, p. 5)
suggests that the model is used to form a structure that guides the research and offers background
information on which the study is justified. Through the framework, the researcher can assess the
perspective of the research to demonstrate the way the research problem relates to the existing
research frameworks. The role of the theory is to relate the research problem to existing literature
to provide a rationale for the research problem. This also provides how the researcher will
conceptualize and investigate the problem. This also forms the basis of data interpretation since
it allows the researcher.
Situation of the study within the literature already conducted in the field
A good study is supposed to build on existing research knowledge and develop a basis for
future research. The literature section is used to present different research studies done on the
topic. They have been presented in the form of objectives to analyses what other studies have
found on the topic. This part is a synthesis of literature and other theoretical frameworks that
exist on the topic. The researcher builds on both research studies and education resources in
Saudi Arabia to justify the state of education in the country. Previous studies offer the
background information on the research topic allowing the researcher to relate different studies
that have been done on the topic to identify the gaps that exist in research. Colquitt & George
(2011, p. 433) suggest that good research needs to be developed on previous research to identify
gaps in research that have been identified by different researchers. Gaps are identified from
limitations and recommendations for future research. The study built on using previous studies to
justify the rationale for carrying out the research and the issues that need to be addressed.

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Research Approach
The methodology of the study is determined by the nature of the research questions
which define whether the data being collected is qualitative or quantitative. Being a qualitative
study, a case study was appropriate to carry out a qualitative inquiry for investigating the
phenomenon. Starman (2013, p. 29) suggests that this study is largely used in education research
since it is based on an in-depth investigation of participants in a study to explores the causes of
the underlying phenomena. The strength of this research method is based on exploring the
phenomena within its context while at the same time allowing the researcher to explore a variety
of lenses that relate to the study. Cases studies are seen as a collective exploration of the
individual case which forms the interaction between the participats of the study and the problem.
In this case, the participants of the study are Saudi ESL students while the study is a new study
environment. Through the case study design, the study provids a holistic picture of the study
phenomenon within natural settings. Flyvbjerg (2011, P. 307) argues that the success of a case
study in research is defined by the collection of qualitative data in words rather figures. This type
of data is presented in themes that justify the phenomenon topics rather than statistical figures.
This the choice of the design was appropriate based on the study nature and the data that will be
collected. Despite that case studies have been described as being limited by their limited
reliability and challenges in the construction of validity. The researcher addressed this problem
through the triangulation of data to compare the consistency of the data.
Research methods
The research methods are an important part of research since they determine how the
researcher will collect and present data for the study. The choice of the data collection method
adopted by the researcher is defined by the study design. Interviews were used to collect data

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from the participants of the study. The interview process offers the researcher a better
environment for utilizing the additional elements of research like observation which add more
insight to the study. This can also be a way of learning from others to develop multiple
descriptions of the participants. The interview was in a semi-structured form that allowed the
researcher to use storytelling from the participants of the study. Interviews offer better data since
they allow the researcher to clarify areas that have not been understood well which allows
refining of the research and have a better understanding of the research phenomena. The
researcher did one interview at the beginning of the study and at the end of the study to verify the
data that has been collected through other collection methods.
The second data collection method was the observation of the participants in their natural
settings. The strength of this method is that it improves data collection since the participants
were not aware that they were being observed. Mannik & McGarry (2017, 22) argue that in this
method, the role of the researcher is documenting the observations as they occur in their natural
settings and areas that are not clear can be justified through a follow-up interview.
Ethical considerations are important in any study that involves human subjects. In this
study, the researcher sought the consent of the participants by requesting them to sign a consent
form showing that they had agreed in the study (Fouka & Mantzorou 2011, p. 6). The
participants were also free to drop out of the research at any point since it was based on
voluntary acceptance. The role of the consent form is to assure the participants of the integrity of
the data collected and how it will be used. The researcher also sought consent from the academic
institution to gain the authority to carry out the research.
Analysis and discussion of results and recommendations

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According to Flick (2012, p. 5) suggests that in qualitative data analysis, the data is
classified and interpreted in lingusiic material for making statements about the implicit or explict
dimesion structure in the study. The data analysis started by transcribing of the interview data
and triangulating the data to determine if the data from the three sources were consistent. The
data were analyzed in two qualitative categories. This blended method as defined by the
heterogeneity of the respondents since some issues related to male while others were related to
female students. The qualitative interviewing method of Rubin and Rubin was used to classify
the data into themes for easy analysis. The data was presented in themes based on the research
questions and objectives. Udo (2019, 184) suggests that thematic analysis is used in presenting
qualitatoive data making it easy for the researcher to classify collected data according to themes.
Since the data was collected qualitatively, themes allow the researcher to present the data in a
format that makes it easy to conclude. Each of the themes connected to a research objective that
was related to the theoretical framework.
The discussion part of the study has been presented as a comparison of the findings of the
study and the existing research on the topic. A good study needs to add knowledge to the
research studies done in the past or offer new directions for practice. The discussion of this study
designed in relation to other studies to develop the conclusion. The role of recommendations is to
form the implications for the study by proposing areas for further research. Since studies have
limitations and are not conclusive, then the recommendations form the basis that other studies
can be used to improve knowledge on the topic. Further, research implications define the
relevance of the study to the field or industry that it belongs to. Every study must have
implications for practice which define how the findings of the study can be applied in real-life

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settings. This study can thus be used to form an understanding of the role of the writing
environment in creating differences is Saudi ESL students.
This study has been presented well by capturing most elements of a dissertation. The
reader can easily identify the different parts of the study and the justifications for using different
methods of research. Therefore, this dissertation has been well presented and meets the scientific
requirements of a dissertation.

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References
Atmowardoyo, H., 2018. Research Methods in TEFL Studies: Descriptive Research, Case Study,
Error Analysis, and R & D. Journal of Language Teaching and Research, 9(1), p197-204.
Colquitt, J. & George, G., 2011. From the editor publishing in amj—Part 1: Topic Choice.
Academy of Management Journal, 54(3), p432-435.
Flick, U., 2012. The SAGE Handbook of Qualitative Data Analysis. Los Angeles: SAGE .
Flyvbjerg, B., 2011. Case study. In: The Sage Hand-book of Qualitative Research. 4TH ed.
Thousand Oaks: Sage, p301–316.
Fouka, G. & Mantzorou, M., 2011. What are the Major Ethical Issues in Conducting Research?
Is there a Conflict between the Research Ethics and the Nature of Nursing?. Health Science
Journal, 5(1), p3-14.
Huggins, T. J. & Johnston, D. M., 2015. The importance of theory, analysis and practice to
integrated disaster research: Introduction to the IRDR Conference Special Issue. Australasian
Journal of Disaster and Trauma Studies, 19(4), p1-6.
Mannik, L. & McGarry, K., 2017. Practicing Ethnography: A Student Guide to Method and
Methodology. Toronto : University of Toronto Press.
Saba, M. S., 2013. Writing in a New Environment: Saudi ESL Students Learning Academic
Writing. Virginia: Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University.
Starman, A. B., 2013. The case study as a type of qualitative research. Journal of Contemporary
Educational Studies, 10(5), p28-43.
Udo, K., 2019. Qualitative Text Analysis: A Systematic Approach. In: Compendium for Early
Career Researchers in Mathematics Education.. s.l.:Springer, p181-197.
Vance, D. E., Talle, M., Azuero, A., Pearce, P. F., & Christian, B.L., 2013. Conducting an article
critique for a quantitative research study: perspectives for doctoral students and other novice
readers. Nursing: Research and Reviews, 3(4), p76-75.