Abstract
Welcome back! I hope your recent NAfME conference in Atlanta was outstanding, and attendees came back inspired to do great things. Here at Update we are going to be inviting six new review board members to start their terms this summer. Thanks again to the wonderful reviewers who have terms that are ending this year. The outstanding work that our reviewers do is the reason that everything runs smoothly for the journal.
In this issue of Update we have wonderful articles covering a range of topics. We have articles addressing technology, such as Bauer’s technological affordances study and Riley, MacLeod, and Libera’s investigation of distance learning. There are articles addressing aural components, including Furby’s investigation of peer tutoring’s effect on aural skills performance, Brunkan’s investigation of the relationship of arm gesture to acoustical and perceptual measures, and Anderson’s investigation of mindful listening’s effect on sensitivity and enjoyment. In instrumental settings, we have two articles, one on the relationship of gender and instrument choice by Wrape, Dittloff, and Callahan and another on perceptions of conducting by Silvey and Baumgartner. Finally, we have a review of literature on the topic of collaboration and standards by Cangro. Please make sure to listen to Bauer’s podcast discussion of his technology article published in this current issue of Update; all podcasts can be accessed at upd.sagepub.com.
In the past two Comments from the Editor, I discussed validity and reliability of measurement instruments, which are two required components for research studies that are submitted to Update. In this issue, I will add two other required components: institutional review board approval and parsimonious use of statistics.
To ensure appropriate and ethical data gathering from human subjects, Update requires that all submissions document the approved review of the study’s procedures, including participant consent. This review ensures that an external body of individuals has considered issues of confidentiality, coercion, the protection of special populations, and participant risk safeguards. Having been on the institutional review board (IRB) at my institution for 12 years now, I have seen how an IRB can work hand in hand with researchers to ensure the facilitation of a safe and soundly-designed study. I truly see the feedback that an IRB can provide as a safety net, another set of eyes, if you will, that can help researchers avoid potential challenges in their studies. The process is akin to early-stage article review board feedback that can help positively inform study choices. It is also becoming increasingly common for K–12 school districts to have review boards that are weighing safety as well as potential benefit for participants from their schools who might be engaged in a research study. Researchers who can plan for ensured safety as well as some potential benefit from study participation are considering important issues for research in academia and society. I would encourage you to review the IRB requirement as well as all other NAfME-endorsed ethical research statements at http://www.nafme.org/my-classroom/journals-magazines/journal-of-research-in-music-education-code-of-ethics/.
In addition to IRB confirmation, Update’s editorial review board wants to make sure that readers are getting to the heart of what is useful to know about the results of any given study. To this end, researchers submitting to Update are encouraged to be strategic, clear, and parsimonious in their use of parametric statistics. Since Update was designed as a practitioner-oriented journal, it is important that teachers can glean the most salient points from a study. While analyses of variance and other parametric statistics allow us to make inferences, it is extremely important for Update authors to provide the descriptive components of subgroup means, ranges, standard deviations, and effect sizes so that readers can have the necessary context to understand the practical significance of a study’s findings. In addition, descriptive and effect size findings are less confounded than are parametric statistics by a common challenge we see in many music education research studies: small sample sizes. If researchers do use parametric statistics, then, it is imperative that they transparently and clearly describe the impact of issues such as sample size and variability on their significance tests in order to make the pragmatic meaning come to the forefront for readers. Finally, since the .05 significance cutoff to which we commonly adhere in research is set for one use of a parametric statistic in a study, it would benefit researchers to consider carefully how many parametric statistics they use; if many analyses of variance or correlation coefficients are run, then researchers should consider a correction for multiple comparisons (e.g., a Bonferroni correction) or perhaps consider being more strategic and parsimonious with their parametric statistic choices. This balance of beautifully constructed and implemented studies that also read very clearly to even those practitioners with only minimal statistical knowledge is a wonderful, positive goal for all Update writers!
In summary, (a) the process of institutional review board review and (b) consideration of strategic and transparent use of statistics can be two useful steps in the dissemination of well-designed, high-quality, pragmatic, readable studies for our profession. I appreciate your efforts to make research usable, ethical, reputable, and beneficial, and I look forward to reading your outstanding work.