Program Overview

EXSC306 - Independent Study in Exercise Science

Year

2022

Credit Points

10

Campus Offering

No unit offerings are currently available for this unit.

Prerequisites

EXSC122 Research and Ethics in Exercise Science

Teaching Organisation

150 hours of focused learning.

Unit Rationale, Description, and Aim

Evidence-based practice in Exercise Science relies on a foundation of rigorous scientific research to inform practitioners and clinicians in academic, clinical and/or industry contexts. This unit provides students with the opportunity to complete research-informed studies and supervised readings in an area of interest within Exercise Science. Its aim is to improve the student's ability to critically appraise research and literature in a specific topic, so as to develop in them fundamental skills and strategies as a foundation for future research-focused studies and activities.

Learning Outcomes

To successfully complete this unit, students will be able to demonstrate they have achieved the learning outcomes detailed below.

• LO1: Demonstrate structured skills of research, enquiry, critique, and analysis.
• LO2: Plan and conduct a problem-based enquiry.
• LO3: Report the outcomes of an independent enquiry, demonstrating information literacy and communication skills appropriate to the audience.

Graduate Attributes

• GA4: Think critically and reflectively.
• GA5: Demonstrate values, knowledge, skills, and attitudes appropriate to the discipline and/or profession.
• GA6: Solve problems in a variety of settings, taking local and international perspectives into account.
• GA7: Work both autonomously and collaboratively.
• GA8: Locate, organise, analyse, synthesise, and evaluate information.
• GA9: Demonstrate effective communication in oral and written English language and visual media.

Content

Topics will include:

• Developing a research question.
• Systematic review strategies.
• How to search multiple electronic databases.
• Assessing methodological quality.
• Scientific writing and presentation of results.

Learning and Teaching Strategy and Rationale

Learning and teaching strategies may include active learning, project work, web-based learning, resources sessions, tutorials, lectures, field work, and reflective/critical thinking activities, delivered over 12 weeks. These strategies will provide students with access to required knowledge and understanding of unit content, and opportunities for application of this learning in research-based contexts. Students will need to have gained the support of one or more members of staff from the Discipline of Exercise Science to supervise their study program and have developed a written proposal before seeking approval to enrol in this unit from the Course Coordinator.

Assessment Strategy and Rationale

In order to best enable students to demonstrate unit learning outcomes and develop graduate attributes, standards-based assessment is utilised, consistent with University assessment requirements. Students are given a project to conduct by their supervisor. This may include using data already collected by the supervisor or may be collected by the student. Students are required to demonstrate their ability to research and review current literature on a topic approved by their supervisor using an oral presentation (Assessment 1). Assessment 2 allows students to show the outcomes of their project in the form appropriate to the field, but generally a journal manuscript.

Overview of Assessments

• Oral Presentation: Enables students to conduct a review of the literature and communicate their findings. (40%)
• Written Assignment: Enables students to communicate the outcomes of their independent work via an introduction, methods, and results section in the form of a journal manuscript. (60%)

Representative Texts and References

• Cochrane Collaboration (2017). Cochrane Handbook for Systematic Reviews of Interventions.
• Downs, SH, and Black, N. (1998). The feasibility of creating a checklist for the assessment of the methodological quality both of randomised and non-randomised studies of health care interventions.
• Neura & University of Sydney (1999) PEDro scale.
• The CONSORT Group (2010). The CONSORT Statement.
• Ottawa Hospital Research Institute & University of Oxford (2015). Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses.
• Centre for Evidence-based Medicine (2017). Critical Appraisal Tools.