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last.updated 8.7.08

 

Audience Research Memo

Purpose

Although no writer can guarantee the success of a text they compose, the writer can increase the likelihood of the text's success by understanding her/his audience. Some writers who might be personally familiar with this audience will draw upon this knowledge to appeal to this audience, but these writers may benefit from paying closer attention to this audience to make sure their assumptions are correct. For those who are less familiar with their audience, making an effort to learn about this audience. While most people do not conduct field research to learn about their audience (although some do), this is a useful method to get to know your audience better. Also, for the purposes of this course, field research also can be used as a method to collect information that can be used to support your point.

Instructions-Research

In the Proposal, you identified the audience you want to respond to your Final Text. With this assignment, you will conduct field research to learn more about the audience for this text. After the instructor introduces you to the various methods of field research, you will choose one to get to know your audience better.

First, you will need to design the research to learn about your audience. Then you execute this research design. The instructor will use classroom lessons to guide you through this process.

Once you have conducted the research you will need to analyze the data. The following graphic organizer will assist you in sorting through your data to come to some conclusions about your audience and what you need to know to address them.

Instructions-Writing

After you have collected data about your audience you will compose a 750-1000-w0rd memo addressed to the instructor in which you...

  • list your research questions and explain why it is important for you to answer these questions
  • report what you did to conduct the research and explain why you made these choices. These explanations should tie back to your research questions. You will want to be detailed enough that your audience could practically reproduce your study based upon what you have written. This might include the questions you used for a interview or survey
  • report what you learned from the field research you conducted. In short, you are just reporting the raw data or results. If your results remind you of anything you read in your sources, you should make that connection
  • explain what these results mean to you and how it is going to influence how your approach to the Final Text


Criteria

Logistic:

In addition to the general evaluation criteria, the instructor will be looking for evidence of...

  • an understanding of how to conduct research and analyze the results
  • an understanding of your audience, the instructor. Do you provide enough detail about your study that your audience could reproduce it? Does your conclusions follow from your results?
  • an academic or professional persona; this means you should adopt a professional tone and publish a well-edited paper
  • an understanding of the composing decisions that you made. Can you explain the decisions that you made for the memo?
  • a good sense of what you plan to do with the Final Text based upon the results of your field research
  • appropriate use of conventions, including MLA, APA, or an appropriate citation formatting