When you say "explore" the question should be open ended.

Explore the factors influencing students choice of disciplines (Social, personal and political influence and suggestions)

you should be using mixed method.

The study should be a qualitative study

Qualitative, interview students from arts and science groups, evaluate their SES, previous education record, interests, and education of parents etc.

Since you have no apriori hypotheses and, from your questions, it appears to be an exploratory study, a qualitative methodology appears to be in order. I would suggest a combination of interviews and focus groups and using the results of these to develop a questionnaire to implement and check out any conclusions from the interviews and focus groups.

A qualitative study using purpose sampling seems to be the most appropriate. Conduct face-to-face interviews and a focus group discussion.

I suggest a qualitative study based on questionnaire and semi-directive interview. A pre-survey is required to establish this questionnaire.

The final results of your study may have a double analysis (qualitative and quantitative).

I suggest a mixed method . you may collect data using a questionnaire. ( interviewer administered ) . Conduct a few interviews in order to gather information to develop the questionnaire, pilot study and refine before using it .

I think it would be better to adopt Mixed Method Approach in your research study.

Aisha

The research proposal's you formulated is not a research question but maybe your title of the research proposal "The factors influencing secondary students choice of subjects in high school?" I am totally confuse. The factors you referred to is to broad. Be specific with your factor(s) you want to investigate. There are so many factors. Is your study a masters or a doctoral study? Secondly, you gave a couple of objectives. These objectives are mostly to understand factors which influencing students choices. So, your study is more interpretative/constructivist approach using a qualitative design. If you want to work mixed methods - change the verbs of each of the explore - then you can apply an pragmatic approach or if you want to measure those factors impacting students' choices - quantitatively. Finally, the last objective is a problem because want to compare.You must decide quantitative or mixed methods. It seems from these objectives you stated, this is a master degree research proposal. For a doctoral study, I suggest more high order questions focusing on HOW and WHY.

I think the target of this reseach should collecting data from: Gender and Age. And used both qualititive and quantitative for Data Colecting and processing. The result of reseach will be decided by community.

Mixed method probably the suitable approach for your to examine this issue - starting with focus group or interview and followed by a quantitative approach. best of luck

I would suggest qualitative method using both focus group and in-depth methodology. Purposive sampling would also ideal, I would think.

Aisha this is a great area for research. However, there is need for clarity and structure. Firstly, “Factors Influencing Secondary Students Choice of Subjects in High School” is your proposed research topic and not your research question. I see that you have outlined your research objectives which is great but they need to be SMART (Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic and Time Bound) for example:

Objectives

1. Explore the factors influencing student’s choice of subjects at Mountain View High School.

2. Identify factors that prevent students from choosing subjects at Mountain View High School.

3. Evaluate the difference in the choice of subjects between male and female students at Mountain View High School.

These objectives will then be used to derive your research questions, for example:

Questions

1. What are the factors influencing student’s choice of subjects at Mountain View High School?

2. What factors prevent students from choosing subjects at Mountain View High School?

3. Is there a difference in the choice of subjects between male and female students at Mountain View High School?

Methodology

1. Research Philosophy

I don’t know if you are going to go as far as adopting a research philosophy but for this study, I recommend you adopt an interpretive approach (Interpretivism). You can read about different research philosophies available out there and pick one that suits your study and what you are trying to achieve. Here is a link that can help you with that https://www.researchgate.net/publication/330760964_Research_Methods_for_Business_Students_Chapter_4_Understanding_research_philosophy_and_approaches_to_theory_development

2. Research Approach.

This study would go well with a deductive approach which means you are bound to conduct a qualitative study but I wouldn’t want to restrict you, so feel free to explore other alternatives.

3. Sampling and Sampling Techniques.

You will need a good sample for this study, I would recommend a minimum of 30 but bearing in mind that your tool for analyzing the data will determine your sample and sampling technique. If your study will be qualitative then I prefer you work with non-probability sampling techniques. I think for this study purposive is a good start but I am not restricting you. Read about sampling and sampling techniques.

4. Data Collection Strategies

Focus groups, questionnaires, semi structured interviews etc. can be applied as a collection strategy. However, remember that this will be greatly informed by what we have talked about in the previous paragraphs under methodology.

5. Read about tools of analyzing your research data be it qualitative or quantitative. Pick what you think would best suit your study. Make sure there is a correlation between all the aspects of your methodology, allow them to influence each other. For example, if your research is qualitative then use sampling methods that work best with qualitative research. Lastly, do not forget to include how you will achieve Validity and Reliability with your study and also Ethical Considerations. I think a case study approach would be great but again the choice is yours.

I believe this lengthy reply will give you a good start for your research proposal. Break a leg 😁.

Ii recommend you using the PISA data base for the the additional contribution of this research . this is not a new problem statement for the world therefore i hope you can found number of references for this matter

Should include descriptive and inferential statistic in your objective and research question. So that it look complete in your analysis.