The purpose of this study is to assess employer perceptions of factors making it difficult to comply with the Americans with Disability Act and to determine whether these perceptions significantly differ as a function of differences in employers' ages, gender, educational background, religion, or marital status. This section of the proposal describes and discusses all of the methods and procedures that will be used in the collection and analysis of data. The proposed study is descriptive in nature. According to Best (1991), descriptive research has several distinguishing characteristics. These can be listed as follows:
(1) Descriptive research is nonexperimental in that it deals with the relationships between nonmanipulated variables in a natural, rather than artificial (lab) setting. Since the events or conditions of research interest have already occurred or exist, the researcher merely selects the relevant variables for an analysis of their relationships. For example, in this study, perceptions are not manipulated by the researcher. Rather they are merely measured and analyzed in relation to employers' existing demographic characteristics (age, gender, educational background, religion, marital status).
(2) Descriptive research involves hypothesis formulation and testing.
(3) Descriptive research uses logical methods of inductive and deductive reasoning in order to arrive at generalizations about the population from which the sample was d