Procedures

This chapter documents the step-by-step execution procedures for the AACSB international comparison study (PROC-001), based on IDEA-001.


PROC-001: AACSB International Comparison Study — Step-by-Step Execution Procedure (2026-04-08)


Phase 1: Data Collection & Coding

1-1. Sample Confirmation

Step 1: Collect AACSB-Accredited School Lists

  • US: Obtain Hwang et al. (2025) existing 40-school list (from Tables 2a, 2b, 3a, 3b of the paper)
  • China: Collect full list of Chinese accredited schools from AACSB official website
  • Korea: Collect full list of Korean accredited schools from AACSB official website
  • Source: https://www.aacsb.edu/accredited

Step 2: Determine Sample Selection Criteria

  • US: Use existing 40 as-is (Top 20 UG + Top 20 MBA)
  • China: Full census or top-ranked by global ranking (Financial Times, QS, etc.)
  • Korea: Full census (manageable accredited count)

Step 3: Collect Sample Metadata

  • Per school: accreditation years, program level (UG/MBA), city, student enrollment

1-2. Data Collection

Step 4: Collect Public Data by Country

Data Type US China Korea
Course Catalogs University website University website + registrar office University website + course list
Syllabi Open faculty repositories Public course outlines (limited) Department website + direct requests
Innovation Reports School websites Teaching reform reports Educational innovation reports
Program Descriptions Official program pages Major introduction pages Major introduction pages
AI Policy Documents School AI guidelines School AI usage guidelines School AI policy documents

Step 5: Multilingual Processing Protocol

  • Preserve originals + parallel English translation
  • Translation method: researcher translation + AI-assisted + cross-validation
  • Coding performed in original language (assign native-proficient coders per language)

1-3. Coding

Step 6: Apply Coding Framework

Apply Hwang et al.’s (2025) 4-dimension coding framework identically:

  • Dimension 1: Curricular Themes (S, E, D, En, L)
  • Dimension 2: Pedagogical Approaches (C, S, B, P, L)
  • Dimension 3: Assessment Modes (A, R, F, Q)
  • Dimension 4: AI–CT Relationship (CT Level: H/M/L, CT Linkage: E/I/A)

Step 7: Coder Training and Pilot

  • Coder composition: Minimum 2 coders per language (English/Chinese/Korean)
  • Pilot coding: Code 5 schools per country first
  • Inter-coder reliability: Target Cohen’s Kappa >= 0.80
  • Disagreement resolution: Discussion -> coding guideline refinement -> re-coding

Step 8: Full Coding Execution

  • Two independent coders -> discuss disagreements -> finalize coding
  • Code additional contextual variables (national AI policy, accreditation years, etc.)

Step 9: Organize Coding Data

  • Compile school-level coding results into structured spreadsheet/CSV
  • File location: docs/05_분석/Data_Raw/

Phase 2: Qualitative Comparative Mapping

Step 10: Derive Country-Specific Clusters

  • Place schools on CT Level x CT Linkage matrix (identical to Hwang et al.)
  • Derive clusters independently for US / China / Korea
  • Verify applicability of 3 clusters (Explicit/Implicit/Nominal) + check for new cluster emergence

Step 11: Cross-National Comparison

  • Compare cluster distributions (e.g., does Korea have more Nominal?)
  • Compare within-cluster detail patterns (same Explicit cluster but different themes/pedagogy?)
  • Visualization: Alluvial diagram or Sankey diagram for cross-national flow representation

Step 12: Qualitative Interpretation

  • Explain cross-national differences using contextual variables (AI policy, educational tradition, accreditation experience)
  • Construct cross-case comparison tables

Phase 3: Quantitative Analysis

3-A. Topic Modeling (STM)

Step 13: Corpus Preparation

  • Collect course description/syllabus text by country
  • Preprocessing: tokenization, stopword removal, stemming (language-specific)
  • Construct English unified corpus (post-translation) or country-specific individual analysis

Step 14: STM Execution

  • Use R stm package
  • Determine number of topics: searchK() function, k = 5-25 range
  • Model fitting: prevalence ~ country + program_level
  • Output: Top keywords per topic, representative documents, topic proportions

Step 15: STM Results Analysis

  • Statistical test of topic distribution by country (estimateEffect)
  • Match against 5 pre-defined themes
  • Interpret newly discovered themes
  • File location: docs/05_분석/Quan/

3-B. Network Analysis

Step 16: Construct Network

  • Convert coding data to adjacency matrix
  • Co-occurrence network: create edges between coding categories co-occurring in the same school
  • Weight = co-occurrence frequency

Step 17: Execute Network Analysis

  • R igraph or tidygraph + ggraph packages
  • Whole network: degree centrality, betweenness centrality, community detection (Louvain)
  • Country-specific sub-networks: repeat same analysis
  • Cross-national structural comparison: QAP (Quadratic Assignment Procedure) via sna package

Step 18: Visualization

  • Force-directed layout for whole and country-specific network visualization
  • Node size = centrality; edge thickness = co-occurrence frequency; color = coding dimension
  • File location: docs/05_분석/Quan/

3-C. QCA

Step 19: Calibration (for fsQCA)

  • Transform each condition variable to 0-1 fuzzy set
  • Set calibration anchors (fully in, crossover, fully out)
  • Example: CT Level Higher = 1.0, Mid = 0.5, Lower = 0.0

Step 20: Necessity Analysis

  • Test whether each condition is a necessary condition for the outcome
  • Consistency >= 0.90 -> necessary condition

Step 21: Sufficiency Analysis (Truth Table)

  • Construct truth table -> set frequency threshold (minimum 2 cases)
  • Consistency threshold >= 0.80
  • Boolean minimization -> derive parsimonious / intermediate / complex solutions

Step 22: Results Interpretation

  • Identify sufficient condition paths (what condition combinations lead to Explicit CT)
  • Confirm equifinality (do different paths exist by country?)
  • R packages: QCA or SetMethods
  • File location: docs/05_분석/Quan/

Phase 4: Integration & Triangulation

Step 23: Integrate Results

  • Confirm alignment: qualitative mapping clusters vs. network communities
  • Evaluate: pre-defined 5 themes vs. STM topics matching
  • Map: QCA paths vs. sub-patterns within mapping clusters

Step 24: Interpret Divergences

  • If divergence between methods: analyze cause and provide theoretical interpretation
  • The divergence itself can be a research contribution (reporting methodological sensitivity differences)

Step 25: Write Final Report

  • File location: docs/06_라이팅 프로세스/

Phase 5: Writing & Submission

Step 26: Draft Paper

  • IMRaD structure (Introduction, Method, Results, Discussion)
  • Determine target journal (top AACSB/education-related journals)

Step 27: Internal Review

  • All co-authors review -> incorporate feedback

Step 28: Submit

  • Submit to target journal; respond to revisions

Tools and Software

Purpose Tool
Coding data management Excel / Google Sheets
Topic Modeling R (stm, tidytext, quanteda)
Network Analysis R (igraph, tidygraph, ggraph, sna)
QCA R (QCA, SetMethods)
Visualization R (ggplot2, ggraph) + Quarto for reports
Reference management Zotero / BibTeX
Collaboration Google Drive + GitHub Pages (public/)

Timeline (Draft)

Period Task
2026-04 to 05 Phase 1: Data collection and coding
2026-05 to 06 Phase 2: Comparative Mapping
2026-06 to 08 Phase 3: Quantitative Analysis
2026-08 to 09 Phase 4: Integration
2026-09 to 10 Phase 5: Writing & Submission

Created: 2026-04-08 Related: IDEA-001, Hwang et al. (2025) JBMC Analysis outputs: docs/05_분석/Qual/ (mapping), docs/05_분석/Quan/ (STM, Network, QCA)