When you hit the send button, you were delighted with the draft research questions you forwarded to your academic mentor. You then receive their feedback. You read their email with surprise and disappointment. ‘A useful start, but your questions are too abstract, philosophical and loosely defined. They are too challenging to answer, there are a variety of ways respondents can interpret the questions, and a multitude of possible replies that can be given.’ You read and re-read the email, but still have no idea what the comments mean.
There are five tests to apply that help you produce concrete, tight and realistic research questions.
A useful first test of any research question is whether it is clear and understandable. Not just to you, but to others. Show your questions to someone you trust within the academic community and ask them if they make ‘sense’. Your questions make sense, if, for example, they are capable of being converted into a series of specific research objectives. Or if they lend themselves to an effective research design. That is, a study where you can easily identify what data might be collected to address your questions, and how that data could be collected.
A second test is to check if the questions are definite. A definite question is one where you can visualise what the answer may be. You could, for example, have a question that generates a simple yes/no reply, or a restricted response. Such as, ‘what proportion of graduates obtain work within six months of getting their final-year results’? At first glance, this seems to have a straightforward answer and appears clear-cut. It requires, however, further consideration to define and describe what a graduate is. For instance, is it when they get their results, or when they collect their parchment at the awards ceremony? So, only pose questions for which you know what answer, or type of answer, would be expected.
The third test is to determine if the questions have intellectual provenance. In other words, derived from reputable and recognised academic sources. Effective research questions should be grounded in the existing body of knowledge for your topic. In most cases, there will be an established literature base from which you draw on to advise how your questions should be approached. You should only integrate relevant concepts, theories, frameworks, models, techniques and tools into your questions that have already been rigorously developed and robustly investigated by others.
A fourth test is to identify if the purpose of each of your questions is significant. All academic research should have the potential to contribute to scholarship. By linking your questions to the extant literature for your topic, you can provide additional insights into existing knowledge and understanding. This is achieved by immersing yourself in the literature and perusing the sections in journal articles that offer avenues for further research. For example, lookout for statements like ‘this paper builds on the work of X and Y … but advances their theory by carrying out an empirical study on …’. Additionally, when formulating your questions, it may be useful to include the recommendations that these scholars have suggested to overcome the limitations they identified in their research.
The final, and fifth test, is to ascertain if you can obtain the answers to your questions within the timeframe of the study. Typically, when doing your thesis or dissertation, time is measured in weeks and months, rather than years. Be realistic when considering the time available to complete your research, from proposal to submission. For example, with a six-month project, it may be challenging to gain permission and access to your research site, acquire ethical approval from both your own institution and the research site, and collect your data in a timely manner. Missed timelines may have implications for the allocation of your resources. For example, funding could cease, or be capped, access to facilities and equipment may be restricted, and the availability of respondents for surveys, or participants for interviews, may be curtailed. Such constraints may require you to redefine, or tighten, your original research questions.
In summary, it is important to be realistic, but not over-ambitious, with your research questions. An appropriate question is not too broad in scope (so that you would need considerable resources to investigate it). Neither is it too narrow (so that you unable to make a significant contribution to your topical domain).
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