STEVE CAMPITELLI:
Welcome to this video
on developing a research
question presented
by Academic Skills at the
University of Melbourne.
The research question
is fundamental,
and a lot of people consider
it to be the most important
component of research.
Why?
Why do you think that is?
Everything is focused on
answering the research
question.
When you're thinking about
your research project,
your research question,
consider a few questions
that you can answer
for yourself.
The primary one is,
what do I want to know.
What am I aiming to find out.
Are there any interesting
points that come out of the data
that you might have or
that you're going to get.
Do you understand that data.
Can it provide answers
to what you want to know.
Will you be able to question
the data, pull things out.
Fundamentally ask yourself,
can I answer the question.
The research question needs to
summarise the significant issue
that the research
intends to investigate.
So what are the features of
a good research question.
Primarily, it needs
to be relevant.
It has to be an issue
covered by the research.
It's manageable.
Keep it within scope.
Don't go too large, but you
can't be too small either.
We'll talk more about this.
Is it specific.
Is it measurable.
Can you investigate it.
It has to be clear and
simple in the sense
that the readers, who are
engaging with the research
question and the
research itself,
need to understand what
you're hoping to find out.
Is it interesting
again in the sense
that any readers who
are engaging with this
will be interested
in that research.
It's a substantial question.
Is it legitimate.
Is it a question,
not a statement.
And, perhaps fundamentally, can
you actually provide an answer
to that research question.
So, again, is it investigatable.
So how do I formulate one?
Well, identify the broader
subject of interest
that is arising out of the
data, if you have the data.
If it's before the data,
stick with the broader subject
of interest again.
So, for example, it might be
something like cyberbullying.
Research that general topic
to find out what literature
and what data exists already.
Then what you want
to do is to start
narrowing the topic by
asking how and why questions
around this topic.
So, for example,
why is cyberbullying
becoming more prevalent.
Now, what do you notice
about that question?
I'm hoping you're thinking
it's still pretty wide.
So what we want to do is to get
into something more specific,
something more measurable,
something like that.
What are the social
factors leading
to the increasing
prevalence of cyberbullying
in young Australians.
It's quite specific.
It's measurable.
We're looking at factors
that we can investigate.
So a tip, make it
open-ended enough
so it can't just be answered
by a simple yes or no
or a simple number.
Some elements to
consider, the construct.
What's the idea that
you're investigating.
Get beyond the data.
Don't just rely on the data.
It needs to extend it.
Application, is the question
broad enough to show relevance
within your field.
So that's not too narrow,
not too specific just
to be of interest
or relevance to you
and a couple of other
people, but to the broader
academic area.
And it speaks to the
'so what?' factor.
When you're looking at this, you
might ask yourself 'so what?'.
And what you're asking there
is, why is this important.
Why do I need to
investigate this.
Try to have an answer for that.
So what's some of the
sample research question
language that you might use.
It's grounded in
the question forms
you're going to form
the question around.
The words like what,
how, why, does.
And here are some
sample questions
on the screen in front of you.
Addressing the
'so what?' factor,
at some point you'll be asking
yourself or using the language
which says this shows that.
Why is it important?
This is important because, this
is significant because, this
points to, this suggests that.
And that type of language
helps you get to the 'so what?'
factor behind this.
The why is this important.
Interpretive 'so what?' language
should always appear somewhere
in academic discourse, whether
it's at the point where
you're questioning yourself
why it's important or when
you're doing the writing,
explaining the rationale
for why you're doing that
research or what it means.
So a process, determine
the broad topic,
we've talked about that.
Draft a research question.
Then, a crucial point, out
of the research question
form a purpose
statement which says
why we're investigating this.
It will be something like
the purpose of this study
is to investigate, determine,
establish, and so on.
It's a purpose statement.
And then out of the
purpose statement
you might need to revise
your research question.
OK.
Let's make one.
I hope you're familiar with
the classic English language
joke of why did the
chicken cross the road,
because that's what
we're looking at.
So a broad topic,
chickens crossing roads.
Why?
Why do chickens cross roads?
Purpose statement, the
purpose of this study
is to determine the causes
of why chickens cross roads.
Research question,
version one, why
did the chicken cross the road?
What do you think
of this question?
Too broad?
Correct, too broad.
Not specific enough.
It relies on
qualitative data, which
may not be attainable because
chickens don't interview well,
as we know.
Version two, how many chickens
crossed Grattan Street
in the period January to July?
Is this better?
It is, but it's
gone the other way.
It's too specific.
It's closed information.
We can answer this with
a statistic, a number,
very quickly.
Let's try again.
What are some of the
environmental factors that
occurred in Parkville
between January and July
that would cause chickens
to cross Grattan Street?
We're looking at factors.
We're looking at causal factors
that occurred in the area
in a specific time period.
We're starting to get
specific, but we're also
looking at the why.
Why are chickens doing this.
But we can measure it.
We can investigate it.
It gets to the why
and investigates
the purpose statement
of determining
why chickens cross roads.
OK.
I hope you get the idea about
the process, the language,
the need to be specific,
the need to be relevant.
Here are some resources.
You can click on
those URLs and go
to a series of similar
type of information
which will give you a little
bit more idea around developing
a research question.
Good luck with developing
your research question.
