UNIT I

Nature of Inquiry and Research

Introduction
Inquiry and Research are two terms that are almost the same in meaning. Both involve
investigative work in which you seek information about something by searching or
examining the object of your search. Inquiry is to look for information by asking various
questions about the thing you are curious about while research is to discover truths by
investigating on your chosen topic scientifically; meaning, by going through a systematic
way of doing things wherein you are to begin from the simplest to the most complex modes
or patterns of thinking.

LESSON 1: Nature of Inquiry

INQUIRY-BASED LEARNING
Meaning of Inquiry
Learning is your way of obtaining knowledge about your surroundings. This takes
place in many ways, and one of these is inquiry, which many people in the field of education
consider effective. Inquiry is a learning process that motivates you to obtain knowledge or
information about people, things, places, or events. You do this by investigating or asking
questions about something you are inquisitive about. It requires you to collect data, meaning,
facts, and information about the object of your inquiry, and examine such data carefully. In
your analysis, you execute varied thinking strategies that range from lower-order to higher-
order thinking skills such as inferential, critical, integrative, and creative thinking. These are
top-level thinking strategies that you ought to perform in discovering and understanding the
object of your inquiry. Engaging yourself in many ways of thinking, you come to conclude
that inquiry is an active learning process.
Putting you in a situation where you need to probe, investigate, or ask questions to
find answers or solutions to what you are worried or doubtful about, inquiry is a problem-
solving technique. Solving a problem by being inquisitive, you tend to act like scientists who
are inclined to think logically or systematically in seeking evidence to support their
conclusions about something. Beginning with whatever experience or background knowledge
you have, you proceed like scientists with your inquiry by imagining, speculating,
interpreting, criticizing, and creating something out of what you discovered.
Inquiry elevates your thinking power. It makes you think in different ways, enabling
you to arrive at a particular idea or understanding that will motivate you to create something
unique, new, or innovative for your personal growth as well as for the world. Inquisitive
thinking allows you to shift from one level of thought to another. It does not go in a linear
fashion; rather, it operates in an interactive manner.
Solving a problem, especially social issues, does not only involve yourself but other
members of the society too. Hence, inquiry, as a problem-solving technique, includes
cooperative learning because any knowledge from members of the society can help to make
the solution. Whatever knowledge you have about your world bears the influence of your
cultural, sociological, institutional, or ideological understanding of the world. (Badke 2012)

Governing Principles or Foundation of Inquiry

Inquiry-based Learning gets its support from these three educational theories serving
as its foundation: John Dewey’s theory of connected experiences for exploratory and
reflective thinking; Lev Vygotsky’s Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD) that stresses the
essence of provocation and scaffolding in learning; and Jerome Bruner’s theory on learners’
varied world perceptions for their own interpretative thinking of people and things around
them. Backed up by all these theories, inquiry, as a way of learning, concerns itself with these
elements: changing knowledge, creativity, subjectivity, socio-cultural factors, sensory
experience, and higher-order thinking strategies. All of these are achievable through the
inquiry methods of fieldwork, case studies, investigations, individual group project, and
research work. (Small 2012)

Benefits of Inquiry-Based Learning

In conclusion, you can say that Inquiry-based Learning gives you the following
advantages:
1. Elevates interpretative thinking through graphic skills
2. Improves student learning abilities
3. Widens learners’ vocabulary
4. Facilitates problem-solving acts
5. Increases social awareness and cultural knowledge
6. Encourages cooperative learning
7. Provides mastery of procedural knowledge
8. Encourages higher-order thinking strategies
9. Hastens conceptual understanding

LESSON 2: Nature of Research

DOING A RESEARCH IN COLLEGE

Meaning of Research
In college, you involve yourself in varied school activities such as academic contests,
sports fests, elocution contest, music festivals, college week celebrations, art exhibits,
research work, debate competitions, and many more. All of these activities are aimed to let
you develop a well-rounded personality. But one or two of them gave emphasis in honing a
particular ability (e.g., making you excel in mathematics, science, arts, music, and many
more).
One school activity that every college student has to excel in is research. This is a
hallmark of a university or college education. Your research abilities reflect the quality of
your school. If you graduate from a school with superb knowledge of research work, you can
tell yourself that, “I am a product of a quality college or university.” Hence, the greatness of a
higher education institution depends on how knowledgeable its faculty and students are about
the ins and outs of research; more so, on the application of this to their everyday life for the
progress of the whole world.
What is research? A number of books on research define this term in many ways, but
such varied definitions boil down to the primary meaning of this word, which is:
Research is a process of executing various mental acts for discovering and examining
facts and information to prove the accuracy or truthfulness of your claims or conclusions
about the topic of your research. Research requires you to inquire or investigate about your
chosen research topic by asking questions that will make you engage yourself in top-level
thinking strategies of interpreting, analyzing, synthesizing, criticizing, appreciating, or
creating to enable you to discover truths about the many things you tend to wonder about the
topic of your research work. (Litchman 2013)
Research is analogous to inquiry, in that, both involve investigation of something
through questioning. However, the meaning of research is more complicated than inquiry
because it does not center mainly on raising questions about the topic, but also on carrying
out a particular order of research stages. Each stage of the research process is not an
individual task because the knowledge you obtain through each stage comes not only from
yourself but other people as well. Thus, similar to inquiry, research involves cooperative
learning.
Central to research is your way of discovering new knowledge, applying knowledge
in various ways as well as seeing relationships of ideas, events, and situations. Research then
puts you in a context where a problem exists. You have to collect facts or information, study
such data, and come up with a solution to the problem based on the results of your analysis. It
is a process requiring you to work logically or systematically and collaboratively with others.
To sum up your concepts about the nature of research, the following will give you the
characteristics, purposes, classification, types of, and approaches to research. (Badke 2012;
Silverman 2013; De Mey 2013)

Characteristics of Research
1. Accuracy. It must give correct or accurate data, which the footnotes, notes, and
bibliographical entries should honestly and appropriately documented or
acknowledged.
2. Objectiveness. It must deal with facts, not with mere opinions arising from
assumptions, generalizations, predictions, or conclusions.
3. Timeliness. It must work on a topic that is fresh, new, and interesting to the present
society.
 4. Relevance. Its topic must be instrumental in improving society or in solving
problems affecting the lives of people in a community.
5. Clarity. It must succeed in expressing its central point or discoveries by using
simple, direct, concise, and correct language.
6. Systematic. It must take place in an organized or orderly manner.

Purposes or Research
1. To learn how to work independently
2. To learn how to work scientifically or systematically
3. To have an in-depth knowledge of something
4. To elevate your mental abilities by letting you think in higher-order thinking
strategies (HOTS) of inferring, evaluating, synthesizing, appreciating, applying, and
creating
5. To improve your reading and writing skills
6. To be familiar with the basic tools of research and the various techniques of
gathering data and of presenting research findings
7. To free yourself, to a certain extent, from the domination or strong influence of a
single textbook or of the professor’s lone viewpoint or spoon feeding

Types of Research
1. Based on Application of Research Method
Is the research applied to theoretical or practical issues? If it deals with
concepts, principles, or abstract things, it is a pure research. This type of research
aims to increase your knowledge about something. However, if your intention is to
apply your chosen research to societal problems or issues, finding ways to make
positive changes in society, you call your research, applied research.

2. Based on Purpose of the Research

Depending on your objective or goal in conducting research, you do any of
these types of research: descriptive, correlational, explanatory, exploratory, or action.
Descriptive Research – This type of research aims at defining or giving a verbal
portrayal or picture of a person, thing, event, group, situation, etc. This is liable to
repeated research because its topic relates itself only to a certain period or a limited
number of years. Based on the results of your descriptive studies about a subject, you
develop the inclination of conducting further studies on such topic.
Correlational Research – A correlational research shows relationships or
connectedness of two factors, circumstances, or agents called variables that affect the
 research. It is only concerned in indicating the existence of a relationship, not the
causes and ways of the development of such relationship.
Explanatory Research – This type of research elaborates or explains not just the
reasons behind the relationship of two factors, but also the ways by which such
relationship exists.
Exploratory Research – An exploratory research’s purpose is to find out how
reasonable or possible it is to conduct a research study on a certain topic. Here, you
will discover ideas on topics that could trigger your interest in conducting research
studies.
Action Research – This type of research studies an ongoing practice of a school,
organization, community, or institution for the purpose of obtaining results that will
bring improvements in the system.

3. Based on Types of Data Needed

The kind of data you want to work on reflects whether you wish to do a
quantitative or a qualitative research.
Qualitative research requires non-numerical data, which means that the
research uses words rather than numbers to express the results, the inquiry, or
investigation about people’s thoughts, beliefs, feelings, views, and lifestyles regarding
the object of the study. These opinionated answers from people are not measurable;
so, verbal language is the right way to express your findings in a qualitative research.
Meanwhile, quantitative research involves measurement of data. Thus, it
presents research findings referring to the number or frequency of something in
numerical forms (i.e., using percentages, fractions, numbers).
The data you deal with in research are either primary or secondary data.
Primary data are obtained through direct observation or contact with people, objects,
artifacts, paintings, etc. Primary data are new and original information resulting from
your sensory experience. However, if such data have already been written about or
reported on and are available for reading purposes, they exist as secondary data.

Approaches to Research
After choosing your topic for research, what is your next move? In other words, how
are you going to approach or begin your research, deal with your data, and establish a
connection among all things or activities involved in your research? There are three
approaches that you can choose from.
The first is the scientific or positive approach, in which you discover and measure
information as well as observe and control variables in an impersonal manner. It allows
control of variables. Therefore, the data gathering techniques appropriate for this approach
are structured interviews, questionnaires, and observational checklists. Data given by these
techniques are expressed through numbers, which means that this method is suitable for
quantitative research.
 The second approach is the naturalistic approach. In contrast to the scientific
approach that uses numbers to express data, the naturalistic approach uses words. This
research approach directs you to deal with qualitative data that speak of how people behave
toward their surroundings. These are non-numerical data that express truths about the way
people perceive or understand the world. Since people look at their world in a subjective or
personal basis in an uncontrolled or unstructured manner, a naturalistic approach happens in a
natural setting.
Is it possible to plan your research activities based on these two approaches?
Combining these two approaches in designing your research leads you to the third one, called
triangulation approach. In this case, you are free to gather and analyze data using multiple
methods, allowing you to combine or mix up research approaches, research types, data
gathering, and data analysis techniques. Triangulation approach gives you the opportunity to
view every angle of the research from different perspectives. (Badke 2012; Silverman 2013)
UNIT II
Qualitative Research and Its
Importance in Daily Life iiiii
Introduction
Around you are different people, things, and places. All these vary from one another
as regards character or qualities. Curious about a person or a thing, you are inclined to
conduct a qualitative research to discover such individual’s thoughts, feelings, and attitudes
about a certain topic, or to find out something beneath the surface of an inanimate thing or the
effects of such object or place to some people. To discover facts and information about the
object of your interest is to work collaboratively with some people, for the answers to your
questions about your topic do not come only from yourself but from others as well. Here lies
the importance of qualitative research. It promotes people’s interdependence or interpersonal
relationships that the world needs for solving its societal problems.

LESSON 3: Qualitative Research

QUALITATIVE RESEARCH
Definition of Qualitative Research
As a curious student, you want to know so many things about your surroundings as
well as the people, places, and things you find interesting, intriguing, mysterious, or unique.
Try looking at the people around you. Perhaps, you are interested in knowing these people’s
ideas, views, feelings, attitudes, or lifestyle. The information these people give you reflect
their mental, spiritual, emotional, or social upbringing, which in turn, show how they view
the world.
Resulting from internal aspects, people cannot measure worldviews but can know
them through numbers. Obtaining world knowledge in this manner directs you to do a
research called Qualitative Research. This is a research type that puts premium or high value
on people’s thinking or point of view conditioned by their personal traits. As such, it usually
takes place in soft sciences like social sciences, politics, economics, humanities, education,
psychology, nursing, and all business-related subjects.
Subjectivity in qualitative research is true, not only for an individual or a group under
study, but also for you, the researcher, because of your personal involvement in every stage
of your research. For instance, during interviews, you tend to admire or appreciate people’s
ideas based on their answers or your observations and analysis of certain objects. By
carefully looking at or listening to the subject or object in a natural setting, you become
affected by their expressions of what they think and feel about a topic. (Coghan 2014)
In a qualitative research, the reality is conditioned by society and people’s intentions
are involved in explaining cause-effect relationships. Things are studied in their natural
setting, enough for you to conclude that qualitative research is an act of inquiry or
investigation of real-life events. Giving you more concepts about a qualitative research are
the following paragraphs that comprehensively present the elements or characteristics, types,
and advantages of this kind of research (Silverman 2013; Litchman 2013; Walliman 2014;
Suter 2012):

Characteristics of a Qualitative Research

1. Human understanding and interpretation
Data analysis results show an individual’s mental, social, and spiritual
understanding of the world. Hence, through their worldviews, you come to know what
kind of human being he or she is, including his or her values, beliefs, likes, and
dislikes.

2. Active, powerful, and forceful

A lot of changes occur continuously in every stage of a qualitative research.
As you go through the research process, you find the need to amend or rephrase
interview questions and consider varied ways of getting answers, like shifting from
mere speculating to traveling to places for data gathering. You are not fixated to a
certain plan. Rather, you are inclined to discover your qualitative research design as
your study gradually unfolds or reveals itself in accordance with your research
objectives.

3. Multiple research approaches and methods

Qualitative research allows you to approach or plan your study in varied ways.
You are free to combine this with quantitative research and use all gathered data and
analysis techniques. Being a multi-method research, a qualitative study applies to all
research types: descriptive, exploratory, explanatory, case study, etc.

4. Specificity to generalization
Specific ideas in a qualitative research are directed to a general understanding
of something. It follows an inductive or scientific method of thinking, where you start
thinking of particular or specific concept that will eventually lead you to more
complex ideas such as generalizations or conclusions.

5. Contextualization
A quantitative research involves all variables, factors, or conditions affecting
the study. Your goal here is to understand human behavior. Thus, it is crucial for you
to examine the context or situation of an individual’s life—the who, what, why, how,
and other circumstances—affecting his or her way of life.
 6. Diversified data in real-life situations
A qualitative researcher prefers collecting data in a natural setting like
observing people as they live and work, analyzing photographs or videos as they
genuinely appear to people, and looking at classrooms unchanged or adjusted to
people’s intentional observations.

7. Abounds with words and visuals

Words, words, and more words come in big quantity in this kind of research.
Data gathering through interviews or library reading, as well as the presentation of
data analysis results, is done verbally. In some cases, it resorts to quoting some
respondents’ answers. Likewise, presenting people’s world views through visual
presentation (i.e., pictures, videos, drawings, and graphs) are significantly used in a
qualitative research.

8. Internal analysis
Here, you examine the data yielded by the internal traits of the subject
individuals (i.e., emotional, mental, spiritual characteristics). You study people’s
perception or views about your topic, not the effects of their physical existence on
your study. In case of objects (e.g., books and artworks) that are subjected to a
qualitative research, the investigation centers on underlying theories or principles that
govern these materials and their usefulness to people.

Types of Qualitative Research

1. Case Study
This type of qualitative research usually takes place in the field of social care,
nursing, psychology, rehabilitation centers, education, etc. This involves a long-time
study of a person, group, organization, or situation. It seeks to find answers to why
such thing occurs to the subject. Finding the reason/s behind such occurrence drives
you to also delve into relationships of people related to the case under study.
Varieties of data collection methods such as interviews, questionnaires, observations,
and documentary analysis are used in a case study.
2. Ethnography
Falling in the field of anthropology, ethnography is the study of a particular
cultural group to get a clear understanding of its organizational set-up, internal
operation, and lifestyle. A particular group reveals the nature or characteristics of their
own culture through the world perceptions of the cultural group’s members.
 3. Phenomenological
Coming from the word “phenomenon,” which means something known
through sensory experience, phenomenology refers to the study of how people find
their experiences meaningful. Its primary goal is to make people understand their
experiences about death of loved ones, care for handicapped persons, friendliness of
people, etc. In doing so, other people will likewise understand the meanings attached
to their experiences. Those engaged in assisting people to manage their own lives
properly often do this qualitative kind of research.
4. Content and Discourse Analysis
Content analysis is a method of quantitative research that requires an analysis
or examination of the substance or content of the mode of communication (letters,
books, journals, photos, video recordings, SMS, online messages, emails, audio-visual
materials, etc.) used by a person, group, organization, or any institution in
communicating. A study of language structures used in the medium of communication
to discover the effects of sociological, cultural, institutional, and ideological factors
on the content makes it a discourse analysis. In studying the content or structures of
the material, you need a question or a set of questions to guide you in your analysis.
5. Historical Analysis
Central to this qualitative research method is the examination of primary
documents to make you understand the connection of past events to the present time.
The results of your content analysis will help you specify phenomenological changes
in unchanged aspects of society through the years.
6. Grounded
Grounded theory takes place when you discover a new theory to underlie your
study at the time of data collection and analysis. Through your observation on your
subjects, you will happen to find a theory that applies to your current study. Interview,
observation, and documentary analysis are the data gathering techniques for this type
of qualitative research.

Advantages or Strengths of Qualitative Research

1. It adopts a naturalistic approach to its subject matter, which means that those
involve in the research understand things based on what they find meaningful.
2. It promotes a full understanding of human behavior or personality traits in their
natural setting.
3. It is instrumental for positive societal changes.
4. It engenders respect for people’s individuality as it demands the researcher’s
careful and attentive stand toward people’s world views.
5. It is a way of understanding and interpreting social interactions.
 6. It increases the researcher’s interest in the study as it includes the researcher’s
experience or background knowledge in interpreting verbal and visual data.
7. It offers multiple ways of acquiring and examining knowledge about something.

Disadvantages or Weaknesses of Qualitative Research

1. It involves a lot of researcher’s subjectivity in data analysis.
2. It is hard to know the validity or reliability of the data.
3. Its open-ended questions yield “data overload” that requires long-time analysis.
4. It is time-consuming.
5. It involves several processes, which results greatly depend on the researcher’s
views or interpretations.

LESSON 4: Qualitative Research in

Different Areas of Knowledge

RESEARCH IN DIFFERENT AREAS OF KNOWLEDGE

Subject Area Research Approaches
Research studies happen in any field of knowledge. Anthropology, Business,
Communication, Education, Engineering, Law, and Nursing, among others, turn in a big
number of research studies that reflect varied interests of people. Don’t you wonder how
people in these areas conduct their research studies?
Belonging to a certain area of discipline, you have the option to choose one from
these three basic research approaches: positive or scientific, naturalistic, and triangulation or
mixed method. The scientific approach gives stress to measurable and observable facts
instead of personal views, feelings, or attitudes. It can be used in researches under the hard
sciences or STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Medicine) and natural sciences
(Biology, Physics, Chemistry). The positive or scientific approach allows control of variables
or factors affecting the study. (Laursen 2010)
To become positivist or scientific in conducting your research study, you must collect
data in controlled ways through questionnaires or structured interviews. For instance, in the
field of medicine, to produce a new medicine, a medical researcher subjects the data to a
controlled laboratory experiment. These factual data collected are recorded in numerical or
statistical forms using numbers, percentages, fractions, and the like. Expressed in measurable
ways, these types of data are called quantitative data.
The naturalistic approach, on the other hand, is people-oriented. Data collected, in this
case, represent personal views, attitudes, thoughts, emotions, and other subjective traits of
people in a natural setting. Collecting data is done in family homes, playground, workplaces,
or schools. In these places, people’s personal traits or qualities naturally surface in the way
they manage themselves or interact with one another. The naturalistic approach focuses on
discovering the real concept or meaning behind people’s lifestyles and social relations.
Unlike the scientific approach that makes you express and record your findings
quantitatively, which means in numerical forms, the naturalistic approach lets you present
things qualitatively through verbal language. Using words rather than numbers as the unit of
analysis, this second research approach concerns itself with qualitative data—one type of
data that exists in abundance in social sciences, which to others exists as soft sciences.
Considered as soft sciences are Anthropology, Business, Education, Economics, Law,
Politics, and all subjects aligned with business and all those focused on helping professions
such as, Nursing, Counseling, Physical Therapy, and the like. (Babbie 2013)
Having the intention to collect data from people situated in a natural setting, social
researchers use unstructured interviews and participant observations. These two data
gathering techniques yield opinionated data through the use of open-ended questions and
actual participation of the researcher in the subjects’ activities. Collecting data through these
subjective-prone research methods indispensably results in the gathering of qualitative data.
All in all, from a social science researcher’s viewpoint, these qualitative data resulting
from naturalistic approach of research serves as the basis for determining universal social
values to define ethical or unethical behavior that society ought to know, not only for the
benefit of every individual and community but also for the satisfaction of man’s quest for
knowledge. (Sarantakos 2013; Ransome 2013)
In the field of Humanities, man’s social life is also subjected to research studies.
However, researchers in this area give emphasis not to man’s social life, but to the study of
the meanings, significance, and visualizations of human experiences in the fields of Fine
Arts, Literature, Music, Drama, Dance, and other artistically inclined subjects. Researches in
these subjects happen in any of the following humanistic categories:
1. Literature and Art Criticism where the researchers, using well-chosen language and
appropriate organizational pattern, depend greatly on their interpretative and reflective
thinking in evaluating the object of their study critically.
2. Philosophical Research where the focus of inquiry is on knowledge and principles
of being and on the manner human beings conduct themselves on earth.
3. Historical Research where the investigation centers on events and ideas that took
place in man’s life at a particular period.

Hard Sciences vs. Soft Sciences

Just like in other subjects under soft sciences such as marketing, man’s thoughts and
feelings still take center stage in any research studies. The purposes of any researches in any
of these two areas in business are to increase man’s understanding of the truths in line with
markets and marketing activities, making him more intelligent in arriving at decisions about
these aspects of his life. Research types that are useful for these areas are the basic and
applied research. (Feinberg 2013)
 A quantitative or qualitative kind of research is not exclusive to hard sciences or soft
sciences. These two research methods can go together in a research approach called
triangulation or mixed method approach. This is the third approach to research that allows a
combination or a mixture of research designs, data collection and data analysis techniques.
Thus, there is no such thing as a clear dichotomy between qualitative and quantitative
research methods because some authorities on research claim that a symbiotic relationship, in
which they reinforce or strengthen each other, exists between these two research methods.
Moreover, any form of knowledge, factual or opinionated, and any statistical or verbal
expression of this knowledge are deduced from human experience that by nature is
subjective. (Hollway 2013; Letherby 2013)
UNIT III
Identifying the Inquiry and
Stating the Problem iiiiiiiiiii
Introduction
Inquiry or research drives you to a thorough or an in-depth analysis of a certain
subject matter. This kind of study involves several stages that require much time and effort.
You need to spend some time in finalizing your mind about a particular topic to research on
or in determining the appropriateness of such topic, in obtaining background knowledge
about it, and in raising some specific questions that you want your research work to answer.
Focusing seriously on these aspects of your study is laying a good foundation or beginning of
your research work.

LESSON 4: Identifying the Inquiry and

Stating the Problem

SUBJECT MATTER OF THE INQUIRY OR RESEARCH

You begin your research work with a problem; that is, having a problem or topic to
work on. Mulling over a topic for your research work drives you to perform HOTS or higher-
order thinking strategies of inferential, critical, integrative, and creative thinking in finalizing
your mind on one topic among several choices. A topic is researchable if the knowledge and
information about it are supported by evidence that is observable, factual, and logical. Here
are some pointers you have to keep in mind in selecting a research topic (Babbie 2013):

Guidelines in Choosing a Research Topic

1. Interest in the subject matter
Your interest in a topic may be caused by your rich background knowledge
about it and by its novelty; meaning, its unfamiliarity to you. Being curious about a
subject, like a conundrum or a puzzle, makes you determined to unravel the mystery
or intriguing thing behind it. Your real interest in a subject pushes you to research,
investigate, or inquire about it with full motivation, enthusiasm, and energy.
2. Availability of information
Collecting a lot of information as evidence to support your claims about your
subject matter from varied forms of literature like books, journals, and newspapers,
among others, is a part and parcel of any research work. Hence, in choosing a research
topic, visit your library to check the availability of reading materials on your chosen
topic. Included in your investigation of the availability of reading materials are
questions on how updated and authoritative the materials are. Let these questions
linger as you tour the library: What are the copyright dates of the materials? How old
 or new are they? How expert or qualified the writers are in coming out with such kind
of reading materials about your topic?
3. Timeliness and relevance of the topic
The topic is relevant if it yields results that are instrumental in societal
improvement. It is timely if it is related to the present. For instance, unless it is a pure
or historical research, a research on the ins and outs of people’s revolutionary acts
will prosper more if it tackles the contemporary revolutionary actions rather than
those in the ancient time.
4. Limitations on the subject
This makes you link your choosing with course requirements. For example, to
make you complete the requirements, your teacher instructs you to submit a paper that
will apply the key principles you learned in business, psychology, education, and so
on. In this case, you have no freedom to choose your topic based on your interest, but
has to decide on one topic to finish your course.
5. Personal resources
Before sticking fully to your final choice, assess your research abilities in
terms of your financial standing, health condition, mental capacity, needed facilities,
and time allotment to enable you to complete your research. Imagine yourself pouring
much time and effort into its initial stage, only to find out later that you are unable to
complete it because of your failure to raise the amount needed for questionnaire
printing and interview trips. (Barbour 2014)

Research Topics to be Avoided

1. Controversial topics. These are topics that depend greatly on the writer’s opinion,
which may tend to be biased or prejudicial. Facts cannot support topics like these.
2. Highly technical subjects. For a beginner, researching on topics that require an
advanced study, technical knowledge, and vast experience is a very difficult task.
3. Hard-to-investigate subjects. A subject is hard to investigate if there are no
available reading materials about it and if such materials are not up-to-date.
4. Too broad subjects. Topics that are too broad will prevent you from giving a
concentrated or an in-depth analysis of the subject matter of the paper. The remedy to
this is to narrow or limit the topic to a smaller one.
5. Too narrow subjects. These subjects are so limited or specific that an extensive or
thorough searching or reading for information about these is necessary.
6. Vague subjects. Choosing topics like these will prevent you from having a clear
focus on your paper. For instance, titles beginning with indefinite adjectives such as
several, many, some, etc., as in “Some Remarkable Traits of a Filipino” or “Several
People’s Comments on the RH Law,” are vague enough to decrease the readers’
interests and curiosity
Sources of Research Topics
This time, you already have ideas on some factors that affect your process of choosing
a researchable topic. It is also necessary for you to know where a good research topic may
come from. Knowing some sources of probable research topics could hasten your choosing;
thereby, freeing you from a prolonged time of pondering over a problem of knowing which
problem is good for you to research on. The following can help you generate ideas about a
good research topic. (Silverman 2013)
1. Mass media communication – press (newspapers, ads, TV, radio, films, etc.)
2. Books, Internet, peer-reviewed journals, government publications
3. Professional periodicals like College English Language Teaching Forum, English
Forum, The Economist, Academia, Business Circle, Law Review, etc.
4. General periodicals such as Readers’ Digest, Women’s Magazine, Panorama
Magazine, Time Magazine, World Mission Magazine, etc.
5. Previous reading assignments in your other subjects
6. Work experience – clues to a researchable topic from full-time or part-time jobs,
OTJ (on-the-job training) experience, fieldwork, etc.

LESSON 4: Research Problem and

Research Questions

RESEARCH PROBLEM VS. RESEARCH QUESTION

Meaning of Research Problem
The ultimate goal of the research is not only to propose ways of studying things,
people, places, and events, but also to discover and introduce new practices, strategies, or
techniques in solving a problem. The word “problem” makes you worry and pushes you to
exert considerable effort in finding a solution for it. When you feel perplexed or anxious
about what to do about something you are doubtful of or about a question you are incapable
of answering, you then come to think of conducting research, an investigation, or inquiry.
You consider research as the remedy for getting over any problem.
When you decide to do research, you begin with a problem that will lead you to a
specific topic to focus on. For instance, you are beset by a problem of year-by-year flash
floods in your community. This problem drives you to think of one topic you can investigate
or focus on for the solution to your community’s flood problem. Perhaps, you can research
only one aspect of the flood problem, like examining only the neighborhood lifestyle in
relation to floods in the area, the need to construct antiflood structures, or the practicability of
more footbridges in the area. (Gray 2013)
Background of the Problem
You must not rush into gathering ideas and information about your topic. First, spend
time getting background knowledge about the problem that triggered off your research topic
to discover its relation to what the world, particularly the experts, professionals, and learned
people know about your topic. Also, reading for rich background ideas about the problem is
also another way to discover some theories or principles to support your study. (Braun 2014;
Woodwell 2014)

Research Questions
The research problem enables you to generate a set of research questions. However,
your ability to identify your research problem and to formulate the questions depends on the
background knowledge you have about the topic. To get a good idea of the problem, you
must have a rich background knowledge about the topic through the RRL (Review of Related
Literature), which requires intensive reading about your topic. Apart from having a clearer
picture of the topic, it will also help you in adopting an appropriate research method and have
a thorough understanding of the knowledge area of your research.
A research problem serving as an impetus behind your desire to carry out a research
study comes from many sources. Difficulties in life are arising from social relationships,
governmental affairs, institutional practices, cultural patterns, environmental issues,
marketing strategies, etc. are problematic situations that will lead you to identify one topic to
research on. Centering your mind on the problem, you can formulate one general or mother
problem of your research work. (Punch 2014)
To give your study a clear direction, you have to break this big, overreaching, general
question into several smaller or specific research questions. The specific questions, also
called sub-problems, identify or direct you to the exact aspect of the problem that your study
has to focus on. Beset by many factors, the general question or research problem is prone to
reducing itself to several specific questions, seeking conclusive answers to the problem.
The following shows you the link among the following: research problem, research
topic, research question, and the construction of one general question and specific questions
in a research paper.
Research Problem: The need to have a safer, comfortable, and healthful walk or transfer of
students from place to place in the UST campus
Research Topic: The Construction of a Covered Pathway in the UST Campus
General Question: What kind of a covered path should UST construct in its campus?

Specific Questions:
1. What materials are needed for the construction of the covered pathway in the UST
campus?
2. What roofing material is appropriate for the covered path?
 3. In what way can the covered pathway link all buildings in the campus?
4. What is the width and height of the covered path?
5. How can the covered path realize green architecture?
Research questions aim at investigating specific aspects of the research problem.
Though deduced from the general or mother question, one specific question may lead to
another sub-problem or sub-question, requiring a different data-gathering technique and
directing the research to a triangulation or mixed method approach. Referring to varied
aspects of the general problem, a set of research questions plays a crucial part in the entire
research work. They lay the foundation for the research study. Therefore, they determine the
research design or plan of the research. Through sub-questions, you can precisely determine
the type of data and the method of collecting, analyzing, and presenting data.
Any method or technique of collecting, collating, and analyzing data specified by the
research design depends greatly on the research questions. The correct formulation of
research questions warrants not only excellent collection, analysis, and presentation of data,
but a credible conclusion as well. (Layder 2013)
Hence, the following are things you have to remember in research question
formulation. (Barbie 2013; Litchman 2013; Silverman 2013)

Guidelines in Formulating Research Questions

1. Establish a clear relation between the research questions and the problem or topic.
2. Base your research questions on your RRL or Review of Related Literature because
existing published works help you get good background knowledge of the research
problem and help you gauge the people’s current understanding or unfamiliarity about
the topic, as well as the extent of their knowledge and interest in it. Convincing
solutions to research problems or answers to research questions stem from their
alignment with what the world already knows or what previous research studies have
already discovered about the research problem or topic.
3. Formulate research questions that can arouse your curiosity and surprise you with
your discoveries or findings. This is true for research questions asked about a problem
that was never investigated upon.
4. State your research questions in such a way that they include all dependent and
independent variables referred to by the theories, principles, or concepts underlying
your research work. 5. Let the set of research questions or sub-problems be preceded
by one question expressing the main problem of the research.
6. Avoid asking research questions that are answerable with “yes” or “no” and use the
“how” questions only in a quantitative research.
7. Be guided by the acronym SMART (specific, measurable, attainable, realistic,
time-bound) in formulating the research questions. Applying SMART, you must deal
with exact answers and observable things, determine the extent or limit of the data
collected, be aware of the timeframe and completion period of the study, and
endeavor to have your research study arrive at a particular conclusion that is
indicative of what are objective, factual, or real in this world.