Asking questions

In the previous section you were introduced the methods and skills you need to identify a good research problem. As you learned, researchers start their research study by identifying a broad research problem that they want to address. However, they usually need to narrow down their research problem and identify a specific focus for their study.

Specifying the purpose for research consists of identifying the objective for a study, and then narrowing it into specific research questions, and then into hypotheses.

In other words, research questions are questions that narrow down the study purpose to specific questions that researchers seek to answer. Unlike the single statement found in a research purpose, researchers usually state multiple research questions so that they can fully examine a topic.

After you identify a research problem and find an interesting topic to study, you may start to ask yourself some questions that you want to answer. A question generally starts with: How, What, When, Who, Which, Why, or Where. For example, if you are interested in cancer cell research, your questions might be 'What are cancer cells?' or 'How could cancer cells develop from normal cells?' or 'What is the most effective method for killing cancer cells?' The research and experiments you will be conducting all revolve around finding answers to the questions you are posing.

Let's move on to some basic considerations in asking research questions.

If you are conducting something like a science project, it is important to think ahead. For one thing, you need to think through the potential implications of your project questions. If you can identify and plan for these implications, this will save you lots of time and unhappiness in your later experimental work.

There are also basic practical and ethical considerations that need to be addressed before asking interesting science project questions. Again, if researchers do not consider and follow these considerations carefully, they may waste a lot of time and materials.

What are the characteristics of good research questions?

First, the questions should be interesting Remember that it is difficult to work for months or even years on something that is not interesting.

There should be at least some references on the subject. That is, you will want to be able to build on the experience of others!

A good question should measure changes to important factors – that is, the variables – using a number that represents a quantity such as a percentage, length, width, weight, voltage, velocity, time, temperature, and so on. It should be measureable. If you cannot measure the results of your experiment, you're not doing science!

Do you have all the materials and equipment you will need for your research study?

Do you have enough time to do your research study? Remember; for most experiments you may need enough time to do a trial/preliminary test so that you can work out any problems in your procedures; these are sometimes called 'dirty experiments'.

Most importantly, is your experiment safe to perform? If a scientific research project involves human subjects, vertebrate animals – that is, animals with a backbone – or animal tissue, pathogenic agents, DNA, or controlled or hazardous substances, you will likely need approval from corresponding authorities such as a Scientific Review Committee.

For example, in order to maintain an ethical approach to animal research in HK, local researchers should follow the code of practice developed by Animal Welfare Advisory Group and issued by Agriculture, Fisheries and Conservation Department, AFCD when handling animal experiments. The purpose of this code of practice is to ensure the humane care of animals used for experimental purposes. This is one part of the overall strategy being adopted by local universities, private research laboratories and the HKSAR Government. If you're interested, you can search for an download the 'Code of practice' from the AFCD website.

The questions shown here are good project questions. As you can see, their parameters – such as water purity and surface tension – are measurable! Answering them will be safe to perform. There are tons of references that you can find. And so on….

Now that you know the basic considerations for setting good research questions, the next question that you may ask is: How do you actually make up such research questions? It certainly can be difficult to think of good questions from scratch. Usually they must be triggered by something, and as such they can arise from a number of sources.

If you analyse the questions that scientists typically ask, you will see that there is a generalized form of these questions that can be applied to nearly anything. What you need to do, however, is to refine a general question into a very specific one that fits into your research study. Of course, this approach is not perfect, but it can help you overcome research difficulties that you may be frightened to ask questions about because you may feel you don't have enough knowledge to do so.

All study subjects have arisen somehow, and for some reasons. They must be composed of certain elements, and possess certain characteristics. You can immediately get a better understanding of most subjects for scientific study by asking questions that start with: How, What, When, Who, Why, or Where – the six Ws.

In the example listed here, do you think the questions are good or bad?

I would say both of them are bad…but why?

First, the effect of music on plants is something that is difficult to measure.

Ladies and gentlemen, can we compare an orange with an apple to see which tastes better? Some of you may say an apple is better, and some of you may say an orange is better. The question is too subjective, and difficult to measure!

You can begin to build an understanding of a study subject just by asking research questions based on the skills you have learned – even if the answers are not known to you. Forming good research questions is important for your subsequent experimental design. I hope, therefore, that you have learned some useful tricks for devising research questions that you can apply when you go on to prepare your own project.