Stating
Research Questions
or Establishing Hypotheses
The place of research questions
Research questions usually conclude your Introduction to an investigative project.
The research question(s) should be seen to grow out of the problems and work reviewed.
In investigative reports:
- The reader looks for key statements that indicate questions for research rather than answers or positions
- The reader normally expects to be shown every angle of the problem before research questions are framed
- Research questions are often framed as hypotheses, particularly in objective, scientific research
Here are two things to check when you establish your research questions or hypotheses at the end of the Introduction:
Research questions emerge from the analysis
Here is an example of how a the student arrived at research questions, when reporting on code-mixing.
The Research Question: Following the lead of Gibbons' earlier research with students from the university of Hong Kong, it was decided to investigate three hypotheses:
Notice how the hypotheses are from a previous study. In the full introduction, you need to show clearly how your research questions emerge:
- from the discussion of issues and problems in your literature review and
- from the gap you have identified. This means they must emerge as a logical result of your analysis.
Research questions reflect type of investigation
The research questions need to be framed according to the type or nature of the study.
They are concerned with evaluating or identifying factors or causes - determining kinds or categories.
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