Research is a systematic inquiry to describe, explain, predict and control
the observed phenomenon. Research involves inductive and deductive methods (Babbie,
1998). Inductive methods analyze the observed phenomenon and identify the general
principles, structures, or processes underlying the phenomenon observed; deductive
methods verify the hypothesized principles through observations. The purposes
are different: one is to develop explanations, and the other is to test the
validity of the explanations.
One thing that we have to pay attention to research is that the heart of the
research is not on statistics, but the thinking behind the research. How we
really want to find out, how we build arguments about ideas and concepts, and
what evidence that we can support to persuade people to accept our arguments.
Gall, Borg and Gall (1996) proposed four types of knowledge that research contributed
to education as follows:
- Description: Results of research can describe natural or social phenomenon,
such as its form, structure, activity, change over time, relationship to other
phenomena. The descriptive function of research relies on instrumentation
for measurement and observations. The descriptive research results in our
understanding of what happened. It sometimes produces statistical information
about aspects of education.
- Prediction: Prediction research is intended to predict a phenomenon
that will occur at time Y from information at an earlier time X. In educational
research, researchers have been engaged in:
Improvement: This type of research is mainly concerned
with the effectiveness of intervention. The research approach include experimental
design and evaluation research.
Explanation: This type research subsumes the other three: if the
researchers are able to explain an educational phenomenon, it means that they
can describe, can predict its consequences, and know how to intervene to change
- Acquiring knowledge about factors that predict students' success in school
and in the world of work
- Identifying students who are likely to be unsuccessful so that prevention
programs can be instituted.
What are the purposes of research?
Patton (1990) pointed out the importance of identifying the purpose in a research
process. He classified four types of research based on different purposes:
- Basic Research: The purpose of this research is to understand and
explain, i.e. the research is interested in formulating and testing theoretical
construct and propositions that ideally generalize across time and space.
This type of research takes the form of a theory that explains the phenomenon
under investigation to give its contribution to knowledge. This research is
more descriptive in nature exploring what, why and how questions.
- Applied Research: The purpose of this research is to help people
understand the nature of human problems so that human beings can more effectively
control their environment. In other words, this type of research pursues potential
solutions to human and societal problems. This research is more prescriptive
in nature, focusing on how questions.
- Evaluation Research (summative and formative): Evaluation research
studies the processes and outcomes aimed at attempted solution. The purpose
of formative research is to improve human intervention within specific conditions,
such as activities, time, and groups of people; the purpose of summative evaluation
is to judge the effectiveness of a program, policy, or product.
- Action Research: Action research aims at solving specific problems
within a program, organization, or community. Patton (1990) described that
design and data collection in action research tend to be more informal, and
the people in the situation are directly involved in gathering information
and studying themselves.
What is the research process?
Gall, Borg, and Gall (1996) described the following stages of conducting a research
- Identify a significant research problem: in this stage, find out the research
questions that are significant and feasible to study.
- Prepare a research proposal: a research proposal usually consists of the
sections including introductory, literature review, research design, research
method, data analysis and protection of human subject section, and timeline.
- Conduct a pilot study: the purpose is to develop and try out data-collection
methods and other procedures.
- Conduct a main study
- Prepare a report
Gall, Borg, and Gall (1996) also explained that these five stages may overlap
or occur in a different order depending the nature of the study. Qualitative
studies which involve emergent research design may gather and analyze some data
before developing the proposal, or a pilot study can be done before writing
a research proposal or not at all.
Anglin, Ross, and Morrison (1995) took a closer look at the stages of identifying
a research problem and preparing the research proposal. They advised a sequence
of planning steps:
Select a Topic
Research requires commitment. As a researcher, you want
to make sure you are doing something that you have a great interest
Identify the Research Problem
Based on your own understanding and interest of the
topic, think about what issues can be explored? Sometimes, a research
problem cannot be immediately identified. But, through reviewing the
existing literature and having continuous discourse with peers and scholars,
the research problem will start take its shape.
Conduct a Literature Search
Reviewing literature has two major purposes: one is
to build up the researcher's knowledge base of the topic under exploration
for a deeper understanding, and the other is to ensure the significance
of the research. The researcher needs to make sure how the research
will be able to contribute to the knowledge in the related field compared
with the existing research literature.
State the Research Question
The research problem will evolve during your pursuing
knowledge base through reviewing literature and discourse with peers
and scholars. To specify what questions your research study want to
answer helps to provide the basis of planning other parts of your
study, e.g. the research design, the methods for data collection and
- Questions about whether a certain instructional method or
strategy improve a certain skill or learning outcome
- Questions about whether a certain student characteristics
have effects on a certain skill or learning outcome, or whether
the characteristics interact with the instructional strategy
or method to affect learning of a certain skill or cognitive
- Questions about whether two or more variables are related
to each other? Those questions intend to use or control one
variable to predict a future performance of a particular variable
- Questions to generate a theory to describe certain patterns
of interaction or process of an observed phenomenon
- Questions about lived experience of research participants
- Questions about the cultural patterns or social patterns
in the classroom
Ideas abstracted from Anglin, Ross, and Morrison (1995)
Determine the Research Design
In the intention of the research study is to verify
a causal relationship between certain variables, use an experimental
design; if the intention of the research study is to find out how variables
relate to one another, use a correlational design; if the intention
of the research study is to describe and understand a particular social
condition/pattern and meaning of a social experience, conduct a qualitative
Three major elements in the research study need to be
considered: participants, materials, and instruments.
Participants: It concerns whom to
study. For experimental studies, the researcher needs to consider
statistical sampling to make sure that sample is representative
of the population, e.g. techniques of random sampling and stratified
sampling. For qualitative research, purposeful sampling is the major
principle. The selection of individuals, groups, or cases depends
on how the characteristics, or properties of the individuals, groups,
or cases will best inform the researcher with the focus of what
is under investigation.
- Materials and Instrumentation: For experimental research,
operationalization of the variables is the focus, i.e. what are different
treatment conditions, and how to measure the dependent variables.
The researcher has to consider issues about the reliability (the consistency
of the test), and validity (whether the test is testing what is meant
to test) of the measurement. The design of the experimental conditions
has taken the threats of the internal and external validity into account.
The researcher wants to make sure that the establishing of the causal
relationship is not influenced by other factors than the controlling
factors, and the researcher needs to consider to what extent the results
of the research can be generalized to the population beyond the sample
For qualitative research, the issues are the sources of data, where
the researcher can find the information and what methods the researcher
can use to get the information. Qualitative research usually focuses
on the verbal information gathered from the interviews, observations,
documents or cultural artifacts. The very distinctive feature about
the qualitative research is that the researcher is part of the instrument.
The recognition of this researcher's subjective interpretation of
the information yields the process of triangulation, which emphasizes
use of multiple sources, methods, investigators, and theories to
ensure the credibility of the research.
- Procedures: A procedural planning of how to get approval
from IRB, how to get entry to research participants or to the field,
how to implement the experimental treatment or to schedule observations
and interviews, and how to prepare for write-up. A general outline
of the process and a timeline will facilitate the research progress.
Identify Analysis Procedures
| Different research questions and different
research designs entail different analysis method to take. Experimental
design employs statistical analysis to give statistical descriptions of
the groups in terms of different independent variables and dependent variables,
and to determine the significance of the differences whether the dependent
variables are caused by the independent variables. On the other hand,
qualitative design employs semantic analysis to identify themes, categories,
processes, and patterns of an observed phenomenon, and provides rich descriptions
of the phenomenon in order to develop a deeper understanding of human
Anglin, G. J., Ross, S. M., & Morrsion, G. R. (1995). Inquiry
in instructional design and technology: Getting started. In G. J. Anglin (ed.),
(2nd ed.) Instructional technology: Past, present, and future. Englewood,
CO: Libraries Unlimited, Inc.
Gall, M. D., Borg, W. R., & Gall, J. P. (1996). Educational
Research: An Introduction ( Sixth ed.). White Plains, NY: Longman.
Patton, M. Q. (1990). Qualitative Evaluation and Research Methods.
( 2nd ed.). Newbury Park, CA: Sage.