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We’ve all been here! Maybe the paper is completely blank. If we are lucky, we might start with a hypothesis or uncharted territory to explore. But what do we do next? And more importantly, how do we know when our idea is good enough to invest time, money, and effort, often committing years of our lives to its pursuit?

Why? Because a well-crafted question makes everything better. Imagine having confidence, at the start of a project, that everything is set up for success. For example:

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• Everyone on your team is on the same page.
• The question is answerable with the resources you have.
• The target audience finds your question relevant.

• Your team includes expertise or training to execute the study.

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Does all this seem out-of-scope for a simple research question? 

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It may feel that way! Yet, all of this and more is possible with a well elaborated and evaluated research question.

Did you notice that our example questions weren’t, well, questions? Different people can mean very different things when they talk about a “research question!” Each interpretation has a valuable purpose, and there is no single correct definition. What matters is that everyone agrees on the goals.

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For the purposes of this unit, a “research question”:

• Starts as an idea.
• Can be written as a question or statement.some text
  • Our examples will be statements because these are easier to work with when adding detail. 
• Is different from a title, abstract, research proposal, etc.some text
  • These will be much easier to write with a rigorously developed research question.
• Often requires multiple revisions and rewrites.some text
  • You may find room for improvement after you decide to proceed. That’s ok! BUT also…
• Should not change in response to data.some text
  • If you catch your question shape-shifting during the data analysis phase of your project, check out our upcoming unit on Outcome Switching.

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But we don’t just want to create any old research question! Our goal is to improve our research question, taking it from good to great. A GREAT research question:

• Is elaborated in enough detail for all key people to understand the project idea.
• Expresses an idea for a project that still seems sound after you conduct a thorough evaluation.

In science legends, ideas strike as if by magic! In real life… we’re not going to tell you this won’t happen, but let’s just say it’s hard to plan a career around it.

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Promising ideas – knowledge gaps that are unfilled AND practical to address – are the hidden treasures of the research world. These gems are often discovered when we listen to and learn from each other. This may occur through considering advice from an advisor, talking things through with a colleague, or carefully reading a body of literature. The key is to pay attention to the boundaries of what is known and unknown – often these are found at disciplinary intersections. When this boundary becomes clear, congratulations, you have found a gap!

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But a knowledge gap is just the first half; the second half is what turns an idea into a great research question.

Time is probably the number one reason we skip steps and make mistakes - with research questions and with many other things! We need a process that is realistic and worthwhile. Fortunately, a little rigor can go a very long way when it is applied at this stage. Using a framework at each step will help us to break things into manageable pieces. It will also help us to prioritize our efforts within the tight time budget of real-world research, giving us a quick comprehensive snapshot that we can use to identify areas that need work.

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Are you ready? This investment will continue to pay off for years to come!

If you are bringing your own research question to this unit, you may have only a seed of an idea, or you might have a fully formed question that you are looking to improve. As you can see in the diagram below, either of these is a great place to start for our next lesson.

In the full-length version of this unit, we will unpack the many dimensions along which a research question may be elaborated. For the lab meeting version, we will move on after Lesson 2 to a framework for evaluating a research question. In that process, you may turn up areas of challenge or uncertainty that can be addressed by pausing to further elaborate or improve your idea. Alternatively, you may decide that you are ready to make a choice! That decision will be up to you - by that time, we feel confident that your choice will be rigorously well-informed.