I'm, what you can say, a novice researcher. At the moment, I am perplexed by the huge information gaps in my research. When I make an educated guess, it generally goes wrong. Is this normal? What are the things you follow when you do research in an unexplored territory? What should I do? Please give me some advice. Thank you.
Often, a road map of research is vague and unstable. It will gradually become clear and stable with the research process going on.
Firstly be clear with your research objectives. then create a roadmap diagram in any plateform that you are comfortable be it in paper or Excel etc.... on how to go about with a time frame. After you are clear with objectives, read and collect literatures(theory, data, methodology) as much as possible that will strengthen your understanding and when you gain confidence, surely it will drive you in
Dear Arifin
You haven't mentioned the discipline in which you are conducting your research. Different disciplines have different protocols and methods for expanding knowledge. A generalised answer is that you should ask a senior academic at your university, such as your immediate supervisor or an experienced colleague, to identify some benchmark articles or books in your field of study. Read those articles or books to gain an overview of the field of research in which you are interested. Next I would frame a "central research question" or issue for which you can't find answers in the literature. As you can continue your research, you might change that central research question. Often, as you read more material, you will find that someone else has already answered part of that central research question, or else you might find that the question is so broad that you won't be able to produce an answer in the time available for your project. That means that you need to go back and adjust the central research question. (You might express it in the form of a hypothesis that you set out to prove or disprove). Now in the evidentiary disciplines such as the sciences, you may need to collect some original data, or conduct an experiment or survey that sheds some light on your central research question.
I would make extensive use of the international search engines like Google Scholar and Scopus to find previous writings in your field of study.
But I think to get started, you need to find a good review article or scholarly book.
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