A very useful, informative and practical article that helps researchers.
The intriguing part is: who precedes whom: RQs or Literature Review?
If it is RQs, how does a researcher gets these questions? By experience, intuition or rather directed?
If it is Literature Review, how does a researcher selects literature (to be specific, of a particular field) for 'gap filling?'
Chapter 1. Cecez-Kecmanovic, D. & Kennan, M.A. (2013) Chapter 5. The...
This is a good question, because we do want to advise our research students: “Find the R Question first” or “Do your Lit Review first to find your R Question). This is a classic Catch 22 (Chicken and egg question.)
I teach my students to start with a preliminary, tentative question, to refine it with what they see in the literature, and then to repeat the literature review. This way they are more likely to come up with research with a practical application.
Perhaps if you were a theoretician or a Mathematician, looking for a safe R Question, you might prefer to start with the literature first.
Certainly, however, we need to alert our research students to the fact that Research is not linear (RQ->LR...)
Thank you Prof Ian. I very much appreciate your response and kind of help you are providing to aspiring researchers.
This point appears to be silly, but assume an alien lands into the research arena, how does he get a preliminary question? Unfortunately, this is never told/ admitted.
Unaided by any help, it appears a great challenging task to question. As you have rightly pointed out, it is not linear and may be a hermeneutic cycle. Thank you once again.
From my forthcoming book. “Ask a burning question. Being a researcher gives you a licence to purposefully poke and pry. Become aware of the problems that are practical, pressing, and that need to be investigated. Whatever arouses your curiosity, and which has not been answered unequivocally is a candidate for your research question.”
This then leads one to ponder on how to encourage curiosity and creativity! {Especially in aliens.}
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