Research questions: how to approach a study, with examples
Research questions are the first step that must be taken before starting the study of something that intrigues us. In science, knowing how to specify what the objective of an investigation is is necessary to know in which direction the research must be designed and with what kind of methodologies it can be counted.
In Psychology and other similar disciplines, such as Biology or Sociology, there are still many research questions that have not been answered. Below we will see some of them and how it is possible to propose new studies thanks to which we increase our level of knowledge about the subject in question.
- Maybe you're interested: "50 questions to get to know a person better"
Research questions: the starting point of any study
The function of the research questions is to specify the unknown that you want to unveil (or partially reveal, in most cases). So important is knowing how to identify the problem well as specifying what is not part of it, to avoid confusing similar concepts.
For example, if we want to know what influence a person's intelligence has on the fact of having lived in the same home with his biological father and mother during childhood, we can not ask the following research question:
How does coexistence with the family affect the intelligence in adulthood during the first years of life?In this case the concept "family" it is too ambiguous , and the fact of working with him can completely distort the results of the investigation. In addition, "the first years of life" is not an enlightening concept, it is much more convenient to concretize proposing, for example, a lapse of the 11 years that go from birth to puberty, approximately.
The operationalization of the initial doubt
Given that scientific research always has a point necessarily reductionist (we are interested in knowing very well a very specific part of reality, and not others), the research questions give way to other sub-questions that further specify what you want to answer. A) Yes, you move from a general doubt to more specific ones that, together, help answer the first.
In the case at hand, these research questions of a hierarchy lower than the initial one could be:
- How does coexistence with biological parents during the first 11 years of life affect crystallized intelligence?
- How does coexistence with biological parents during the first 11 years of life affect fluid intelligence?
- How does coexistence with biological parents during the first 11 years of life affect IQ?
Examples of research questions to be developed
Given the logic and purpose of the research questions, let's see some examples of scientific mysteries that can give us surprises in the future.
Of course, these are unknowns raised in a general and abstract way , so that each person who wants to investigate must specify them more so that they adapt to what they are most interested in.
1. Are the mechanisms of memory based on synapses or the storage of molecules in neurons?
Although the first theory is the most accepted, some researchers believe that our memories they are not patterns of joint activation of neurons , but they are individual elements that can be found in each nerve cell separately.
- Related article: "Synapses may not be the basis of memory"
2. Is there only one intelligence, or several?
This is a doubt that lasts for decades, or even centuries, if we consider the work of philosophers. There are several proposals according to which there is not a single biological element that determines who is more intelligent than another, but a set of those that work in a relatively independent way. An example is found in Howard Gardner's proposal of Multiple Intelligences or in Sternberg's theory.
3. What produces gender dysphoria?
Many transsexual people suffer a lot when they perceive that their gender identity does not coincide with the observable characteristics of their body. It is not known if the root of this problem is biological or cultural , or to what extent both components are combined.
- Related article: "Gender dysphoria: being born in the wrong body"
4. Does decision making occur unconsciously?
Although we usually link the decision-making process to rationality and the meticulous reflection of the expected consequences, there is evidence that we make many important decisions unconsciously, and then we justify that decision through rationality.
5. Is male aggression something cultural?
Around the planet, men are more likely to perform acts of physical violence . This seems to suggest that it is a differentiated fact based on genes, but it is also possible that a universal characteristic is cultural.
- Maybe you're interested: "The 11 types of violence (and the different kinds of aggression)"
6. How do human pheromones influence our behavior?
What we perceive through smell usually has a powerful impact on our mind, but in the case of pheromones we do not really know how they act on us.
7. What causes autism?
Autism Spectrum Disorders are partly a mystery, and their cause is not well understood. Of course, it is ruled out that they are produced by vaccines, as is sometimes still defended today.
8. How do the great apes think?
The group of primates formed by chimpanzees, bonobos, gorillas and orangutans they are the most intelligent non-human animals that exist nowadays, and much remains to be known about their way of thinking.
9. Can psychopathy be eliminated?
There are people for whom psychopathy is not a problem, but in some cases it can be a psychological factor that predisposes to harm others. In these cases, how can we eliminate this psychological attribute?
- Related article: "Psychopathy: what happens in the mind of the psychopath?"
10. What causes falling in love?
It has been said that falling in love with someone is something that depends on the contexts that are lived together, and not on the personality and stable characteristics of the people. Which of the two explanations prevails?
