What is a Good Research Project

Abstract

This paper discusses characteristics of a “good research project.” It also discusses strategies for developing a research proposal. This includes suggestions for how to choose and focus a research topic as well as how to refine a research question. Details to include in a research proposal as well as the very specific areas that a research proposal needs to address are discussed. Questions to guide the design of the research proposal are also presented. The paper concludes with the discussion of a sample study which contains the characteristics of a good research project referred to in the paper. Suggestions for further reading on the development of a research project are also provided. A key feature of a good research project is that it has never been done before; that is, it is in some way original in the sense that it is not aiming to find out something people in the field already know. The project also needs to be worth doing. It is, then, important to consider the value and relevance of the project as there are many things that might be capable of being done that are not worth doing. A good research project also needs to be feasible and manageable within the time frame available for it, with the resources that are available for the project and by the person (or people) who will be carrying out the study. Thus, a project that may take three to four years, as with a PhD project, will be much too ambitious if there is only a year available to carry out and complete the study. There may also be financial resources required for the project, such as airfare and hotel costs, that without them, the project may not be able to proceed. It is also important to consider whether the people who wish to carry out the project have the theoretical background and methodological skills that the proposed study requires. For example, if the study is a conversation analysis project, the people carrying out the study need to know how to do conversation analysis. If the study requires some kind of statistical treatment, the researcher (or researchers) needs to be able to do this. It is also important that the topic of the research be of interest to a wider audience, such as the international readership of a journal, as one of the aims of conducting research is disseminating it to a wider audience. Connected to this is whether the completed project is likely to lead to some kind of publication, such as a journal article or a book, so that the research is able to contribute to the development of the discipline in which it is located. Developing a Research Proposal There are a number of important steps to go through in developing a research proposal. A good place to start with this is by drawing up a shortlist of topics that might be worth investigating. It is then a good idea to take this list to someone who has had experience in carrying out research (such as a colleague or potential mentor) to get advice on which topic, in their view, is the best one to proceed with. The next thing for researchers to do is to formulate a general question that Language Education in Asia, 2014, 5(1), 20-27. http://dx.doi.org/10.5746/LEiA/14/V5/I1/A03/Paltridge Language Education in Asia, Volume 5, Issue 1, 2014 Paltridge Page 21 the research will answer and, from there, focus the question. This stage of the process often causes new researchers the most trouble, so people who are new to research should not rush this stage and should take as much time as needed to do this. In short, the question has to be both worthy and answerable. A question may be worth asking but impractical to answer, or answerable but not worth researching. The study, thus, needs to have a question that both has value and is answerable in terms of the proposed methodology and the question’s capability. Table 1 provides more detailed advice on ways to refine a research question. Table 1 Ways to Refine a Research Question (based on Stevens & Asmar, 1999, p. 17)  Read broadly and widely and to find a subject about which you are passionate. Immerse yourself in the literature, use your library, read the abstracts of other recent theses and dissertations, check theses on the web. For example: http://www.ndltd.org/  Narrow your focus to a single question: be disciplined and not over-ambitious  Be prepared to change or modify your question if necessary  Be able to answer the question “Why am I doing this project?” (and not a different one)  Read up-to-date materials ensure that your idea is achievable and no one else has done or is doing it  Work through the implications of your research question: consider existing materials and ideas on which it is based, check the logic, spell out methods to be used  Condense your research question into two sentences: write it down, with pride, above your working area. Change the question if needed.  Ask yourself: What will we know at the end that we did not already know? Table 2 shows how a Chinese student who was a beginning researcher started from a very general topic and moved from there to a more narrowly focused research question that had value and was answerable. In his particular case, he was studying at a university outside China but was interested in how a communicative approach to language teaching could be implemented in university classes in his country. As he was not living in China, he could not get any firsthand data that he could use for his study. He did, however, have a set of textbooks with him that everyone in his university used to teach English. The researcher was also particularly interested in the teaching of listening so he brought the resources and the interest he had together by looking at how the teaching of listening was approached in Chinese university text books and comparing this with communicatively oriented textbooks published in English-speaking countries. He, thus, moved from a question that was worth asking but not, in his current situation, capable of being answered to one that was also worth asking and also capable of being done. CamTESOL Conference Plenary Speaker Paltridge Page 22 Table 2 Choosing and Focusing a Research Topic: An Example