Biases regarding gender, race, ethnicity, etc. , can raise important ethical issues, especially regarding who should be able to study whom, how, where, under what conditions, to what effect. While remaining sensitive to the issue of bias, we often develop a research question by placing ourselves in a research community , finding out how others have studied the topic, how they have framed their research, what methods they have used, and how our research can build on and add to what has already been done. Using library search tools can us find the studies we need to consult. A good research question is one that is researchable or, in other words, is a question that can be answered with empirical information. While we need to be wary of value bias, we need to focus on trying to acquiring factual information whether it is qualitative or quantitative.
Research is all about acquiring sound empirical information about the world as it is.
A good research strives to achieve controlled observation . Controlled observation is where we establish conditions such that we can isolate how certain selected factors affect other factors. When trying to acquire quantitative empirical information, research is often framed in terms of an hypothesis . An hypothesis is a statement about what is likely to be true. It is like a bet or a wager.