Copyright © 2008 Wolters Kluwer Health | Lippincott Williams & Wilkins Chapter 4 Conceptualizing Research Problems, Research Questions, and Hypotheses

Copyright © 2008 Wolters Kluwer Health | Lippincott Williams & Wilkins Basic Terminology Research problem An enigmatic, perplexing, or troubling condition Problem statement A statement articulating the research problem and indicating the need for a study

Copyright © 2008 Wolters Kluwer Health | Lippincott Williams & Wilkins Basic Terminology (cont’d) Research questions The specific queries the researcher wants to answer in addressing the research problem Hypotheses The researcher’s predictions about relationships among variables

Copyright © 2008 Wolters Kluwer Health | Lippincott Williams & Wilkins Basic Terminology (cont’d) Statement of purpose The researcher’s summary of the overall study goal Research aims or objectives The specific accomplishments to be achieved by conducting the study

Copyright © 2008 Wolters Kluwer Health | Lippincott Williams & Wilkins Sources of Research Problems Experience and clinical fieldwork Nursing literature Social issues Theory Ideas from external sources

Copyright © 2008 Wolters Kluwer Health | Lippincott Williams & Wilkins Developing and Refining Research Problems Selecting a broad topic area (e.g., patient compliance, caregiver stress) Narrowing the topic—asking questions to help focus the inquiry Examples: –What is going on with…? –What factors contribute to….?

Copyright © 2008 Wolters Kluwer Health | Lippincott Williams & Wilkins Evaluating Research Problems Significance of the problem Researchability of the problem Feasibility of addressing the problem (e.g., time, resources, ethics, cooperation of others) Interest to the researcher

Copyright © 2008 Wolters Kluwer Health | Lippincott Williams & Wilkins Problem Statements Should identify the nature, context, and significance of the problem being addressed Should be broad enough to include central concerns Should be narrow enough to serve as a guide to study design

Copyright © 2008 Wolters Kluwer Health | Lippincott Williams & Wilkins Statement of Purpose-Quantitative Studies: Identifies key study variables Identifies possible relationships among variables Indicates the population of interest Suggests, through use of verbs, the nature of the inquiry (e.g., to test…, to compare…, to evaluate…)

Copyright © 2008 Wolters Kluwer Health | Lippincott Williams & Wilkins Statement of Purpose-Qualitative Studies: Identifies the central phenomenon Indicates the research tradition (e.g., grounded theory, ethnography) Indicates the group, community, or setting of interest Suggests, through use of verbs, the nature of the inquiry (e.g., to describe…, to discover…, to explore…)

Copyright © 2008 Wolters Kluwer Health | Lippincott Williams & Wilkins Research Questions: Are sometimes direct rewordings of statements of purpose, worded as questions Are sometimes used to clarify or lend specificity to the purpose statement In quantitative studies, pose queries about the relationships among variables

Copyright © 2008 Wolters Kluwer Health | Lippincott Williams & Wilkins Research Questions: (cont’d) In qualitative studies, pose queries linked to the research tradition:  Grounded theory: process questions  Phenomenology: meaning questions  Ethnography: cultural description questions

Copyright © 2008 Wolters Kluwer Health | Lippincott Williams & Wilkins Hypothesis: States a prediction Must always involve at least two variables Must suggest a predicted relationship between the independent variable and the dependent variable Must contain terms that indicate a relationship (e.g., more than, different from, associated with)

Copyright © 2008 Wolters Kluwer Health | Lippincott Williams & Wilkins Simple Versus Complex Hypotheses Simple hypothesis Expresses a predicted relationship between one independent variable and one dependent variable Complex hypothesis States a predicted relationship between two or more independent variables and/or two or more dependent variables

Copyright © 2008 Wolters Kluwer Health | Lippincott Williams & Wilkins Directional Versus Nondirectional Hypotheses Directional hypothesis Predicts the direction of a relationship Nondirectional hypothesis Predicts the existence of a relationship, not its direction

Copyright © 2008 Wolters Kluwer Health | Lippincott Williams & Wilkins Research Versus Null Hypotheses Research hypothesis States the actual prediction of a relationship Statistical or null hypothesis Expresses the absence of a relationship (used only in statistical testing)