What is a Research Question?
A research question, in simple terms, is the questions that a researcher asks in his research project; they are the questions a researcher tries to answer in his research project. A researcher tries to find answers in his inquiry in regard to a specific problem. In every research, the first step is to find a problem, then the researcher sets specific questions related to this problem, and the researcher then begins a journey to answer these questions. Research questions are asked in both qualitative and quantitative studies. The researcher does investigations using different methods, and this requires the collection of data and analysis ( Sandberg & Alvesson, 2011) . A good research question looks to enhance knowledge over a critical issue, and are normally narrow and specific.
In order to create a research question, the researcher must first determine the kind of research they want to engage in. Types of research studies include qualitative, quantitative, or mixed study ( Agee, 2009) . Other factors are likely to determine the research question that is asked, including the available funding for the project. An example of a research question is business research. A business owner may be experiencing low sales in a month. To find why the sales are declining, they will need to do a scientific study. The first step is to ask questions, and the first obvious question is, “Why are our sales declining?” Then there will be other specific questions like “Are our social media interaction declining?” etc.
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Importance of Research Question
Both successful student types of research and expert researchers in different industries develop research questions. They create these questions because they are very important tools, and they are a very important part of the research process. Through the definition of the exact objectives a research study sets to solve, the research questions influence almost the entire phase or the course which the rest of the study will take in completing the research. It is true that a research question dictates the rest of the steps to be taken in a study, or even in other areas of life ( Sandberg & Alvesson, 2011). For example, if a researcher wants to answer questions related to a health challenge in society, research questions will help make faster and better decisions on the next steps to take before a problem arises. Another example, in the current COVID-19 pandemic, research questions are created to help understand ways to keep people safe. Potent research questions over the pandemic have been: Should the public wear masks ? How can we prevent the fast spread of coronavirus ? Most importantly, research questions help find solutions to a societal problem.
Importance of Ethical Considerations in Public and Nonprofit Administration Research
Ethics are the written and unwritten rules and regulations that define people’s moral conduct. The ethical concerns in public and nonprofit administration is critical for respectable organization conduct based on the needs of a specific state, town, or country—ethics guarantees accountability between the public or nonprofit organizations administrations and the public. By observing codes of conduct standards and principles, the public find their issues solved in a fair manner ( Clark & Badiee, 2010) . Observing codes of conduct also provides the leaders with the standards for integrity in their activities. In return, integrity helps to promote community trust. By creating a welcoming and an environment of trust, the nonprofits and public administration help the general public have a proper understanding that they truly have the public’s interest close to their hearts.
A code of ethics is also very important in creating the standards and guidelines for the level of professionalism and expertise that the fellow workers in different nonprofits and the public or non-profit organizations can expect of one another. The public in return also can look forward to good moral conduct from their public administrators and leaders. By establishing a strong moral and ethical conduct in public administration, the leaders have the standards and guiding principles they require to conduct their tasks and to inspire their committees and workers to enforce laws to complete their mandates and tasks equitably and professionally.
It is important for a researcher to consider the safety of research participants private information. This calls for observing anonymity, confidentiality, and privacy. Institutional Review Board (IRB) is the umbrella body created to protect the welfare and rights of research participants. Anonymity implies that the researcher does not collect identifiers linking responses to a specific individual. To promote anonymity, the researcher needs to use codes to represent identifiers like names, telephone numbers, and addresses. The data have to be totally anonymous; even the researcher must not know the personal details of an individual. Confidentiality, on the other hand, refers to an agreement through informed consent between the researcher and the participant that the individual answers to the research questions and the identifiers will never be disclosed beyond the research team unless an agreement is reached otherwise. Privacy, on the other hand, involve safely storing the research data to prevent individuals’ identification. Researchers protect participants’ privacy by safely storing their personal information.
Lastly, a good ethical standard that needs to be considered in public administration and nonprofits organizations the informative and timely communication with the community. By building such kind of transparency in administration, trust is creating, and the potential to have issues are minimized ( Agee, 2009) . There are several issues that the public usually is interested in knowing every time, and this kind of information must come directly from the administration and the leaders. Communication is important in keeping all the stakeholders informed and involved so that they can work towards achieving a common goal. Good communication standards can help engage the leaders on critical matters.
Research Questions
Does graduating from a specific University in California automatically place a graduate student in a certain salary range?
The hypothesis for this research question is that students graduating from certain privileged university are likely to earn higher than lower ranked universities.
What are some of the motivating factors that make a university to have higher enrollment and graduation rate?
The hypothesis for this research question is that income, color, and hard work could be some of the motivating factors to high enrollment in the universities. The blacks are likely to go to the low ranked universities and end up earning lower salaries because of their backgrounds while the natives are likely to afford the premium colleges and end up in better paying universities.
References
Agee, J. (2009). Developing qualitative research questions: a reflective process. International
journal of qualitative studies in education , 22 (4), 431-447.
Clark, V. P., & Badiee, M. (2010). Research questions in mixed methods research. SAGE
Handbook of mixed methods in social & behavioral research , 275-304.
Sandberg, J., & Alvesson, M. (2011). Ways of constructing research questions: gap-spotting
or problematization? Organization , 18 (1), 23-44.
