Article I.

Introduction, definition & value of Research

Whether we are aware of it or not, we are surrounded by research. Educators, administrators, government officials, business leaders, human service providers, health care professionals, regularly use social research findings in their jobs. Social research can be used to raise children, reduce crime, improve public health, sell products, improve workers efficiency, or just understand ones life. Assume for the moment that you are the Manager of a restaurant. You are experiencing a significant turn over in your waiter/waitress pool, and long time customers have been commenting that the friendly atmosphere that has historically drawn them to your door is changing. What will you do? Where will you try to solve this problem? The problem of high turn over and decline on the friendly atmosphere at the restaurant has to be researched (research). The study of research methods provides you with the knowledge and skills you need to solve the problem and meet the challenges of a fast paced decision making environment. A systematic inquiry whose objective is to provide Information to the problems in one way to explain research.

What is Research?
General image of the research is that it has something to do with the laboratory where scientists are the study. Such variables have to be identified by the researcher. In order to opinion about the new packaging of milk is also doing research. Research is simply the process of finding solutions to a problem after through study and analysis of the situational factors. It is gathering information needed to answer a question, and thereby help in solving a problem.

What is value of Research?

The nature of research problem could vary. Problems may refer to some undesirable situation or these may refer to simply a curiosity of the researcher that may be agitating his or her mind. For example, in a recent BA/BS examination of the Punjab University 67 percent of the students failed. That is a colossal (huge) wastage of resources, hence an undesirable situation that needs research to find a solution. The researcher may come up with a variety of reasons that may relate with the student, the teachers, the availability of books, the examination system, the family environment of the student, and many more. So the study may be carried out diagnose the situation, and the recommendations to be applied to overcome the undesirable situation of mass failure of students. In the same examination result one finds that the girls have captured a good numbers of top positions; and that is happening for the last couple of years.

We are surrounded by research

For the understanding of the professional works; incorporation of the new findings in the practical situations, and for the implementation of the recommendations in policy/planning, the manager have to be well conversant with researchers. Many of you may be preparing yourselves for such managerial positions, I am sure training in research methodology will certainly be helpful in your career.

SCINTIFIC METHODS OF RESEARCH & ITS SPECIAL FEATURES

Research produces knowledge which could be used for the solution if problems as well as for the generation of universal theories, principles and laws. But all knowledge is not science. The critical factor that separates scientific knowledge from other ways of acquiring knowledge is that it uses scientific approach. What is approach? Or what is science? When most people here the word science, the first image that comes to mind is one of test tubes, computers, rockets ships, and people in which lab coats. These outward trappings are part of science. Some sciences, such as the natural sciences deal with the physical and material world. Some other sciences involve the study of people, their beliefs, behavior, interactions, attitudes, institutions, and so forth. They are sometimes called soft sciences. This is not that their work is sloppy or lack rigor but because their subject matter, human social life, is fluid, formidable to observe, and hard to measure precisely with laboratory instruments. The subject matter of a science (e.g. human attitudes, protoplasm, or galaxies) determines the techniques and instruments (e.g. surveys, microscopes, or telescopes) used by it. Science is a way to produce knowledge, which is based on truth and attempts to be universal. In other words science is method, a procedure to produce knowledge i.e. discovering universalities/principles, laws, and theories through the process of observation and re observation. Observation here implies that scientists use sensory experience for the study of phenomena. They use their five senses, which are possessed by every normal human being. They not only do the observation of phenomena but also repeat the observation, may be several times. The researchers also do so they want to be accurate and definite about their findings.

Important Characteristics of Scientific Methods

1. Empirical
Scientific method is concerned with the realities that are observable through sensory experience. It generates knowledge which is verifiable by experience or observation. Some of the realities could be directly observed, like the number of students present in the class and how many of them are male and how many female. The same students have attitudes, values, motivations, aspirations, and commitments. These are also realities which cannot be observed directly, but the researchers have 2

designed ways to observe these indirectly. Any reality that cannot be put to sensory experience directly or indirectly does not fall within the domain of scientific method.

2. Verifiable
Observation made through scientific method are to be verified again by using the senses of confirm or refute the previous findings. Such confirmations may have to be made by the same researcher or others. We will place more faith and credence in those findings and conclusions if similar findings emerge on the basis of data collected by other researchers using the same methods. Responsibility, in this way, is an important characteristic of scientific method. Hence revelations and intuitions are out of the domain of scientific method. 3. Cumulative Prior to the start of any study the researchers try to scan through the literature and see that their study is not repetition in ignorance. Also the researchers do not leave their research findings into scattered bits and pieces. Facts and figures are to provide with language and thereby inferences drawn. The results are to be organized and systematized. A linkage between the present and the previous body of knowledge has to be established, and that is how the knowledge accumulates. Every new crop of babies does not have to start from a scratch; the existing body of knowledge provides a huge foundation on which the researchers build in and hence the knowledge keeps on growing. 4. Deterministic Science is based on the assumption that all events have antecedent causes that are subject to identification and logical understanding. For the scientist nothing just happens it happens for a reason. The scientific researchers try to explain the phenomena by identifying its cause. Of the identifying cause which ones can be the most important? The researchers tries to narrow down the number of reasons on such a way that some action could taken. Therefore, the achievement of a meaningful, rather than an elaborate and cumbersome, model for problem solution becomes a critical issue in research. That is parsimony which implies the explanation with the minimum number of variables that are responsible for an undesirable situation. 5. Ethical and Ideological Neutrality

CLASSIFICATION OF RESEARCH
Research comes in many shapes and sizes. Before a researcher begins to conduct a study, he or she must decide on a specific type of research. Good researchers understand the advantages and disadvantages of each type, although most end up specializing in one. 1. 2. 3. 4. The purpose of doing Research; The intended uses of research; How it treats time i.e. the time dimension in research; The research (data collection) techniques used in it.

The four dimensions reinforce each other; that is, a purpose tends to go with certain techniques and particular uses. Few studies are pure types, but the dimensions simply the complexity of conducting research.

1. The purpose of doing Research

If we ask some one why he or she is conducting a study, we might get a rang of responses: My boss told me to do; it was a class assignment; I was curious. There are almost as many reasons to do research as there are researches. Yet the purpose of research may be organized into three groups based on what the researcher is trying to accomplish- explore a new topic, describe social phenomena, or explain why something occurs. Studies may have multiple purposes but one purpose usually dominates.

a.

Exploratory/Formulate Research

You may be exploring a new topic or issue in order to learn about it. If the issue was new or the researcher has written little on it, you began at the beginning. This is called Exploratory research. The researchers goal is to formulate more precise questions that future research can answer. Exploratory research may be the first stage in a sequence of studies. A researcher may need to know enough to design and execute a second, more systematic and extensive study.