Posing questions worth exploring
R-8
Every research project starts with questions. Working within the guidelines of your assignment, pose a few preliminary questions that seem worth researching—questions that you are interested in exploring, that you feel would engage your audience, and about which there is a substantial debate. Here, for example, are some preliminary questions jotted down by students enrolled in a variety of courses in different disciplines.
- Why are boys diagnosed with attention deficit disorder more often than girls?
- Do nutritional food labels inform consumers or confuse them?
- How does the portrayal of family in Grissom’s The Kitchen House reflect the values depicted in nineteenth-century slave narratives?
- Why was amateur archaeologist Heinrich Schliemann such a controversial figure in his own time?
As you think about possible questions, choose those that are focused (not too broad), challenging (not just factual), and grounded (not too speculative) as possible entry points in a conversation.
