Chapter 2 - Research Problems, Variables, and Hypotheses
After reading Chapter 2 you should have mastered each of the following objectives.
- Define the term research problem and identify five (5) characteristics of good research problems.
- Differentiate research problems from research problem statements and/or questions.
- List the characteristics of researchable and non-researchable problems. Identify examples of
each.
- Identify four (4) common sources of research problems.
- Differentiate quantitative and qualitative research problems in terms of the following: the specificity
of the problem, the nature of the questions addressed, the development of the problem itself, and
the terminology related to the problem. Classify research problems as quantitative or qualitative
on the basis of these characteristics.
- Describe the characteristics of quantitative research problems.
- Define the term variable and give examples of variables relevant to educational research.
- Differentiate conceptual and operational definitions and give examples of each.
- Differentiate the following types of variables: independent and dependent, extraneous and
confounding, and continuous and categorical.
- State the criteria for evaluating quantitative research problems and evaluate specific problems
using these criteria.
- Define the term hypothesis and identify five (5) reasons for using a hypothesis.
- Differentiate the following types of hypotheses: 1) inductive and deductive and 2) research and
statistical. Define the term null hypothesis and discuss its use in a study. Identify examples of
each type of hypothesis.
- State the criteria for evaluating hypotheses and evaluate specific hypotheses using these criteria.
- Describe the characteristics of a qualitative research problem.
- State the criteria for evaluating qualitative research problems and evaluate specific research
problems using these criteria.
