- Factors that affect social work research questions
Professional ethics: While the researcher may feel the need to as a particular question to the respondent, the researcher should first examine whether the question may harm the respondent emotions or psychology.
Political and social considerations: Politics plays an important role in research. Thus if the research question does not meet the expected standards of social and political balancing, the research may not see the light of the day through lack of funding or being deprived academic appointments.
The researcher: The research question depends on the researcher’s motivation in relation to the particular topic of interest.
The social work profession: Social work research questions are always specific to the client’s issue. They focus on obtaining knowledge from the respondent. This knowledge should be viable for the research question.
The social work practitioner: The researcher’s beliefs and attitudes may determine the questions they may present in research findings.
The social work agency: The research questions tend to be geared towards answering or unearthing a certain issues that directly related to the mission and vision of the agency. A child-protection-agency research questions setting will try to unearth issues relating to children neglect and abuse.
- Describe in detail the knowledge-level continuum
The amount of knowledge available for a research study determines its position along the knowledge-level continuum. It can be at the exploratory level when little information is known about it, at the descriptive level when a bit more information is known about it or at the explanatory level when so much information about research has been established amicably. This continuum helps researchers in the classification of research in terms of the questions it can answer, the purpose and the research approach it should take.
- Describe in detail how the sieving procedure works when formulating social work research questions
The sieve procedure is used to move a research study from one level to another. As more studies on a particular topic are done, more knowledge is available, and therefore the research findings can answer in-depth questions relating to the research amicably. This promotes a research from one knowledge level of the continuum to another.
- List and discuss the four criteria that good research questions must fulfill
Relevance: a good research question must be relevant on social grounds such that when answered, it can be used to develop a theory, policy or practice within the social work sector.
Researchable: A research question must be finitely answerable. This implies that the research question should not present a hard time to the researchers in collecting data. The data must be seen as available rather than scanty. The nature of the research questions could also render a research possible or impossible to conduct. For instance, it is possible to debate whether gays and lesbianism should be allowed as a norm in the society but it is not possible to answer the moral question relating to this issue.
Ethical and cultural considerations: a research question should not be seen as trying to break or invade the moral, ethical or cultural beliefs of a particular group or the society in general. Research should be geared towards making a positive impact in the society.
Feasibility: a research should remain within the budget of available resources. While precise information would be achieved with more resources, the budget limitation should not compromise the quality of research. The available resources should be used to ensure useful findings from the research.
