What is Research ?

INTRODUCTION

“Research is nothing but finding diamonds from a ploughed field,” said Sir C.V. Raman, the Indian Nobel Laureate in Physics, who won the Nobel prize in 1930 for his invention, “Law of Refraction.” Research is a process of searching and acquiring knowledge through objective and systematic methods with an aim to find a solution to a problem. Research is common parlance to a search for knowledge and a scientific and systematic search for relevant information on a particular topic, as it is an act of scientific investigation. Research is an original contribution to the existing body of knowledge, advancing it, and also providing ideas for an effective and efficient system of creating a corpus of knowledge. Research is an unconscious learning interest pertaining to experiments, a sincere longing for obtaining more information or library study, or archival exploration, or any other in-depth explication to study something new. Research is a process of developing procedures by assuming and developing a theory, making an inquiry to find out evidence, and creating a methodology and methods to reach a conclusion.

Research is a method of critical thinking for making a new paradigm, or a new theory, or finding something which is pertinent to the addition of the existing theory for knowledge production and knowledge generation. Even though scholars are least bothered in doing fundamental research, quite often they raise fundamental questions that eventually become one of the most important critical questions to be explored for achieving an answer. Research is also a critical inquiry for bringing knowledge and correcting the existing misconceptions. Research is a systematic and scholarly application of the scientific method, as science is knowledge, which is more organized and calculated than ordinary observations and inclinations. Scientific approaches and innovations in research are trials of immense credibility for obtaining innovative methods in academic research. Research should be viewed only as a scientific investigation, which is empirical, inductive and understanding the reality through sense perception, so as to become an attitude of inquiry.

WHY DO WE DO RESEARCH?

Research is carried out for gaining knowledge, and knowledge is ‘human beings' supreme virtue and hidden treasure.’ Knowledge, which is gained through research, has mainly two components: basic and applied. Knowledge is transmitted from generation to generation, and from tradition to modernity, as tradition has a lot of knowledge. The quest for knowledge to generate more and more from less and less propels and compels, to raise various questions descriptively and exploratively. While science is an approach to knowledge that is more organized and calculated than ordinary observations and inclinations, but quantitatively explored and qualitatively expounded with a bird’s eye.

QUALITATIVE RESEARCH

Research is a methodical and organized effort to explore a specific problem to find a solution. Qualitative research is conceptualised on a critical and reflective gaze on methodological approaches, understandings and engagements. Qualitative research encourages authors to take a critical engagement with the orthodox and the heterodox, the familiar and the innovative, the modern, and the experimental and traditional. Qualitative research involves participant’s experiences, perceptions, and questions, persistently raised for answering. One of the strengths of qualitative research is its ability to explain processes and patterns of human behaviour that can be difficult to quantify. Phenomena such as experiences, attitudes, and behaviours can never be accurately and quantitatively assessed. Qualitative research is the methodology used by researchers to acquire deep contextual understandings of users through non-numerical means and direct observations.

QUANTITATIVE RESEARCH

Quantitative Research is based on the scientific method. It uses deductive reasoning, where the researcher forms a hypothesis, collects data, and uses the data for the investigation to make conclusions. Quantitative research observes something which is unknown, unexplained, or new, where it searches for and explicates and searches for the contemporary theory to find out solution. Quantitative research is formal, objective, rigorous, deductive in approach, and systematic strategies and manoeuvres for generating and refining knowledge to problem solving [Burns & Grove, 2005]. In quantitative research, the research objectives are measurable and cannot be separated from variables and hypotheses. Survey, case study and experimental research are some of the most frequently used research strategies in quantitative research.

CONCLUSION

In conclusion, it may be apt to cite an anecdote on a retired Indian Muslim who went to Mecca as a pilgrim. This pious man, after retirement, received his retirement benefits and prepared to go to Macca, for he had desperately wanted to go there for a long time now. This devotee, sixty-five years now, planned and booked his Hajj pilgrimage, and started from New Delhi, and went to Mecca through Mumbai. Having landed in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, he started moving towards the Holy Place and reached a particular common junction where all devotees used to gather. From this particular point, according to the norms that existed, public transportation was unavailable, and every devotee had to either walk for a five-kilometre distance or hire private men who used to carry the devotees. And he saw a police barricade right there, from where everyone had to walk to the sanctum sanctorum, the most important place, which was five kilometres apart. The Musalman, gently asked the police officer, who was guarding: “How long will it take to reach the Macca main building?” The policeman looked the pilgrim top to bottom many times, and asked, “How old are you?” and he replied, ‘sixty-five’. The policeman added, “From where are you coming?” “India”, he responded. The police man gently added, “See, the distance between this barricade and the main building is just five kilometres. If you can walk all five kilometres in one hour, you can reach the main building within one hour. If you can walk one kilometre in one hour, it will take five hours to reach there. Now you decide.”

Research is all about speed, perseverance, and exorbitant interest, which is developed in learning, explaining, experiencing, exploring and explicating to invent something new, that could be a diamond.

Written By:
Dr Sam Nesamony
Professor and HoD, Department of English and Humanities,
School of Humanities, Social Sciences and Liberal Arts (HSLA),
SGT University, Gurugram, Delhi-NCR.