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Unit-7: Research Design: Meaning of Research Design, Selecting of Research Design
and the papers on which i will collect the facts and information will be as many as will be required to notes
cremate my dead body, which means all the corrected facts can cremate the body but the conclusion
of research cannot be taken out. so the area of research needs to be limited from the beginning.
4. Necessity for Defining the Units of Research: A researcher should keep in mind that the subject
he has chosen, should be define be it very clearly so that there should not be any misconception in
the mind of the researcher or other people regarding this. for example, take child marriage. if we
make it very clear in the beginning that only girls who will attain puberty will be included in the child
marriage, then few people will take till seven years, few others will take ten years and some might
take fourteen years and provide information according to this. so the facts will not provide results for
correct research. similarly unemployed “person”, community, marital adjustment and even a boy etc.
words seem to be very simple but they can make the research unclear. So everybody advices to define
all the words and terms very clearly from the beginning. Mrs Young has written, “clearly defined
units not only become the basis of inspection of facts but also measure and compare the study work,
without clear definition we will only collect garbage in our studies. Unclear and unverified units leads
to collection of waste material”. Mr. M.C. elmer has written that whereas possible units should be
free from conflicting or varying elements. If we have to know the number of boys of a community we
should make it clear in the beginning that up to what age we will consider the category of boys? If
we have decided that from an infant to the age 20 all the males will be considered boys, then we need
to be very clear in all the probable conditions. for example, if till 20 years of age all the males are the
boys then will a married and father of two under twenty years of age will be considered a boy? We
need to be careful about all these probable conditions.
5. Understanding of Future Difficulties: Before starting his studies a scholar should gather information
about all the problems which can occur during the research. For example, if he finds out beforehand
when the people will be available for interview and the problems in coming and going to the field of
study then it will save money, time and labour during research work.
6. Selection of Method: Another practical issue which should be taken care of by the scholar is that
according to the nature of subject, study methods should be chosen carefully. A few attractive and
difficult methods cannot guarantee the correctness of research. For this to choose the best method
according to the nature of subject is very important. the method which is correct for one topic cannot
be suitable for another. for this chosen method should be speculated according to the usage and
suitably improved. Doing this does not require changing the methods during the real research work
and the research work continues successfully without any methodological hindrance.
7. Idea about the Accessibility of the Sources of Data: Choosing the correct method does not ensure
the success of research work unless the sources of facts and from where the data and proofs related
subject, should be sourced, is known to scholar and then only sources are not enough. A scholar should
have accessibility of these sources. He should very clearly have the knowledge about accessibility of
data. Mr. V.M. Palmer has written that, sometimes research work has to be stopped because of lack
of accessibility to the data or a side of the subject remains untouched so to be careful about this from
beginning is important.
8. pilot study and pre-testing: According to Mr. Ackoff, to speculate the problems of the research,
to choose correct directions, to find out the source of information, to get idea about the specialties of
the subject and the duration of study and expenditure, it is not only important but necessary to check
the usefulness of study method and manner and to find out the need of improvement pre-testing is
extremely beneficial.
9. time and cost estimate: social research requires lots of money and time. so for a researcher its
necessary to get an idea about the boat. it might be possible that due to lack of any of these research
work needs to discontinue and be incomplete forever. sometime it happens that if the time and money
is not distributed properly, both are wasted on less important items and further most important subjects
and items remains with less money and time. this does not ensure balanced progress of the subject.
so a proper budget and time schedule is an important requirement of the research work.
loVely professional uniVersity 51