Week - 1

Introduction to

Research Paper Writing and Presentation

Dr. Muhammad Wasim

 Learning Objectives
• Introduction
• Research – Basic Definition and Concept
• Classification of Research Process
• Research Process and Scientific Method
• What Stops you for doing creative work?
What is Research?
• Dictionary
• Scholarly or scientific investigation or inquiry
• Close careful study

• Basic Definition
• Research is an organized and systematic way of finding answers to questions
What is Research? (Cont.)
• The systematic process of collecting and analyzing data in order to
discover new knowledge or expand or verify the existing one.
What is Research? (Cont.)
• Research is an attempt to increase the sum of what is known, usually
referred to as ‘a body of knowledge’, by discovering of new facts or
relationships through a process of systematic inquiry, the research
process.
What is Research? (Cont.)
“Research is to see what everybody else has seen, and to think
what nobody has thought.”

Albert Szent-Gyorgi
What research is NOT
• Research isn’t information gathering
• Gathering information from resources such as books or magazines isn’t
research.
• No contribution to new knowledge.
• Research isn’t the transportation of facts
• Merely transporting facts from one resource to another doesn’t constitute
research.
• No contribution to new knowledge although this might make existing
knowledge more accessible.
Discovery vs Invention
• There are two main ways of practicing science:
• Discovery vs invention
• Biologists, physicists, chemists, researchers in psychology… are
discoverers.
• Computer Scientists, engineers… are inventors
Discovering
• Understanding the world: what are atoms constituted of, why a
disease is inherited, why do people have dreams?
• Understanding means: first asking questions, then observing,
inquiring, modeling, and evaluating
• At the end of the research process, one has an answer to the initial
question
• An answer is most often not definitive. It is an explanation of the
small piece of natural world under some hypothesis.
Inventing
• Software computer science produce inventions
• Computers do not exist by themselves. They have been created by
human beings. There is nothing to discover in a computer or a
software.
• The objective of research in CS is to make computers and computer
networks more efficient, easy to use, more reliable, more powerful…
Purpose of Research
• Reviewing and synthesize existing knowledge
• Investigate some existing situation or problem
• Provide solution to a problem
• Explore and analyze general issues
• Construct a new procedure or system
• Explain a phenomenon
• Generate new knowledge or enhance the existing one
• Combination of the above
Research vs. Reasoning and Experience
• Research distinguishes itself from the two other basic means –
experience and reasoning
Experience
• Experience results in knowledge and understanding gained either
individually or as a group of society, or shared by experts or leaders,
through day-to-day living
• Examples
• A child learns to walk by trail and error
Experience (Cont.)
• Experience – limitations as a means of methodically and reliably
extending knowledge.
• Learning from experience can be rather haphazard and uncontrolled.
• Conclusions are often quickly drawn and not exhaustively tested.
• Despite these shortcomings, experience can be a valuable starting
point for systematic research.
Reasoning
• Reasoning is a method of coming to conclusions by the use of logical
argument.
• Using the knowledge we have to draw conclusions of infer something
new about the domain of interest
• Two basic forms:
• Deductive Reasoning
• Inductive Reasoning
Deductive Reasoning
• Derive logically necessary conclusions from given premises.
• An argument based on deduction begins with general statement and
through logical argument, comes to a specific conclusion.

• Example:
• If it is Friday, she will go for work
• It is Friday
• Therefore, she will go for work
Inductive Reasoning
• Induction
• Generalization from cases seen to cases unseen
• All elephants we have seen have trunks, therefore, all elephants have trunks
• Unreliable
• Can never prove it true
• … but useful!
Research vs. Experience vs. Reasoning
• It is the combination of experience with deductive and inductive
reasoning which is the foundation of modern scientific research.

• Research is a combination of both experience and reasoning and must

be regarded as the most successful approach to the discovery of
truth. ( Cohen and Manion, 1994, p. 5)
Classification of Research
• Dimensions (on which we classify)
• The purpose of doing research
• The intended uses of doing research
• How it handles time
• The research techniques (data collection) techniques used in it.
The Purpose of Research
• Why are you doing research?
• My boss told me to do so
• It was a class assignment
• I was curious
• …
• As many reasons as researchers
• Purpose of research may be organized intro three groups based on
what the researcher is trying to accomplish.
The Purpose of Research
• Three main groups
• Explore a new topic – Exploratory Research
• Describe a social phenomenon – Descriptive Research
• Explain why something occurs – Explanatory Research

• Studies may have multiple purposes (e.g. both to explore and

describe) but one purpose usually dominates.
Exploratory Research
• Exploring a new topic
• Initial research conducted to clarify the nature of the problem
• Formulate more precise questions that future research can answer
• Address the “What” question
• Difficult to conduct because there are few guidelines to follow
Descriptive Research
• Descriptive research presents the picture of specific details of a
situation, social setting, or relationship
• Characteristics of population or phenomenon
• Answers to who, what, when, where and how questions
• Examples
• Labor force survey, Population Census
• Most of the social research is descriptive
Explanatory Research
• The desire to know why
• Builds on exploratory and descriptive research and goes on to identify
reasons for something that occurs.
• Looks for causes and reasons – Determine which of several explanations
is best.
• Determine the accuracy of theory; test a theory’s predictions or principle.
• Example
• Descriptive research may discover that 10 percent of the parents abuse their
children, whereas the explanatory research is more interested in learning why
parents abuse their children.
What about Computer Science / Engineering
Constructive Research
• Develop solution to a problem
• The most common computer science research method
• “Construct” is often used to refer to the new contribution being
developed.
• Construct can be a new theory, algorithm, model, software, or a
framework
The uses of Research
The Uses of Research
• Some researchers focus on using research to advance the knowledge,
whereas others use it to solve specific problems.

• Basic and Applied Research

Basic Research
• Type of research that may have limited direct application and is mostly
conducted for the purpose of acquiring knowledge
• Also known as fundamental or pure research
• Driven by scientists curiosity or interest in a scientific question.
• The main motivation is to expand man’s knowledge, not to create or
invent something
• There is not direct commercial value to the discoveries that result from
the basic research
• Can be exploratory, descriptive, or explanatory; however, explanatory
research is most common
Basic Research (Cont.)
• Generates new ideas, principles, and theories, which may not be
immediately utilized; though are the foundations of modern progress
and development in different fields.
• Today’s computers could not exist without the pure research in
mathematics conducted over a century ago, for which there was not
application at that time.
• Examples of Basic Research
• What are protons, electrons are composed of
• How does the memory system work
• How are language skills developed
Applied Research
• Designed to solve practical problems of the modern world, rather
than to acquire knowledge for the knowledge’s sake.
• Intended to bring about some direct impact to humankind
• Examples
• Improve agricultural crop production
• Treat a cure for specific disease
• Improve the energy efficiency of homes
Time Handling
Time
• Some research neglects the element of time, other research focuses
heavily on time
• Two broad categories
• Cross-sectional research
• Longitudinal research
Cross Sectional Research
• Researchers observe at one point in a time
• Generally the simplest and the least costly
• Cannot capture the changing process
• Can be exploratory, descriptive or explanatory, but it is consistent with
a descriptive approach to research.
Longitudinal Research
• Examine features of people or other units at more than one time
• Much more expensive and time consuming than cross sectional but
powerful
• Three types
• Time Series
• Panel
• Cohort
Time-series research
• The same type of information is collected on a group of people or
other units across multiple time periods
• Stability or changes in the features of the units is tracked over time
• Example
• One could track the characteristics of students registering in the course on
Research Methods over a period of four years.
• Such characteristics may include total students, age, gender and geographical
distribution
• Such an analysis could tell us the trends in the characteristics over the four
years.
Panel Study
• Observe exactly the same people, people or organization across time
periods
• Difficult to carry out
• Tracking people over time is often difficult – some people die or
cannot be located
Cohort Analysis
• Similar to the panel study, but rather than observing the exact same
people, a category of people who share a similar life experience in a
specific period of time are studied.
• Example:
• All people hired at the same time, all people retiring in the time frame of 1-2
years, and all people who graduated in a given year.
Research Data
Quantitative vs Qualitative
• Quantitative
• Data that can be express numerically and subjected to statistical analysis
• Experiments, surveys, using existing statistics
• Qualitative
• Data typically in the form of words or pictures and can be analyzed through
informed judgement
• Field Research, Case Study, Focus Group Discussion
Research Process
The Research Process
Research Process
• Research is an extremely cyclic process
• Later stages may necessitate a review of earlier work
• This isn’t the weakness of the process but is part of the built-in error
correction machinery.
• Because of the cyclic nature of research, it can be difficult to
determine where to start and when to stop
Non-scientific ways
• Non-scientific research is based on hunches, experience and intuition
• Non-scientific ways of obtaining knowledge:

• Common Sense: That which is self evident

• Tenacity: What we have known to be true in the past.

• Authority: establishes belief based on prominence or importance of source

Scientific Method
• Galileo Galilei – (1564 – 1642)
• Italian physicist, mathematician, astronomer, and
philosopher
• The scientific method is popularly attributed to
Galileo who, in 1590, dropped iron balls of two
different weights off the leaning tower of Pisa.
Scientific Method
• He wanted to test his hypothesis that the forces acting
on falling objects were independent of the objects
weight
• He was correct and so refuted the previously held belif
that Havier objects would fall faster than lighter
objects.
Scientific Method
• The steps he took:
• Observation
• Hypothesis generation
• Testing the hypothesis
• And Refutation or acceptance of the original
hypothesis
Scientific Method
• The scientific method is a logical and systematic approach or process
to problem solving.

• It involves a series of steps that are used to investigate a research

question.
Scientific Method – Steps
• Define the research question
• Research the Problem
• State the hypothesis
• Experiment to test the hypothesis
• Collect and record data
• Analyze Data
• Draw Conclusion
• Determine Limitation
• Communicate / Report Results
Step 1 – Problem / Question
• Define the research question
• A question occurs or posed to a researcher for which that researcher
has no answer.
• This doesn’t mean that someone else doesn’t already have the answer.
• The question needs to be converted to an appropriate problem
statement like that documented in a research proposal.
• Research question can also arise from observation
Step 2- Research / Review
• Gather information related to the problem published in a
conference/journal (using Google Scholar)
• Read, observe, measure, take samples etc.
• Perform literature review
• The available literature is reviewed to determine if there is already a solution
to the problem.
• Existing solutions do not always explain the new observation
• The existing solutions might require some revision or even be discarded
Step 2- Research / Review
• It is possible that the literature review has yielded a solution to the
proposed problem.
• This means that you haven’t really done research.
• On the other hand, if the literature review turns up nothing, then
additional research activities are justified.
Step 3 - Hypothesis
• Predict the possible answer to the problem or question.
• The researcher generates intermediate hypothesis to describe a
solution to the problem.
• This is the best and temporary solution since there is as yet no
evidence to support either the acceptance or rejection of these
hypothesis.

• Example: If soil temperature rise, then plant growth will increase.

Step 4- Experiment
• Testing the hypothesis
• Design experiments
• Variables
• Controlled
• Manipulated
• Responding
Step 4- Experiment
• Variables: Factors that can be changed
• Controlled Variables: all the variables that remain constant
• Manipulated Variables: factors in an experiment that the scientist
purposely changed
• Responding variables: (also called the dependent variables) what a
scientist wants to observe
Step 5- Data Collection
• Data – observations and measurements made in an experiment
• Type of recorded data:
• Quantitative: observations that involve measurements/numbers
• Qualitative: observations that do no involve numbers and are descriptive in
nature.
Step 6 – Data Analysis
• Examine data tables, charts and graphs
• Looks for trend, patterns, and averages
• What does your data show?
• Put your data into words
Step 7 - Conclusion
• The data will either support the hypothesis or they won’t
• Includes a statement that accepts or rejects the hypothesis
• This may lead the researcher to cycle back to an earlier step in the process
and begin again with a new hypothesis
• This is one of the self-correcting mechanisms associated with the scientific
method.
Step 8 - Limitations
• Scientists look for possible flows in their research
• They look for faulty data
• They look for experimental error
• They decide the validity of their results
• They make suggestions for improvement or raise new questions
• Make recommendations for further study
Step 9 – Communicate Findings
• Communication is an essential part of science
• Scientists report their results in journals, or in conferences
• This allows their experiments to be evaluated or repeated
• Scientists can build on the previous work of other scientists.
Why do Students Procrastinate or Delay
Things?
All Thinking, no action
• Many students keep reading and listening to good ideas. However, all
these ideas sum up in head and hardly put into action. Do 20%
thinking and 80% action.
No Regular Schedule
• Several students follow an abrupt way of spending their day. They
randomly do things coming their way. The best way to set daily
targets in your notebook in the form of bullet lists.
Easily Distractable
• Some people are very easy to distracted. Anything that pops up will
take away their focus. Eventually, they say – Okay, I will do it
tomorrow. Tomorrow never comes and today is the best time to act.
It is too difficult
• Taking the first step is always difficult even scary at times. It is the
place where many people give up. Eveything is difficult before you do
it, just go for it.
• Take the first step, and you will realize that the rest of the journey is
not as difficult as you imagined.
Relying on Others
• Many times, you rely on others to do certain things. For example,
seeking feedback on an initial draft.
• Wait for some time, remind, and if it is not there, go ahead – find
another way.
Aiming for Perfection
• There is no such thing as perfection. Aiming for it might take you no
where.
• Give it your 100% and then take the next step.
• Do not wait for an eternity to make it perfect.
I will do it on weekend
• Perhaps, one of the best reason to procrastinate.
• It hardly works as there are many other things to do on weekend.
• Furthermore, the thinking ‘it is weekend, why should I work’ comes in
the middle too.
• Eventually it does not happen.
I don’t know enough about it
• Offering oneself an excuse that I am not an expert in it also takes
people back from acting.
• It is not possible to know everything anyways.
• However, it is possible to learn what is needed.
• The internet is the place where you can find information on anything
you like.
I don’t have enough time
• All successful and unsuccessful people have the same 24 hours a day.
• It depends on how one utilizes the time.
• Perhaps it might not take as much time as you might think.
• Just give it a try