3.2 - Inquiry-Based Research

Research begins with a question you want to answer. In academia, this process is generally referred to as inquiry and invites a range of answers and perspectives. These points of view are illustrated in a variety of sources, which can be identified as either scholarly or popular.

We perform research every day, which we can define as collecting information to study and draw conclusions. Whether we’re comparing prices for a big purchase, finding a new restaurant to try, or looking up the bus route to a friend’s house, each of these processes starts with a question and the need for a specific solution. In academia, this process is a little more developed. First, we’ll start with inquiry. We can define inquiry as an investigation to ask narrow and refined questions to develop knowledge and ideas about an issue. This process invites a complicated range of answers and perspectives, and the goal is to remain neutral and discover conflicts, rather than finding a quick answer and moving on. By starting with a strong, open-ended inquiry question, you can help ensure that your research will be well-rounded and complete.

As you begin your inquiry, you have to first decide what you’ll investigate. Your class may have a theme or specific area of focus, so within those limitations, you can identify a topic, or a broad category of interest. Generally, these are big, neutral categories like “education” or “athletics.” They begin to define what you’re interested in. Within a topic, you can begin to define issues, which may be more controversial or have multiple sides. For example, within education, issues include the cost of college education, or the use of standardized tests in K-12. Each of these spark specific discussions with evidence for and against that make these issues complicated and engaging.

When thinking about issues, the relevance and recency of the issue is also important. For example, standardized tests may have been really important for you to get to college, but they aren’t used as often during college courses. This means that standardized tests may be less relevant to college students; however, if you’re studying education or have children who are taking these tests, then this issue is likely to be more relevant to you!

With recency, you should consider timing. Some issues have been resolved or were more popular a decade ago. Other issues might be so new that we haven’t had time to study them yet. While you don’t have to choose something from the front page of the newspaper, considering the timeline of your issue will help you find a more engaging issue.

Now that we’re familiar with the research process, it’s time to dig in and find some sources. Using the reading skills we’ve been building this semester, you’ll review and select the best sources to answer your research question. Remember, we don’t know much yet, so maintain a neutral stance throughout your investigation.

Conducting Research

The research process is complicated, so you may still need to make adjustments to your issue — what if you can’t find enough information, or your idea is still too broad or narrow? Through the research process, you’ll be able to decide, with the help of your classmates, instructor, and university librarians, you can adjust your issue to make sure you can find enough evidence to complete your investigation.

During your research, you’ll need to represent multiple points of view by reviewing and citing a variety of sources. Broadly speaking, sources can be categorized as popular or scholarly.

Popular Sources

We interact with popular sources every day. The articles linked in your social media feeds, the magazines at the grocery store checkout, and the evening news are all considered popular sources. To identify a popular source, these are some common, rhetorical characteristics:

• Author: journalists and editors

• Audience: written for large, general groups of people; not always specified

• Genres: magazine articles (e.g. interviews), newspapers (e.g. editorials), and many books

• Include photos, are shorter in length, more easily understood, often persuasive

Popular sources are great tools to learn about a topic quickly and are published daily. This means you can find information on brand new topics and current events, and there will be a variety of publications on the topic that draw varying or contradictory conclusions. This helps diversify your research and learn more very quickly.

However, because these sources are written so quickly, may be based on opinion, and sold or make profits from clicks and views, they’re not as trustworthy. Writers who produce popular sources are often not specialists or authorities in the field; instead, they report on and make sense of daily events, significant studies from experts, or try to persuade readers to adopt their points of view.

Scholarly Sources

To access scholarly sources — also known as peer-reviewed or refereed sources, or even journals — you’ll likely need to use your university library. These journals typically require subscriptions and special access, which universities typically pay for with your student fees. Once you’ve accessed your university’s subscriptions, you’ll have access to hundreds, if not thousands, of journals on specific topics within your major and everything else. You can likely tell by looking that you’re reviewing a peer-reviewed source from these rhetorical characteristics:

• Author: often multiple authors, hold advanced degrees, lists what university the author works with

• Audience: written for others in this specific field, readers need understanding of the jargon, or specialized vocabulary

• Include long reference lists at the end, often uses tables and graphs to communicate data, longer texts with sections such as: abstract, introduction, methods, results, discussion, and conclusion

These texts are much more complicated and sophisticated, so be patient as you read. A good first step — before you try to read the entire text! — is to focus on the first paragraph, which may be titled as the abstract. This paragraph summarizes the entire article, explaining the end result. Unlike popular sources that may try to keep you guessing, the purpose of scholarly sources is to present the findings. If you read the abstract and the article seems like a good fit for your research, download or save it to read more closely. If not, try your search again! Once you have a few or several scholarly texts that seem like a good fit and you’ve evaluated their credibility (explained below), prioritize your reading and start with the text that’s the best fit for your research question. Throughout the sections of scholarly texts, the most relevant information will come from the Discussion and Conclusion sections. While the other sections provide context and specific details on how the research was completed, you’ll focus most closely on the Discussion and Conclusion, where the authors will explain their significant findings and why this new information is so important.

If you’re having trouble finding appropriate sources, this may mean that you need to adjust your topic. You may have too narrow of a search. Or, you may just need to revise your search terms. Unlike Google, where you can type in a complete question and find answers, scholarly search engines are very particular about your searches. Consider your key words again, consult your instructor and librarian for assistance, and make adjustments as needed.

Once you have collected some sources, it’s important to take the time to verify their credibility. Not all information online or in print is accurate, up-to-date, or reliable, so checking the author’s expertise, the publication’s reputation, and the evidence provided can help you avoid misleading or biased material. Evaluating credibility early in the research process saves time later, ensures your work is well-supported, and helps you focus on sources that are most relevant and trustworthy for answering your inquiry question.

When deciding to use a source, there are some specific characteristics that we can review and evaluate to prove whether or not the source is ultimately trustworthy:

• Author: What experience (time working in the field, lived experience, etc.) or expertise (degrees, awards, other publications, etc.) does the author have?

• Evidence: Where does information in the text come from? Are other sources cited?

• Bias: Is the author objective? Do they have something to gain or lose in the issue? Do they represent and explain both their point of view and others’?

• Timeliness: Is the article recent and relevant? Are the sources recent and relevant?

If your source passes  all or most of these checks, you likely have a credible source! It’s okay to have some questions and to challenge the information, but if your source fails more than one of these tests, you’ll likely want a different, more credible and reliable source. This skepticism will improve your research and get you thinking critically about where the information comes from, who’s behind it all, and why they’re writing.

This assignment requires at least two two popular sources and two scholarly sources, so keep this in mind as you evaluate and critique your sources. Make sure that they work together well, focusing on the same issue, and are credible and reliable.

For many students, referencing other sources or the practice of citation is closely linked to plagiarism. Students learn quickly that the academic community penalizes writers who present the ideas of others as their own. Consequently, students may feel that this is the primary motivation behind our citation rules. However, there is much more to citation than preventing plagiarism.

Why Do We Cite?

Citation is the Currency of Academia: Acknowledging the source of ideas isn’t just about ethics. Scholars’ job performance is often linked to their citation count, or the number of times their research papers are cited by other scholars. Some disciplines, particularly those in the sciences, use a formula called the h-index to measure the productivity and impact of researchers. A researcher’s h-index can determine if they get hired, promoted, or receive a research grant.

Scholarly journals also measure the average number of citations each article receives as an indication of the importance and reach of the journal. This number is called an impact factor. Journals with high impact factors are prestigious, and publishing in these journals is often an important milestone for researchers.

Citation is Evidence: Academics use citations to provide evidence of their claims. For instance, if you claim that students procrastinate when writing more now than in previous generations, you should use a citation to show that this claim is based on credible information.

Because the university aims to advance human knowledge, we care a lot about using the best possible sources. We put a lot of effort into advancing knowledge systematically and checking this knowledge carefully. This is why academic journals use a peer-review system to assess every submitted article. Peer review means that every submission is checked by other experts in the field, who also provide suggestions on how to improve the article. This attention to the quality of knowledge is also why we want students to get into the habit of finding and using the best possible sources to develop their arguments.

Citation is About your own Credibility as an Author: In academic writing, citation demonstrates that you know about the important conversations in a discipline. When you cite important research in a field and you integrate it well into your own argument or research, you are showing that you understand the implications of your ideas and how they fit into the broader context. Citation helps you to demonstrate why your ideas matter.

As an undergraduate student, you are just beginning this process of learning the important conversations in your field, and your instructors will likely not expect you to have a full grasp of this yet. However, as your journey continues at university, learning to recognize key conversations in your field and responding to them in your papers will become more important.

What Information Should You Cite?

Citing sources is often depicted as a straightforward, rule-based practice. In fact, there are many grey areas around citation, and learning how to apply citation guidelines takes practice and education. If you are confused by it, you are not alone.

Here are some guidelines to help you navigate citation practices.

• Cite when you are directly quoting. This is the easiest rule to understand. If you are stating word-for-word what someone else has already written, you must put quotes around those words and you must give credit to the original author. Not doing so would mean letting your reader believe these words are your own and represent your own thinking.

• Cite when you are summarizing and paraphrasing. This is a trickier area to understand. First of all, summarizing and paraphrasing are two related practices, but they are not the same. Again, summarizing is when you read a text, consider the main points, and provide a shorter version of what you learned. Paraphrasing is when you restate what the original author said in your own words and in your own tone. Both summarizing and paraphrasing require good writing skills and an accurate understanding of the material you are trying to convey. Summarizing and paraphrasing are not easy to do when you are a beginning academic researcher, but these skills become easier to perform over time with practice.

• Cite when you are citing something that is highly debatable. For example, if you want to claim that an oil pipeline is necessary for economic development, you will have to contend with those who say that it produces few jobs and has a high risk of causing an oil spill that would be devastating to wildlife and tourism. To do so, you’ll need experts on your side.

When Should You Not Cite?

Don’t cite when what you are saying is your own insight. Research involves forming opinions and insights around what you learn. You may be citing several sources that have helped you learn, but at some point, you are integrating your own opinion, conclusion, or insight into the work. The fact that you are NOT citing it helps the reader understand that this portion of the work is your unique contribution, developed through your own research efforts.

Don’t cite when you are stating common knowledge. What is common knowledge is sometimes difficult to discern. Generally, quick facts like historical dates or events are not cited because they are common knowledge.

Examples of information that would not need to be cited include:

• Partition in India happened on August 15th, 1947.

• Vancouver is the 8th biggest city in Canada.

Some quick facts, such as statistics, are trickier. For example, the number of gun- related deaths per year probably should be cited, because there are a lot of ways this number could be determined (does the number include murder only, or suicides and accidents, as well?) and there might be different numbers provided by different organizations, each with an agenda around gun laws.

A guideline that can help with determining whether or not to cite facts is to determine whether the same data is repeated in multiple sources. If it is not, it is best to cite.

The other thing that makes this determination difficult might be that what seems new and insightful to you might be common knowledge to an expert in the field. You have to use your best judgment, and probably err on the side of over-citing, as you are learning to do academic research. You can seek the advice of your instructor, a writing tutor, or a librarian. Knowing what is and is not common knowledge is a practiced skill that gets easier with time and with your own increased knowledge.

Any idea or fact taken from an outside source must be cited, in both the body of your paper and the references. The only exceptions are facts or general statements that are common knowledge. Common knowledge facts or general statements are commonly supported by and found in multiple sources. For example, a writer would not need to cite the statement that most breads, pastas, and cereals are high in carbohydrates; this is well known and well documented. However, if a writer explained in detail the differences among the chemical structures of carbohydrates, proteins, and fats, a citation would be necessary. When in doubt, cite!

What Are Citation Styles?

APA, CMOS, MLA: These are acronyms that you have probably heard before in relation to citation; they are the names of citation styles.

Citation styles are writing conventions that academic writers use to help their readers find their sources as quickly as possible. Disciplinary associations like the American Psychological Association (APA), the Chicago Manual of Style (CMOS), and the Modern Language Association (MLA) set the standards for disciplines in their broad disciplinary areas. For instance, the American Psychological Association (APA) style is used by psychology, sociology, economics, and other social sciences. The standards set by the disciplinary associations will reflect the needs of each disciplinary area. For instance, APA style, often used in social sciences, emphasizes the date of publication because this matters in social sciences; an economics publication from the 1920s is not likely as relevant to current economic research as a more recent one. However, MLA style, often used by humanities disciplines, does not emphasize date of publication because humanities disciplines often examine and use older texts and publications as sources.

Disciplinary organizations like APA, CMOS, and MLA publish citation style guidebooks and will update the citation styles regularly to reflect changes in our information ecosystem. For instance, citation styles had to be updated after the introduction of the Internet. Similarly, the disciplinary organizations will update their styles as we better understand the role that Generative AI will play in academic writing and research.

Citation styles typically have three components:

• Standards for in-text citations. In-text citations are placed within your text to indicate that an idea is not your own. The in-text citations do not include all of the information about a source; they usually have just enough information so the reader can find an entry in the reference list with the complete citation. Some citation styles use footnote or endnote numbers for in-text citations (i.e., CMOS), but others use information such as the author’s name, year of publication, and page number within brackets (i.e., APA or MLA).

• Standards for full references and reference lists. Citation styles provide standards for reference lists where the full citation information for a source appears. The standards will indicate where to put the full reference (footnotes, endnotes or a bibliographic list), what information to include, how to order the information, and how to format it. They will also indicate the name for the list. For instance, APA calls the list “References,” where MLA calls it “Works Cited.”

• Standards for formatting and style. Some citation styles have specific information about how papers should be formatted. For instance, APA specifies how your title should be set up, how wide your page margins should be, and what font type you should use. Citation styles can also provide guidance on stylistic issues such as capitalization, spelling, and hyphenation.

This chapter contains materials from:

• First-Year Composition by Leslie Davis and Kiley Miller,  Colorado State University, licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0.

• Introduction to Academic Writing by Nancy Bray, University of Alberta, licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0.