Final answer:
Research aims should be SMART and include measurable terms such as being testable, providing measurable results, and sometimes necessitating yes or no answers. Researchers need to clearly define their audience and methods, and identify exactly what needs to be determined in the research.
Step-by-step explanation:
When identifying the aims of a research study, it is imperative to ensure that each goal is SMART: Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, and Time-bound. Specifically for a research study, goals should:
- Be tested using experiments to collect evidence, ensuring that the hypotheses can be proven wrong if necessary, thus adhering to the scientific method.
- Provide measurable results, which are quantifiable and allow for observable progress, leading to factual conclusions.
- Into consideration cases where yes or no answers are applicable, such as in closed questionnaires, which can offer quantifiable data for analysis.
The audience for the research study should be clearly defined, and researchers must develop a specific plan to engage with participants. This includes informing them about the study's nature and securing their consent. Subsequently, researchers use a tailored instrument, like a questionnaire, to gather information, which often includes close-ended questions to facilitate straightforward, numerical analysis.
To flesh out these goals, it is important to identify exactly what needs to be determined in the study (identify the unknowns), which can often be helped by creating a written list of these unknown quantities.