8 steps of research 1) Selecting and defining research problem Many researchers come to be identified with studies of specific types

or specific approaches. Researchers should find things which related to his or her personal field of study, topic which related to the society or current change, and the topic should not been explored by someone else. 2) Determining topic relevance and significance To determine the topic is good or bad, or is it worth to be conduct. There are 8 questions to determine whether the topic is relevance and significance. (a) Is the topic too broad? For example, what are the effects of television on children, hence what kind of affect the researcher wants to discover and what kind of genre of television the researcher wants to conduct. The effects could be physical effect, emotional effect or academic results; while the genre of television could be advertising, cartoon, education material or entertainment material. Therefore, this topic is too broad and is not suitable to be conducted. (b) Can the problem really be investigated? To determine whether the topic is doable.

For example, how a teenager who never expose to television communicate with others. It is very hard for a researcher to find a group of teenagers who never watch television before as television is a very common gadget in our life. (c) Can the data be analyzed? The researcher needs to determine whether their data could be analyzed by doing statistic, whether have the capability and ability to count the average so that the data collected will not become raw data. (d) Is the problem significant? A researcher should determine whether the topic chose is useful and meaningful to the society.

A researcher should be aware about is there any readers who will read their research result after it is published. (e) Can the results of the study be generalized? A researcher should aware of is the research result could apply to the other people at other states or countries. For example, what music genre a basic communication research student at Taylors University, Lakeside Campus like. This topic is not generalized as all of the students are from the same setting, the age group is the same, and the number of males and females are not balanced.

(f)

What costs and time are involved in the analysis?

(g) Is the planned approach appropriate to the project? (h) Is there any potential harm to the subjects? The potential harms include physical harm and emotional harm.

For example, a study about abused children and their violence behavior. The researchers can continue to carry out this topic, but they need to consider whether this topic is really beneficial for the society. 3) Review of literature Literature review is review on what other experts had done in the area of your study before you. A researcher need to look at how, who, where, and when the other experts conduct their research and the conclusion they made in their previous studies. Through literature review, a researcher could learn from the previous research, save time, energy and effort, and prevent of repeating the same mistakes of the previous study. A researcher will fill in the gap that are missing in the previous research and conduct a new research to contribute new knowledge. 4) Stating or come out with a hypothesis or research question Hypothesis is a statement which pre-establish the relationship between two variables and it could either be accepted or rejected; while research question is question that you want to know the answer by doing the research and as a guide for researcher to conduct their research. Hypothesis is specific; while research question is general as it is open ended. Every research needs at least one, and usually more than one research questions; while hypothesis is not necessary for every research. Hypothesis is not necessary when there is no pre-establish relationship between two variables, hence the researchers have no idea on what is going on. For example, parents use their Facebook account to monitor their children online activity will be the hypothesis of a study, while do parents use their Facebook account to monitor their children online activity will be the research question of a study. 5) Preparing research instruments Researchers are responsible in designing own instruments for their research to collect data. Instruments are needed so that the researchers could gain the answer they need and decide whether their hypothesis could be accepted or rejected. To collect data, the researchers need instruments or methods such as:

Questionnaire Interview questions Coding sheet (Content and analysis) Journal (Require for observation method) Notebook (Require for observation method) 6) Data collection

This is the part where fieldwork, interviews or coding are carried out using specific research instruments. Data could be collected through distributing of questionnaire, doing interviews and any other instruments. 7) Data analysis and interpretation The data collected could be made sense through data analysis and interpretation. Data analysis and interpretation may involve statistical procedures to summarize data, analyze findings and make meaningful interpretation. 8) Presenting data The research result must be presented in a clear and concise manner but the format could depend on the purpose of the study. Research result should be publish in journal or share in conferences in the area which is related to your study. Research result need to be published so that public could know about your study and result.