Designing a research question

The first step before arriving at a good research question is to think about a general topic area. It should be an area that is interesting to you obviously, and interesting to anyone likely to assess your research proposal.  If they are unlikely to find your topic interesting, they probably won’t respond well to the research question.

To do this, it’s good to think in terms of “hot”, “luke-warm” and “cold” topics (Davies, 2022).

• Hot topics are at the cutting edge of research. Hundreds, if not thousands of publications are produced daily around the world in these areas—media articles too. Research grants are widely available. Examples include the COVID-19 pandemic and vaccine development, cancer research, the impact of climate change on weather patterns, ‘green’ energy, driverless cars, carbon capture and storage, etc.
• Luke-warm topics: These are topical but less “hot”. They might be regularly discussed in the scholarly literature, but not on a daily basis. The impact of deforestation on the habitat of fruit bats is an example. It’s important (especially to ecologists) but hardly cutting edge.
• Cold topics have had their day. They might have been important decades ago, but they hardly rate a mention in scholarship these days, and certainly don’t feature in the media. The Marxist revolution in Cuba or St Anselm’s third version of the ontological argument for God’s existence are examples. There’s nothing wrong with cold topics, but they appeal to a very narrow sectional interest groups.

“Hot topics” are great as they will ensure your research has currency and will potentially lead to spin-off research projects and possible future funding down the track. However, topics don’t remain “hot”—what it “hot” now might be cold or luke-warm by the time you have finished your research project. Another disadvantage is the vast quantity of publications you will have to keep abreast of on a daily basis. Finally, a hot topic also means difficulties in finding a good research question as other researchers may have ‘beaten you to it’, or it might be a question that has been ‘done to death’. As they are “hot” topics—with many scholars around the world working on them—there is also the problem that by the time your have finished your thesis, others may have ‘pipped you at the post’, i.e., made the same original contribution that you intended to make.

“Luke-warm” topics have a reduced range of scholarly papers being published regularly so it is easier to become familiar, and possibly to cultivate expertise, in the area. Something “warm” can later become “hot” too, and if you choose wisely you might be at the vanguard of a promising and developing new area later on. This is obviously a good thing.

“Cold topics” have been debated and discussed for decades (if not centuries). Interest in these area has lapsed for all except for specialists in the field. There is little recent research on these areas, and in pursuing them your work will lack currency. It is not unknown for a “cold” topic to re-emerge as a warm topic however (e.g., the 18th century Gallian idea of faculty psychology re-emerged into modularity of brain functions in late-20th century cognitive science) but you’d need to be pretty confident you were onto something that had the potential to be of contemporary interest to other scholars. 

In general, luke-warm topics are a better bet, but hot topics are good too—with reservations. Find one, then move to step 2.