Explain five primary research methods.

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

Primary research is the process of collecting data about a topic directly from the real world. Primary research is much more labor intensive and time consuming than secondary research-and, in the professional world, much more costly. One can conduct fieldwork observations, surveys, interviews, original artifact or document examinations, or experiments.
Fieldwork observations are focused on careful observation of people or groups of people while immersed in their community. A person can conduct fieldwork as a participant observer by engaging in interactions and activities with the people he or she is studying, or as a non-participantobserver by observing but not engaging with them. By focusing on specific behaviors and taking notes on observations, the person will have a record of specifics that he or she can use in his or her speech.
Survey is an examination to get information about people’s ideas and opinions. Surveys may be conducted in person, over the phone, via the Internet, or in writing.
Like media reporters, a person may get some of the best information from an interview-a planned, structured conversation where one person asks questions and another answers them.
Sometimes the information one needs has not been published. Rather, it may exist in an original unpublished source, such as an ancient manuscript, a diary, personal correspondence, or company files. Or one may need to view an object to get the information one needs, such as geographic feature, a building, a monument, or an artifact in a museum.
One can design an experiment to test a hypothesis, which is an educated guess about a cause-and-effect relationship between two or more things. Then he or she can report the results of the experiment in his or her speech. Experiments take time, and one must understand the principles of the scientific process to be able to trust the results of a formal experiment. However, sometimes one can conduct an informal experiment to test the results of a study one learns about elsewhere.