Summary

This chapter is a case study of the application of the five processes of research planning and the development of a conceptual and propositional analysis. A research plan does not spring from the mind complete and perfectly formed at the first attempt. Research planning involves refinement and reorganization of ideas.

Ashley Steel started her planning with ideas that piles of coarse woody debris (CWD) washed up on a riverbank by a Xood would provide shelter and habitat for birds and small mammals. Not all wildlife biologists agreed with her. The process of developing a research investigation meant that she had to specify and organize her initial ideas into a theoretical framework and make exploratory investigations of uncodified knowledge.

Steel constructed hypotheses and tested whether animal use of different types of CWD piles was different. As typical of field investigation, the results led to further research and, particularly, the need to refine concepts that can be measured more effectively.

After completing her Masters research, Steel reflected that two things in particular would have aided this planning process: (1) a pilot study, which would have improved field measurements; and (2) more extensive criticism from scientists with areas of specialist knowledge, which would have helped the conceptual analysis.

Introduction

This chapter describes the evolution of a research plan. It starts with the imprecise, incomplete first ideas of an investigator and shows how these evolve into a plan with defined objectives. The aim of planning – a set of axioms, postulates, and data statements – was kept continuously in mind although it was not achieved at the first attempt.