Stating the Problem, Motivating the Study 63
the present way of doing things is inadequate in some way, or that existing theory
does not explain the observable behaviour of a system satisfactorily. Sometimes to
call it a problem may be too strong: for example, if you were a historian you might
be looking for a new way to view a series of events or the role of a particular person
in them. In this case you might choose a milder description such as ‘motivation for
the study’. But don’t omit this critical opening component. The examiner wants to
know the driving force behind your research.
What should be in it? Certainly not a full review of the literature, although there
might be some reference to it, because the unsatisfactory state of theory or practice
might well be the problem—that is, shortcomings in previous approaches to the
area might be the justification for carrying out the work to be described. There’s
no standard way to write a statement of the problem, but strive to make it relevant,
definitive, and free of ambiguities. In many disciplines, especially those based in
quantitative approaches to research, there is an expectation that the problem state-
ment expresses the relationship between two or more measurable properties and
thus can be empirically tested. The problem can then be written in the form of a
hypothesis, or be stated as a single question such as ‘To what extent do HEPA filters
in ventilation systems reduce food contamination?’ This could be posed as a de-
clarative sentence followed by a series of sub-problems or questions, such as ‘HEPA
filters in ventilation systems can inhibit person-to-person transmission of airborne
infections. To what extent can they inhibit person-to-food transmission?’
Over the course of your research, return to your problem statement on a regular
basis and continue to refine it. With an eye on what you are discovering and the cur-
rent research, ask yourself if your problem is still relevant, sufficiently narrow, and
focused more on its underlying reasons than on approaches and techniques. How
does it foreshadow and signal an overall approach to the investigation?
This is how Aek stated the problem that he had identified:
From ‘Chapter One: Introduction’ in Phakiti, Aek (2003). An Empirical Investigation Into
the Relationships of State-trait Strategy Use to L2 Reading Comprehension Test Perfor-
mance: A Structural Equation Modelling Approach, p. 7. Unpublished PhD thesis, Univer-
sity of Melbourne.
To date, there has not been sufficient research that examines the connection between actual
strategy use and actual L2 language performance. If strategy use does indeed make a dif-
ference in L2 performance, it is equally important to understand the correlation between
strategy use and L2 use performance. In summary, if we could systematically add all the
pieces of information derived from research onto characteristics of the testing procedures,
test-takers background characteristics and strategy use, it would be quite intriguing to know
the degree to which these factors accounted for language test performance and the extent to
which language ability per se was actually tested.
Note that there is no review of literature or theory here (he did review it later in his
thesis), merely a clear statement that here was a large problem that was worth put-
ting some effort into.
Grounded in a context, the statement of the problem sets out the reason the re-
search is worth tackling. It acts as the precursor to the research aim. You will have
to elaborate on the problem later in the document, for example, in the review of