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The contrast reflects different paradigms of knowledge
creation, serving different aims from generalisation to
personal understanding.

1.1.4 Questions and Answers in Research/
Inquiry

Questions are fundamental to inquiry and research. They
reflect our human desire to understand the world around
us - to make sense of things, events, and experiences. Even
as children, we constantly ask many why-s - why is the
sky blue? why do birds fly? why does the sun set? As we
grow, our questions become more complex, but curiosity

Questions fuel remains. In research, asking questions is key to moving
inquiry beyond surface descriptions to deeper explanations and new
insights. The questions push us to uncover causes, motives,
and the logic underlying things. They take us forward from
mere observation confined to the basic nature of something
to asking/understanding why or how it is so. For example, an
anthropologist might move from describing ritual practices
in a culture to asking why or how these rituals developed
and what purpose they served. A psychologist might go from
noting relationship behaviours to asking why people act in
certain ways with romantic partners.

But questions have value beyond the explanation, too. They
Questions drive open up possibilities - for critique, imagining alternatives,
insight and change and creating change. When we ask why current systems or

policies exist, we can challenge the status quo. When we ask
why certain groups suffer injustice, we can uncover the roots
of oppression. Questioning is, thus, often the first step toward
ethics and social justice.

At the same time, questions require humility because
answers are often complex and multilayered. Different
disciplines offer complementary explanations that deepen the
Reveals understanding of motives and causation. Social phenomena
complexity and can rarely be reduced to single causes. Our search for
meaning answers is an ongoing journey. But though incomplete,

asking questions remains essential. It speaks who we are
as thoughtful, inquiring beings - beings who seek not just
facts but meaning, not just observation but deeper human
understanding. Questions illuminate the landscape of our
inner world as much as the phenomena of the external one.

So, in all realms of inquiry, questions anchor our quests
for insight. They propel us to dig beneath the surface. They

SGOU - SLM - Foundational Skills for Research and Writing 15