Scientific research thinking and thesis writing
Principle-Criticality
Cultivating Critical thinking ability is a key goal of western higher education system, and it is also an important content of the most widely debated education and scientific research reform in China. The American Philosophical Society defines critical thinking as? Critical thinking is defined as purposeful, self-regulatory judgment, 1
an interactive, reflective reasoning process of making a judgment about what o believe or do? Critical thinking is purposeful, and the self-regulating judgment process is an interactive and reflective reasoning process in which individuals judge what to believe or do. The author believes that critical thinking for the development of science and technology is the core value of scientific research ability, and the training of critical thinking is the key task of young scholars' training, such as doctoral education.
there are three scientific research methods: new methods to solve old problems, old methods to solve new problems and new methods to solve new problems. There is no doubt that scientific research needs? New? , that is, innovation. So where should innovation come from? Innovation is neither a fantasy (subjectivism) nor an epiphany (opportunism). Innovation comes from critical thinking and reasoning about the correctness of the background, process, evidence, methods, theories and standards for evaluating existing knowledge. In addition, due to the limited resources, pure innovation should not be the only scientific research orientation, and valuable innovative research work in scientific sense should be supported by sufficient and reasonable critical evidence. In short, scientific research should not be? Innovation? And innovation, but should be? Practice? And innovation. These two aspects are reflected in the specific scientific research ability, the core of which is a critical thinking and practice.
specifically, for the use of? New ways to solve old problems? Need to judge:
Why do old problems need new methods?
why can't the old methods effectively solve the old problems?
And more importantly:
Why does this new method have the potential to solve this old problem?
right and use? Old ways to solve new problems? , need to judge
Why do new problems need to be solved?
why can old methods solve new problems?
finally, what about application? New ways to solve new problems? , we should also judge
why are new problems worth studying?
why can't the old method solve this new problem?
why does the proposed new method have the potential to solve this new problem?
Answering these questions should be a necessary starting point for scientific research design and paper writing.
Because the thinking process of scientific research and the thinking of paper writing are inherently consistent, critical thinking can be more specifically reflected in all parts of the basic paper structure.
1) research background: the importance of a large background in the research field, such as its effects on society, economy, environment and health.
2) research question: the critical detection of the established research question, that is, the positive significance and potential concrete contribution of the research question to exploring the large research background field.
3) Literature review:? Literature review? No? Review the literature? , but? Criticize the literature? . In scientific papers, the review of the methods and conclusions of the existing literature should be fully critical. When designing scientific research and writing papers, we must fully judge the degree, value and significance of the existing literature in solving this research problem. More importantly, based on this judgment, we can reasonably defend the implementation of this study and the selection of methods.
4) research hypothesis and research purpose: when putting forward research hypothesis and research purpose, we must comprehensively judge and defend rationality, appropriateness and feasibility.
5) research methods: the proposed research methods, whether new or old, must fully evaluate the characteristics and potential of this method to achieve research objectives and solve research problems.
6) research results and conclusions: the obtained research results need to be discussed and observed in depth, and based on the existing literature, the consistency and abnormality of the research results should be fully judged, and conclusions supported by sufficient evidence should be obtained.
principle 2 Consistent
Newton said? If I see farther than others, it is because I stand on the shoulders of giants? . This famous saying can be understood from the aspect of consistency: the achievement of great scientific research achievements cannot be separated from the attempts and efforts of the vast number of scientific research colleagues for many years, in other words, innovation has broad consistency. In fact, critical thinking in a broad sense can be regarded as an organic combination of consistency and criticism, that is, inheritance and criticism. However, consistency has a special position because it is extremely important for the training of rigorous scientific research thinking. Consistency is a basic quality that a scientific researcher must possess.
specifically, consistency is mainly reflected in two aspects: scientific research design and paper writing.
1) scientific research design
The first two of the three scientific research design methods mentioned above all involve one? Old? : old problems, old methods. And in the third category? New ways to solve new problems? Among them, new methods and new problems? New? Are also inevitably relative? New? . New problems and methods often come from the evolution and development of old problems or methods, just like the replacement of nature. The solution to new problems and the exploration of new methods cannot be separated from the understanding and evaluation of old problems and methods. The consistency of principles is an important starting point of scientific research design, including research strategies, experimental design, analysis methods, variable definitions, etc. The acquisition of innovation comes from inheritance and criticism, but it must be fully consistent with previous studies in a broad sense.
2) paper writing
The writing of scientific research papers is the most important means to publish scientific research results. The previous part focuses on the embodiment of criticism in each part of the paper, and here we should more specifically emphasize the important position of consistency in paper writing. The western scientific research system has extremely strict norms for scientific papers, among which consistency is the most important aspect. Generally speaking, scientific research allows schools of thought, but for the same researcher, the basic position and viewpoint on research problems must be consistent with different papers and the consistency of the same paper. In terms of specific paper elements, consistency is reflected in style, format, use of professional vocabulary, abbreviations and literature list. Don't ignore the inconsistent elements in any article. Many experts first look at the article format and literature when reviewing manuscripts, such as whether to define abbreviations for the first time and then use them consistently. Do you have consistent fonts, blank lines and subheadings? Is the format of literature list consistent? All these reflect the first impression of peer reviewers on the author's scientific research ability.
The lack of critical thinking and the neglect of the principle of consistency is an important bottleneck in the internationalization of scientific research in China today. Young scientific researchers should actively exercise their critical thinking, and at the same time always standardize their scientific research practice and thesis writing with the strictest consistency requirements, which is the prerequisite for achieving significant scientific research results.
Principle 3 Concise
Scientific research is the process of creating scientific knowledge. Simplicity is extremely important for the dissemination of knowledge. More importantly, concise thinking is conducive to achieving good scientific research results. Compared with western language and culture, the simplicity of Chinese characters and literature is better. In this respect, the author prefers the requirement of conciseness in Chinese journal papers. Of course, it should be noted that while having conciseness, it is necessary to emphasize the sufficiency of the demonstration of the stated scientific research results.
figuratively speaking, what is the highest state of the principle of simplicity? One more point means more, and one less point means less? . Specifically for scientific research practice, the principle of simplicity reflects an inherent simplicity of scientific research thinking and an external simplicity of writing on the blackboard. Intrinsically, after the research goal is established, all research strategies, methods and steps should serve to test the research hypothesis or achieve the research purpose without exception, and any other redundant steps should be excluded. Only when the purpose is clear, it will not be disturbed by other non-current research contents. Of course, some abnormal phenomena should be actively considered and observed in the research process, thus leading to possible new research goals.
Externally, for thesis writing, the principle of conciseness requires all thesis elements to serve the conclusion. Research papers are not used to show old knowledge, but to publish new knowledge. In this respect, many scholars are prone to make mistakes, and often want to show their knowledge in their papers, ignoring the role of these contents in demonstrating research conclusions. For example, the writing of the literature review part of many papers often becomes a simple display, a short piece of literature, lacking its own views and comments. In fact, as mentioned earlier? Criticize the literature? At the same time, the writing of documents should also be? Innovative? To sum up, only those pre-school studies related to this study should be judged reasonably, and other irrelevant and even indirect contents and judgments should be excluded from the paper. In addition, scientific research papers are written for peers, not popular science documents, so common sense words and comments of some disciplines should be excluded. At the same time, from the utilitarian point of view, the longer the article, the more content that can be criticized.
Finally, it should be emphasized that the conciseness of Chinese characters is an important historical legacy, and our academic circles should not blindly pursue and simply imitate English-style long speeches in the process of internationalization of scientific research.
Principle 4 Clear
Scientific research papers are not novels, essays or myths, and they should be clear enough. Clear papers can make it easier for readers to understand and accept published research results. Don't let others have the opportunity to guess or look for any elements of the research, including research background, objectives, methods, results, conclusions, etc. Put all the elements where they should be.
Use standard subheadings and clear logical language to identify all parts of the paper; Keep a good and clear connection hierarchy between paragraphs, with clear priorities; Each paragraph expresses an idea or a small theme, with the central sentence at the top or bottom; Use clear and simple words to form sentences to express various opinions, pay attention to emphasizing the part before using English sentences, and so on. The paper written in this way will finally look like a small piece of short but closely related twigs, and these small trunks will logically form a big trunk at a higher level.
Principle 5 Complete
The principle of integrity is a basic principle of paper writing. No matter the length of the article, it must be complete. Although the sparrow is small, it has all the organs? . Any academic paper should be independent and never allowed? And listen to the next decomposition? . So what elements should a complete paper have? With the principle of simplicity, the principle of integrity requires that the paper contain the necessary evidence needed to fully demonstrate the research objectives. In other words, any paper must achieve the research objectives set in advance. Under this logic, it is very important to reasonably establish the research objectives and scope of the thesis. On the premise that all the papers have fully achieved the set research goals, whether low or high, new or old, the review criteria of journals of different grades can simply determine the goals of different papers and the innovation, breadth and depth of the results obtained by achieving the goals.
there are three situations that are easy to cause ambiguity when using integrity.
1) suppose that the initial research goal is A
, but in the process of realizing a, it is found that A is not feasible, but B is unexpectedly found. In this case, the thesis should be written around B. The defense of A goal and related documents can only be stated as the research background at most, and the realization of B should follow the principle of integrity.
2) Limitation of the paper and suggestions for future research
Any research is based on some assumptions, which inevitably has certain limitations under the limitations of experimental conditions, analytical tools and existing theories, so the understanding of limitations and suggestions for future research have become valuable parts of many papers. But it should be noted that these two parts do not conflict with the principle of integrity. Limitation is the limitation of the set research goal and scope to explore the research problem, not the limitation of the research process to complete the research goal. Although the paper has completed the research goal, the limitations show that the completion of this goal is not sufficient to understand the research problem, so it is necessary to set up other supplementary research goals in future research to fully understand the research problem.
3) Joint paper form
This paper form is manifested in writing two or more papers for several innovative parts of a research and publishing them in the same journal, and using the same headline and different subheadings.
this kind of situation often occurs in? New ways to solve new problems? In this case, there are significant innovations in research methods and research results, so the methods and results are emphasized in two articles respectively.
Although such articles are rare, they must also follow the principle of integrity, and any one of them should be an independent article, and the research objectives should be fully realized. Therefore, in this case, the research goal must be set reasonably. For example, the paper on method innovation should aim at innovative methods, while the paper on problem innovation should aim at exploring the results of new problems. ;