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The people you can recruit are not always the people you originally intended to study. Before broadening eligibility or changing recruitment settings, determine whether the accessible population can still provide evidence relevant to the original research question.
Read Guide →A method can be implemented perfectly and still be wrong for the question it is supposed to answer. When that mismatch becomes apparent, reassess what evidence the question requires before deciding whether to adapt the method, narrow the question, or redesign the study.
Read Guide →Not every methodological change creates a new study, but some changes alter the research question, evidence, population, comparison, or inferential logic so substantially that treating the project as unchanged becomes misleading. The boundary is conceptual, not a fixed percentage of procedures changed.
Read Guide →Not every change to a research sample creates a different study. The critical issue is whether the revised sample still provides evidence about essentially the same population and research question, or whether the change alters what the study is actually about.
Read Guide →Not every tiny departure from a research plan deserves equal space in a publication, but deviations that affect interpretation, participant protections, planned analyses, or confidence in the findings generally should be visible. The goal is to let readers understand the study that was actually conducted.
Read Guide →Every real study operates under constraints, so some methodological compromise is unavoidable. The critical question is whether the remaining design can still support the claims you intend to make after those compromises are considered together.
Read Guide →Research, inquiry, and investigation all involve seeking answers, but the terms emphasize different aspects of that process. Understanding their overlap helps clarify when asking questions or investigating a problem becomes formal research.
Read Guide →A research gap describes what existing knowledge does not adequately answer, while a research problem defines the specific issue your study will investigate. Learn how the two concepts connect without treating them as interchangeable.
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