Research for the sake of research?

Conducting research so that it connects to the body of knowledge in journalism and mass communications studies, to me, is about two key issues: 1) knowing what information is “out there” and 2) understanding the industry in a way that helps the researcher know what type of information is needed.

Knowing what type of research exists on your individual topic begins as soon as a researcher thinks of an area he/she would like to study. For me, I decided I wanted to study the idea that journalists could become secondary victims as a result of the things they cover. As soon as I identified that concept as something I was interested in, I immediately began to research. My initial researcher was really about typing the keywords “journalists’ and “victims” into a Google search. By doing that, I was able to find a variety of sites that focused on the concepts of victims and trauma as they surround journalists. Many of the sites, such as the Poynter Institute online, the Dart Center for Journalism and Trauma and the Victims and the Media Program have helped me not only as primary resources, but also in identifying other resources to use in my research. After realizing that there was data available on my topic of interest, I then began doing a variety of keyword searches on Academic Search Elite. Through this academic search engine, I was able to identify the articles that made up the initial stages of my Review of Literature on the topic. I also was able to identify the most important pieces of research in the field, and use their bibliographies to find additional academic resources on the topic. In this way, knowing what information is “out there” helped me to shape my idea and to understand in what way it was worthy of exploration.

To me, “connecting to the body of knowledge” means not only researching a topic that is academically sound, but also providing those working practically in the industry with a foundation for a new way of thinking or approaching an issue. I knew that studying journalists as victims was a worthy cause in a newsroom because I worked in a newsroom and saw journalists who were trauma victims when I generated the idea. I think seeing firsthand what these people experienced helped me understand the true potential of the research. In other words, I could do research that could support a change in the industry. This change would allow for more training and counseling in newsrooms and creating a more mentally stable profession. Working in the newsroom helped me identify a need for information. The experience also keeps me focused because I assigned faces of people I care about to the issue. I’m not just doing research for a nameless, faceless person or group. I’m doing research to benefit people I know and consider friends. Observing the phenomenon also helped me identify social learning theory as a theoretical framework for my study interest.

I think it absolutely is important to connect your research to the body of knowledge in the field. If you don’t, what is the purpose of the research? Research for the sake of research doesn’t make much sense to me. In my mind, the best research is that which can by applied to daily operations in the industry and be used to make a difference in the way those working in the field function. The positive aspect of this, of course, is that your industry can be used to make a difference for people working in the industry. The negative of making your information “applicable” to the field is that those working in the industry are likely to find holes in your theoretical arguments or research methodology. They are closer to the reality of the work than you. However, identifying flaws in your research is not the greatest issue, it just means that there are more areas to develop further. I guess this could be seen as a flaw because it means that you have more work to do; almost never ending work. However, adding to the body of knowledge has to be seen as a positive to the researcher, otherwise, why would they choose to perform research?