Conducting Your Own Research Project

One way to come up with a research question is to start asking the following questions: "What", "How", "How Much", "Which". Watch a professional match. Watch your friends play. Observe your own game. Bounce or throw a tennis ball. Look at different courts or tennis equipment. Do you have any questions?

What makes one player better than another? How does the first serve differ from the second serve? Is it faster or slower? How much faster or slower?

Which is better - lose or tight strings?

What would happen if the tennis ball didn't have fuzz on it?

Do all balls bounce the same? What makes a ball go faster on a return: a lighter racket, a stiffer racket, tighter strings or a faster racket head speed?

If one of your friends always gets their first serve in and the other doesn't - what are your friends doing differently?

You'll often read that you must have a "hypothesis" to prove when you conduct research; that is not necessarily true. There are forms of research that are explorary in nature that do not have to be proved. So sometimes it is simply more applicable to state that you are investigating or studying a subject.

In the next section will discuss looking at reference materials and past research.