You’ve come to Walden for many reasons, but something stressed in the university mission is social change. And so, likely, you have identified a social problem that you’ve seen around you, and you want to work to alleviate, correct, or resolve it. Yet, a social problem on its own is not enough upon which to build a research paper or a Capstone Project. You need to transfer—that is, transform—that social problem into a research problem. Here are some differences between them:
“A social problem is an undesirable situation in your community. Low literacy rates, the achievement gap, failure of small businesses in downtown urban areas, shortages of math teachers, of nurses, health epidemics, obesity. These are social problems. They are undesirable situations that you see around you.
A research problem is a topic that you study to understand in more detail, and that study, your analysis, can lead to options for a resolution.
A social problem is narrowed into a specific research problem that can be researched in the scholarly literature” (Walden University Office of Research and Doctoral Services, 2016).
Reference
- Walden University Office of Research and Doctoral Services. (Producer). (2016, July 26). Developing social problems into research problems [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=udfldYXvUxw&feature=youtu.beLinks to an external site.
Describe the topic that you are interested in exploring. Now that you have identified the topic, you will need to narrow this to an important problem, within the broad topic, that you would like to explore. In choosing the problem, consider the following questions: Do you want to address a work problem, community problem, or problem that affects the larger society? Why is this problem of interest? Keep in mind that the more complex the problem, the more complex the analysis and potential solutions. The topic and problem that you choose will need to relate to your MS specialization area.
- Decide on a topic that you are keenly interested in.
- Begin to narrow the topic to a specific problem that can be researched in the scholarly literature.
- Search the Walden University Library and/or the Internet for at least 2 academic sources to support your topic selection and problem.
- Review the Discussion feedback from your Instructor and/or colleagues.
Review the Learning Resources for considerations about how to think about a problem description for your topic.
Assignment (1–2 pages, not including title page and reference page)
- Describe the topic you have selected for your Capstone Project. Be sure your topic is narrow enough to be able to identify a specific problem.
- Include a brief description of the specific problem related to your topic.
- Support your thoughts with information cited from at least 2 academic sources.
- Integrate relevant Discussion feedback into your topic description.
Support your Assignment by citing all resources in APA Style, including those in the Learning Resources.
