Lesson 3 · Develop Research Ideas and Questions · Step 5 of 5
From question to hypothesis
A question is worth asking when we can answer it, and answerable means answerable with the resources we actually have. Specificity is what gets us there. Naming the population, the intervention or exposure, the comparison, and the outcome turns a broad interest into something a study can settle. The same test applies to a hypothesis, on the studies that need one. Bed nets are helpful is too vague to test; treated nets reduce malaria infections more than untreated nets can be shown wrong.
Also covered: FINER criteria · PICO framework · prognostic factor · malaria parasitaemia · falsifiable hypothesis · hypothesis grounded in theory
Alongside this step
- Slides and transcript — the whole video
- Read the chapter — Develop Research Ideas and Questions
Check yourself
5 questions, marked as you go. Nothing is recorded as a grade and nothing is locked behind it — if a question catches you out, that is the useful part.
Lesson 3 · 5 steps
Foundations of Global Health Research · lesson 3 of 5