The power to research... research!

  Today is my first blog post ever! How exciting! Each post that I will be making on this blog will be pertaining to each week’s studies and discussions that were had in my Family Relations class. This week's topic was concerning research. Throughout this post I will be talking about research. What research is, the importance of how it’s used, and why it pertains to relations within the family. 

Oxford English Dictionary defines the noun research as, “The systematic investigation into and study of materials and sources in order to establish facts and reach new conclusions”. Research is essentially the process of producing facts and statistics through observation and collecting data! This is something that is very important! Research can cause the discovery of truths that were previously undiscovered, and/or unproven. And when those truths or facts are proven, it can be used as evidence in any manner. 

By any manner, I truly mean any manner. Research is something that it used to support a narrative, claim, or prove/disprove an idea. Something this influential can easily be used to manipulate for one’s gain. I found it interesting that in the definition it uses the word “systematic” in describing the way that the investigation happens. This means that there is a particular way that research must be conducted. This also describes how the research is being used as well. If the research is being conducted and published in a certain systematic way, I believe manipulation and deception can be controlled. Even still, the evidence itself may be clear, but the way that it is being portrayed may still be deceiving. I believe this is where the true manipulation is. 

You may now be thinking to yourself: “Why am I still reading this?”, “What is the point?”, or “How the heck does this have anything to do with family relations?”. Well now you know what I am thinking to myself! Just kidding! The reason why this is so relevant to families, and the relations therein, is because research is used to influence us! Whether you know it or not, research influences many of the decisions that we make as individuals! The way we think, the way we act, and it even shapes our perception of reality! If a study was published saying that wearing socks as a child causes the child to have two sizes smaller feet than they genetically would without wearing socks, families might start to change the way they raise their children (raise them without socks) and the baby sock companies might go out of business! A real example of how studies influenced behavior within families is the discovery of the side-effects of smoking. As more and more studies came out linking smoking to different forms of cancer, smoking went down. Look at the culture of the United States of America now! Smoking near families (such as children, babies, and mothers) is culturally unacceptable. At least from my experiences I can confidently say that in general, people who smoke are shamed for smoking. When looking back in time about ninety years, smoking was totally acceptable and some people even said that smoking was good for you! Pondering that the entirety of American culture was changed by research...  is both miraculous, and terrifying. 

The point being of this whole blog post is to give you this message: Do your research on the research! Understanding the context and full details of how research is being done, as well as the way it is portrayed, is important and powerful information that you need, and should have! This is one of the only ways that you can make confident decisions. In all of the chaos, and opinions of the world being thrown at you… know that YOU also have the power to research!

Sources:

https://www.lexico.com/en/definition/research