I’m sure one of the big challenges of the research process is when you do the research into what you think will be a good project idea, but then you realize that it’s not going to work.
I’ve had to face that recently as I have read or am in the process of reading three books–“Happy City”, “Building a Nation” and “The Making of Classical Edinburgh”.
In my last blog, I discussed how I had kind of narrowed my interests down to either looking at why and how people choose to live where they do, or examining connectivity (or the lack thereof) in certain places. I was already aware that these probably would not work as sufficient topics because they’re broad, and in many cases, do not necessarily ask questions that we don’t know the answer for. Since then I have definitely learned that I am more interested in the housing component, but one challenge that I am struggling to think of what a question may be at this point in time. The issue with looking at why and where ppl choose to live is that in many cases there isn’t a choice (affordability). What can I even research if that’s already a known phenomenon?
I did float the idea of researching policy barriers and potential incentives to adaptive reuse in Edinburgh, but this isn’t necessarily a topic I’m totally happy with–firstly, I feel like this, too, is probably not a question that isn’t already answered. Secondly, it also probably is hard to research–what would the methodology of such a question look like?
Another idea is that I could still try to survey how residents of different housing types feel the benefits and drawbacks of their housing type may be. This may be more doable, but it might not be as much of unexplored territory.
Then, what do I start to focus on? Considering the deadline for me is five days away, I’m not quite sure, and it is a little frustrating to not know where to go with such little time left, but perhaps in continuing to read and meet, an answer will come around.
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