Licínio C. Lima was born 1957 in Porto, Portugal. He is Full Professor of Sociology of Education and Educational Administration at the Department of Social Sciences of Education, Institute of Education – University of Minho, Portugal. At UMinho he was Head of the Unit for Adult Education (1984-2004), Director of the Research Centre for Education and Psychology (1994-1997), Head of Department (1998-2004) and Director of the PhD in Education (2011-2013). He is guest professor in various universities in Europe, Africa, Asia and Latin America. He has been in charge of a large number of research and international co-operation projects and he is the author of academic works published in nineteen countries and seven languages, including more than thirty books.
Designing a research problem: Twelve propositions
Designing a research problem is one of the most stimulating and at the same time challenging tasks in epistemological and methodological terms.
Twelve propositions will be presented and commented, including issues such as the transition from the theme to the formulation of the problem, the different types of problems and respective questions, the role of theory, the relations between theoretical work and empirical work, the option for the scale of observation and the delimitation of time, using examples from the scope of research in education.