What is "research"?

• Research is a "deep" search for answers to questions.

• There are two kinds:

  • Library research, where you look up authoritative references to the question, provide summaries of the discussion, summarize the main answers to questions or solutions to problems, and (usually) choose a preferred answer.
  • Original research, where you identify an unanswered question or problem, adapt or develop a (scientifically) valid method to answer it, and implement the method. Both identifying a question and developing a method usually require library research.

• Research is an adventure, like an RPG. You will need to overcome obstacles (up to and including discovering that your original question is unanswerable, or that somebody else has already published an answer similar to the one you propose to develop), and even if it's not unanswerable, you may find "there's no way to get there from here," and you need to start over.

  This is OK, almost inevitable, and the schedule and evaluation standards for your degree program take this into account. You are very unlikely to so unlucky as to fail unless you don't try. (The PhD program is somewhat more risky, since part of the evaluation is external to the faculty, namely submitting papers to journals.)

What is a "research paper"?

• A research paper is a complete report on a research project. See Master Presentation for more detail on the content. A paper differs from a presentation in that it is complete. A presentation is an advertisement, a way to gain audience for your work.

What is a "degree thesis"?

• A degree thesis or dissertation is a research paper that also serves as a way to evaluate a student's progress toward an academic degree, usually as the final examination.
• The library research in a paper for journal publication is just sufficient to demonstrate the importance and originality of the research question and the validity and efficacy of the research method. I.e., it shows the value of your research.

What is "research"?

• Research is a "deep" search for answers to questions.

• There are two kinds:

  • Library research, where you look up authoritative references to the question, provide summaries of the discussion, summarize the main answers to questions or solutions to problems, and (usually) choose a preferred answer.
  • Original research, where you identify an unanswered question or problem, adapt or develop a (scientifically) valid method to answer it, and implement the method. Both identifying a question and developing a method usually require library research.

• Research is an adventure, like an RPG. You will need to overcome obstacles (up to and including discovering that your original question is unanswerable, or that somebody else has already published an answer similar to the one you propose to develop), and even if it's not unanswerable, you may find "there's no way to get there from here," and you need to start over.

  This is OK, almost inevitable, and the schedule and evaluation standards for your degree program take this into account. You are very unlikely to so unlucky as to fail unless you don't try. (The PhD program is somewhat more risky, since part of the evaluation is external to the faculty, namely submitting papers to journals.)

What is a "research paper"?

• A research paper is a complete report on a research project. See Master Presentation for more detail on the content. A paper differs from a presentation in that it is complete. A presentation is an advertisement, a way to gain audience for your work.

What is a "degree thesis"?

• A degree thesis or dissertation is a research paper that also serves as a way to evaluate a student's progress toward an academic degree, usually as the final examination.

• The library research in a paper for journal publication is just sufficient to demonstrate the importance and originality of the research question and the validity and efficacy of the research method. I.e., it shows the value of your research.

  In a degree thesis, on the other hand, you will be expected to demonstrate command of your field, and therefore should include material that is related to your research question, method, and results, but not needed to demonstrate the value of your research.

  A degree thesis is also likely to report more of the research activity in greater detail. A few examples: you may report results that confirm those obtained by previous research, provide more detailed tables, or report variations on your preferred methodology to show that results are robust to these changes. In a published paper, each of these is likely to be present, but summarized in a single sentence:

  • We confirmed the results of Dr. X about Y.
  • The data tables are available from the author.
  • We also ran probit regressions, with results very similar to the logit regressions reported here.

  respectively, where in a degree thesis you would present the replicated regression equations, the detailed tables, or the variant regressions (perhaps in an appendix).

What is "社会工学"?

• Originally, "社会工学" was the name of a graduate program in city and regional planning at the Tokyo Institute of Technology. A more appropriate translation than "socio-economic planning" (the older translation of our department's name) or "policy and planning sciences" or "service engineering" was "infrastructure planning."
• Today, Tsukuba's Shako has a much wider mission, including all of the above as well as management strategy of various kinds, and many aspects of quantitative support for those fields including conventional statistics, big data, game theory, and economics.

What is "society"?

• For us, it depends on our own field. The important things to remember are:
  • It provides the environment for decision-making, and our mission is to support that decision-making.
  • It involves interaction of decision-making. Unfortunately, analysis of interaction is extremely complex, so complex that most of our colleagues (and probably you, too!) dismiss most economics and game theory as "purely theoretical, nearly irrelevant to my work," or avoid analysis, preferring numerical simulations with sensitivity analysis.

What is "engineering"?

• "engineering" vs. "science"
• "engineering" vs. "technology"
• "engineering" vs. "art"

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In a degree thesis, on the other hand, you will be expected to demonstrate command of your field, and therefore should include material that is related to your research question, method, and results, but not needed to demonstrate the value of your research.

A degree thesis is also likely to report more of the research activity in greater detail. A few examples: you may report results that confirm those obtained by previous research, provide more detailed tables, or report variations on your preferred methodology to show that results are robust to these changes. In a published paper, each of these is likely to be present, but summarized in a single sentence:

• We confirmed the results of Dr. X about Y.
• The data tables are available from the author.
• We also ran probit regressions, with results very similar to the logit regressions reported here.

respectively, where in a degree thesis you would present the replicated regression equations, the detailed tables, or the variant regressions (perhaps in an appendix).

What is "社会工学"?

• Originally, "社会工学" was the name of a graduate program in city and regional planning at the Tokyo Institute of Technology. A more appropriate translation than "socio-economic planning" (the older translation of our department's name) or "policy and planning sciences" or "service engineering" was "infrastructure planning."
• Today, Tsukuba's Shako has a much wider mission, including all of the above as well as management strategy of various kinds, and many aspects of quantitative support for those fields including conventional statistics, big data, game theory, and economics.

What is "society"?

• For us, it depends on our own field. The important things to remember are:
  • It provides the environment for decision-making, and our mission is to support that decision-making.
  • It involves interaction of decision-making. Unfortunately, analysis of interaction is extremely complex, so complex that most of our colleagues (and probably you, too!) dismiss most economics and game theory as "purely theoretical, nearly irrelevant to my work," or avoid analysis, preferring numerical simulations with sensitivity analysis.

What is "engineering"?

• "engineering" vs. "science"
• "engineering" vs. "technology"
• "engineering" vs. "art"

Back to contents