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1. Scope and limitations
2. Language focus
3. Language activities

Outlining the scope and limitations (Move 7)

When planning and presenting research, one should be able to critically evaluate the scope (also known as “delimitations”) of one’s research and its limitations. The scope refers to the boundaries or limits to carrying out the study as determined by the researcher. For instance, these boundaries can relate to the timeframes for conducting the study, the types of data to be collected, the time period to which specific data sources (e.g., historical documents) will be limited, the sample size, specific social groups to be included in the study, etc. In other words, the scope usually sets limits on what the proposed research does or does not promise to achieve.

Limitations explain what potential barriers or problems one might face in the course of the research which are beyond the researcher’s control. For example, one may be limited in terms of:

  • financial constraints
  • the timeframes for conducting an extensive study if one is only given a semester
  • access to specific facilities that one may wish to use (e.g., premises, equipment or software)
  • access to data sources (e.g., primary or secondary sources which are only available in a foreign language; human subjects who may be difficult to find and recruit)
  • availability of previous research on the topic
  • availability of published data collection instruments (the lack of which creates a need for designing one’s own instruments).

The scope and limitations have to be explicitly stated to communicate to the reader how the quality of the results can be affected. If no mention is made of the study’s scope and limitations, one may assume that the author is not aware of the imperfections of the approach or believes he/she has control over any inherent barriers which may arise and which will ultimately affect how the results will be obtained and interpreted, and whether they will be generalizable to other contexts and participants.     

Examples:

Here  are two Methods extracts from two studies in the field of political science. As you read each extract, identify the sentences that explain each study’s scope. Does any of them outline the limitations?

Extract 1

Places and Preferences: A Longitudinal Analysis of Self-Selection and Contextual Effects

Our analysis uses eighteen waves of data from 1991 to 2008 inclusive, with almost 10,000 individuals clustered within over 5,000 households in the first wave (1991). We restrict our focus to England only, excluding households in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland because the party systems in these countries are sufficiently different from England to make combined analyses difficult to interpret. We also exclude observations of those aged under 18 in order to match our analysis sample with the voting age population in England. We include ‘new sample members’ who join the BHPS through the formation of new households with ‘original sample members’ as well as ‘re-entrants’ (i.e. those who had been non-respondents in the previous wave). These inclusion criteria yield an analysis sample of 17,373 individuals, who provide a combined total of 158,000 unique observations over the eighteen waves. The average number of waves completed by individuals is 9.14 and 4,100 individuals responded in all eighteen waves.

Source: Gallego, A., Buscha, F., Sturgis, P., & Oberski, D. (2014). Places and preferences: A longitudinal analysis of self-selection and contextual effects. British Journal of Political Science, 46(3), 529–550.

Extract 2

All Policies are Glocal: International Environmental Policy Making with Strategic Subnational Governments

1We will examine the national and international effects of strategic policy formation at the subnational level. 2We will analyze games of complete information, with no uncertainty about preferences and ideal points. 3To simplify, we assume that there are only two national governments. 4We do not attempt to construct a multilateral negotiation game, because the dynamics of coalition formation would greatly complicate the solution of the game. 5This limitation notwithstanding, we believe a simple two-player game can offer insights into how subnational policy makers strategically shape their national policy makers’ negotiation positions and the ultimate outcome.

Adapted from: Bechtel, M., & Urpelainen, J. (2015). All policies are glocal: International environmental policy making with strategic subnational governments. British Journal of Political Science, 43(3), 559–582.
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Language for outlining the study's scope and limitations

Limiting language 

The language used to indicate the scope and limitations of a study tends to build on negative verb forms, as well as words and phrases that are negative in meaning. Present and Future tenses are most common:

  • In this study, we do not attempt to address/ cover ...
  • This study does not/ will not/ cannot examine …

Nouns

The following nouns often feature in statements about the study’s limitations, the first four of them being quite similar in meaning:

Boundaries, constraints, limitation(s), restriction(s), scope

  • This study places the age boundary between 7 and 14 years old, in between those years, the degree of acquiring ability varies by person (MICUSP).
  • Time constraints of one semester require less time than may be ideal for an ethnographic study.
  • An important limitation of these verbal instruments is that emotions, and especially the type of subtle low intensity emotions that are evoked by products, are difficult to verbalize.
  • These restrictions reduced the initial sample from 120 to 100 firms.
  • Although the scope of this paper does not permit detailed comparison of the X and Y editions, it is worth noting that the differences are considerable.

Adjectives

The following adjectives can be useful in discussing the limitations of the research. These can be used with “too” or “very” for emphasis. Negative prefixes can be used as well:

Complex, complicated, difficult, impossible, limiting, limited, (not) generalizable, less likely

  • We do not go beyond complex graphical representations of network structures, as these are complicated to map accurately in any given situation.
  • If planning problems are modeled as systematic and blind search through a tree of actions, the problem quickly becomes computationally too/ very difficult.
  • Whether this value represents an increase or decrease over past years is impossible to say without historical data.
  • Scaling beyond 1024 nodes has not been tested, though memory constraints and duration of simulation could also be a limiting factor.
  • This study’s limited demographic makes it less generalizable to employees in other organizations.
  • However, respondents may be less likely to seek medical help if they are younger than 15.

Verb phrases

To be bound by, be limited/ restricted to, be limited by, to (not) allow/ permit smb to do smth

  • The analysis here is bound by the scoring rubric that exists.
  • There is bound to be disagreement about the precise extent of governmental authority; determining the correct line is not my goal here.
  • Because our objective is to examine trading by insiders motivated by foreknowledge of company disclosures, the transactions included in the study are limited to open market purchases and sales by officers and directors.
  • Also, participants are limited by their level of ability to use more complex words while answering the questions.
  • Finally, the current results are restricted to certain topics and to certain health questionnaires being used.
  • Although experience may allow us to acquire an appreciation of some statistical laws (Nisbett, Krantz, Jepson, & Kunda, 1983), it does not seem to do so for regression.

Additional phrases 

Beyond/ outside the scope of …

  • Closer scrutiny of these approaches is beyond the scope of this review.
  • The discussion of the above issues is, however, outside the scope of the present paper, as will be explained later.

Linking words of contrast

Linking words of contrast are often used to show to describe a study’s limitations. These may include: 

Although + clause (or an adjective), despite/ in spite of + noun (or V-ing), while/ whereas + clause

  • Although the proposed research will provide a general knowledge of the relationship between X and Y, further research will need to be conducted to examine these connections./ Although small, these differences can affect the validity of our findings. 
  • Despite the fact that all shoppers are included in the overall population that this study represents, using a random sample of all shoppers is beyond the capabilities of this project. Therefore, the study will use a convenience sample of shoppers predominantly within ...
  • While the results should correlate to the overall population, this study’s small scope make it less generalizable to the entire population.
  • Therefore, the study will use a convenience sample of students predominantly within the College of Business at the Hattiesburg campus of The University of Southern Mississippi.
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Task 1
Task 2
Task 3
Task 4
Task 5
Task 6

Adjectives

Complete the sentences by dragging one of the adjectives into the gaps:

restricted
generalizable
complicated
impossible
limited
difficult
limiting
1. If planning problems are modeled as systematic, the problem quickly becomes computationally too .
2. The difficulty in identifying learners’ real motivations does appear to be a factor in these studies.
3. In sum, by conducting a systematic analysis of complete data we have the opportunity to go beyond explanations.
4. Although it is, at this stage, almost to accurately quantify various benefits and costs associated with this process, the recent experiences should provide a multitude of useful insights.
5. We reviewed studies which were to the late Roman empire.
6. The data cannot be conclusive due to a number of companies used as a sample in this study.
7. The insights gleaned from these preliminary findings may not be to other organizations.

Adjectives & verbs

Match beginnings and endings of the sentences from both columns:

This area of study calls for research as there is a limited
Because our objective is to examine trading,the transactions included in the study are limited
The study is bound by the fact that the sampling frame
It should be noted that the committee, however, does not allow
The present study is necessarily restricted to a relatively small corpus taken

Nouns

Complete the gaps with suitable nouns starting with the given letter:

1. Since the of the study area are limited to Finland only, key figures for the whole population living in the area are available at the Finnish Population Centre.
2. This is another open research question beyond the of this study.
3. With regard to exploring the role of in work environments, operations and organizational behavior research can prove helpful.
4. Resolving these issues requires training and scholarship that are defined by problems rather than historical disciplinary .
5. Despite these , it is an important finding that more students were identified as having a communication disorder.
6. Given the financial placed on the execution of this study, such activities are deemed impractical.
7. The proposal concludes with a discussion of the implications of the findings and identifies and areas for future research.
8. Describing this method is beyond the of this paper.

Linking words

Complete the sentences by dragging one of the linking words into the gaps:

In spite
Although
Despite
Whereas
although
despite
1. having these limitations, our study is useful in providing important insights into family firms in emerging markets.
2. a lot has been written about the fundamental differences between locomotion in the low versus high Reynolds-number world, the differences identified in our paper appear to be unique.
3. of these limitations, this study demonstrates the effectiveness of explicit instruction for pragmalinguistic forms with low salience.
4. a complete review of the cognitive overload literature is beyond the scope of this article, we provide several examples.
5. It is often hard to avoid the possibility that a study's participants will recognize themselves researchers' efforts to conceal their identity.
6. These stresses, small, easily exceed low tensile strength in sulfur concrete.

Correction I

Choose a more suitable option from the ones given below:

 
 
 
 
 
 

Correction II

Choose a more suitable option from the ones given below:

 
 
 
 
 
 
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