4.5 Factors Affecting Problem Selection

1. The researcher's own: interest and stamina; competence and training (the method's match); the supervisor's expertise. 2. The problem's own: novelty vs replication's value; the data's accessibility (the courts' and prisons' permissions — Nepal's gate-keeping reality); the ethics' load (sensitive subjects' protections). 3. The resources: time (the semester's calendar vs the field's seasons); money (the travel, the enumerators); the equipment-and-software. 4. The context's own: the field's significance (the reform's moment — the 2074 codes' implementation questions are live); the funding bodies' priorities; the access's politics; the risk's climate. The synthesis: the good problem sits at the intersection — significant, researchable, feasible, and yours.