the act of seeking information by questioning; the process of investigating a topic of interest in order to find out more about it

When doing research, students are expected to be actively involved in an ongoing process of gathering and examining information in different ways and for a variety of purposes. Depending on the stage of the research work, this process can focus on specific aspects of the topic being studied (e.g., the life cycle of the tomato plant) or be sustained throughout the study (e.g., conditions that affect the growth of the tomato plant). The former is an example of a short-term inquiry, whereas the latter illustrates a sustained recursive (repetitious) inquiry process.