{"id":18215,"date":"2016-01-27T09:01:17","date_gmt":"2016-01-27T14:01:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/carleton.ca\/edc\/?p=18215"},"modified":"2026-05-06T13:28:07","modified_gmt":"2026-05-06T17:28:07","slug":"blog-why-vs-wtf-questions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/tls\/2016\/blog-why-vs-wtf-questions\/","title":{"rendered":"Blog: \u201cWhy\u201d vs. \u201cWTF\u201d questions"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<section class=\"w-screen px-6 cu-section cu-section--white ml-offset-center md:px-8 lg:px-14\">\n    <div class=\"space-y-6 cu-max-w-child-5xl  md:space-y-10 cu-prose-first-last\">\n\n            <div class=\"cu-textmedia flex flex-col lg:flex-row mx-auto gap-6 md:gap-10 my-6 md:my-12 first:mt-0 max-w-5xl\">\n        <div class=\"justify-start cu-textmedia-content cu-prose-first-last\" style=\"flex: 0 0 100%;\">\n            <header class=\"font-light prose-xl cu-pageheader md:prose-2xl cu-component-updated cu-prose-first-last\">\n                                    <h1 class=\"cu-prose-first-last font-semibold !mt-2 mb-4 md:mb-6 relative after:absolute after:h-px after:bottom-0 after:bg-cu-red after:left-px text-3xl md:text-4xl lg:text-5xl lg:leading-[3.5rem] pb-5 after:w-10 text-cu-black-700 not-prose\">\n                        Blog: \u201cWhy\u201d vs. \u201cWTF\u201d questions\n                    <\/h1>\n                \n                                \n                            <\/header>\n\n                    <\/div>\n\n            <\/div>\n\n    <\/div>\n<\/section>\n\n<p><em>By Mira Sucharov, Associate Professor, Department of Political Science <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>As the old adage goes, a famous physicist (I\u2019ve seen the story attributed to both Richard Feynman and Isidor I. Rabi) became so successful not because he knew all the answers. Instead, it was because, when he\u2019d return home from school each afternoon, his mother would ask him, \u201cDid you ask a good question today?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>As a professor, I, too, try to encourage my students to pose tough questions. I typically begin my courses outlining four types of questions that we use in social sciences: explanatory, descriptive, predictive and prescriptive. While each type has its function, explanatory questions (Why did the prime minister do x? Why did World War I break out? Why do leaders make peace?) are the ones that come up frequently.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But there is a common pitfall that confronts students when they seek to generate these important explanatory, or \u201cwhy,\u201d questions. Students sometimes confuse \u201cwhy\u201d questions with \u201cWTF\u201d questions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>WTF (what-the-f***) has become texting shorthand for expressing moral outrage. An example of a WTF question I typically provide the class is if I were to ask my spouse, \u201cWhy didn\u2019t you take out the garbage?\u201d Most everyone has been on the asking or receiving end of such questions. And most everyone knows that the speaker isn\u2019t actually looking for the answer. Instead, the speaker is looking to express annoyance. \u201cWhy, you ask?\u201d the hypothetical spouse might reply. \u201cBecause I\u2019m a lazy boor.\u201d And the conversation comes to an abrupt close.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In this world of ours, there is plenty of outrage to go around. I want students to feel passionate and even angry about aspects of the public state of affairs: how else will they be motivated to improve this world we live in? But there\u2019s a great risk that WTF questions will lead to analytical closure. Instead, posing a neutral \u201cwhy\u201d question while setting aside one\u2019s moral judgment of the action \u2014 at least temporarily \u2014 can help generate the kind of deep understanding that will help us ultimately become more engaged global citizens. But it means that students really have to pause to determine what it is they are seeking to better understand. And, as they sift through the evidence, they have to be ready for an honest answer.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Mira Sucharov, Associate Professor, Department of Political Science As the old adage goes, a famous physicist (I\u2019ve seen the story attributed to both Richard Feynman and Isidor I. Rabi) became so successful not because he knew all the answers. Instead, it was because, when he\u2019d return home from school each afternoon, his mother would [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[142],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18215","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog"],"acf":{"cu_post_thumbnail":"null"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/tls\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18215","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/tls\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/tls\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/tls\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/tls\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18215"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/tls\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18215\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":40433,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/tls\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18215\/revisions\/40433"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/tls\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18215"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/tls\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18215"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/tls\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18215"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}