Course:VANT149/2021/Capstone/Arts/Team6
Research Proposal Presentation Title
The Government's Solution to Balance Religion and Open Defecation in Rural India
Student researchers
Houzhen Yin
Eileen Ma
Anqi Liu
Ping-chen Hsieh
What is your research question?
What is the impact of different religions on the government's policy against open defecation?
Research proposal keywords or concepts
1. Religion
2. Open defecation
3. Government's policy
How would you summarize your proposed research idea?
Water pollution in India is an urgent and serious problem. After investigation, we found that there is a strong correlation between Indian religions and open defecation and open defecation is one of the strongest factors causing water pollution in India. So, we set our RQ as: "what is the impact of different religions on the government's policy against open defecation?" to help Indian government build a workable solution.
Where is the literature gap and how does your proposed research attempt to fill that gap?
Through literature review, we found that the studies mostly focused on how open defecation affected people's health, but few studies linked religious culture and open defecation together. Therefore, we aim to investigate people's attitudes between open defecation and religions towards these issues through quantitative research method, to help the government better understand people's ideas and carry out some policies.
Why is this gap worthy of research?
For the Indian government and the whole world, solving the problem of open defecation has always been important and worthy of attention. If we could relieve this problem, it can not only reduce the spread of some diseases and environmental pollution, but also improve sanitation levels, to further promote sustainability.
As the culture of using toilets varies with religion and solving the problem of open defecation requires the guidance of the government, this research could survey the religious inhabitants of India and try to figure out what their ideal government policies are, to provide support for the government's future measures.
What made your group interested in and/or what excites you about your proposed topic?
One of the sustainable development goals from the United Nations mentioned that "achieving access to adequate and equal sanitation and hygiene for all and end open defecation by 2030", but open defecation has so far been a problem in India, and the government has also not had an effective solution. Besides, it is generally believed that religious beliefs are not related to open defecation, but they do affect it, which is an interesting topic for our group.