Problems may present themselves in any of several forms:

the provocative exception; research on effective schools had its beginnings in the observation of provocative exceptions. The prevailing wisdom had it that the best schools were characterized by an infusion of resources, wealthy, committed, suburban constituents, stable families and communities, low crime rate, and predominantly non-minority membership. Poorly-functioning schools had the opposite characteristics. When it was observed that a number of schools existed with all the characteristics of failure but which were not failing -in fact were achieving superior results- researchers were presented with a provocative exception begging to be investigated.

A startling example comes from biology and Darwin's theory of natural selection which states that organisms best adapted to their environment survive and reproduce in the greatest numbers. Over time as the traits of survivors are inherited, they lead to new and better adapted species. But what would happen if otherwise successful organisms acquired traits that inhibited their ability to reproduce? According to the law of natural selection, they would become extinct after a few generations. For the past fourteen years, a biologist at the University of Maryland has been studying pink lady's slipper orchids which thrive on the east coast and in Canada. He has labeled 3,500 in the group he has been studying and tracking each of them for fourteen years. On average, more than one thousand of them flower, but only 23 have ever been pollinated and reproduced in all that time. Moreover, their characteristics are completely antithetical to reproduction, e.g., when a bee lands, they enfold the bee in the flower and the bee must struggle to get out, leaving with pollen on his head. Because of this, bees (who learn very quickly) avoid the pink lady's slipper like the plague and the chances of cross pollination is essentially nonexistent. The adaptable thing to do, according to biologists, is for the orchid to either change itself into a nectar producer to attract bees, give up its anti-bee behavior, or develop into a self reproducing organism. No examples of any of these have ever been found, either among those being studied by the Maryland biologist or by anyone else. All but 23 should have long been dead.

Contradictory evidence; Sigmund Freud's great discoveries, and methods for discovering them, led to the world-wide use of orthodox psychoanalysis as a model for classifying, diagnosing and treating all forms of mental disorder. For decades, through much of the first three or four of this century, researchers and practitioners reported fabulous -sometimes incredible- success in alleviating the suffering of people through psychoanalytic techniques. Ultimately, a scholarly squabble ensued as evidence piled up of sufficient strength to contradict the claims of proponents of psychoanalysis, at least in terms of its credibility as a primary treatment option with the expectation of lasting results. Its frailties became particularly glaring as attempts were made to (a) apply the couch fantasies of neurotic adults to the treatment of childhood disturbances without much benefit; (b) the failure of ongoing research to replicate the findings of prior case studies reporting spectacular results. After a period during which skeptics challenged the assumptions of the orthodox view, experimentation with alternative perspectives cleared the way for development of new approaches, such as reality therapy, rational-emotive therapy, cognitive behaviorism, pharmaceutical interventions, and the like.

Moot alternatives, knowledge void: a great deal of inquiry in the social sciences is devoted to addressing gaps or weaknesses in the knowledge base of a particular discipline or sub-discipline. Organization theorists, for example, have spent 7 decades trying to understand the behavior of complex organizations from the perspective of bureaucratic theory without contributing much of anything to our understanding of organizations or how to lead them. Recent research has attacked this enormous knowledge void using entirely new perspectives that essentially abandon the bureaucratic model altogether. State level social policy research has traditionally relied on economic or demographic perspectives for anticipating the effects of various policy options and the process of policy development itself. Policy making bodies (such as legislatures) have been persistently plagued with seeing something entirely different result from the intended results of their decisions. More robust approaches such as backward mapping and examining the policy arena from the point of view of political cultures and public values have been attempts to address weaknesses and gaps in policy studies.

Action-knowledge or knowledge-action conflict: this situation arises when (a) people take one course of action and available evidence indicates another course of action is appropriate or when (b) people engage in inappropriate or wasted activities knowing full well that another activity or course of action is appropriate. A good example is in the area of personnel evaluation. Administrators expend enormous amounts of time and energy engaged in the process of personnel evaluation, purportedly for the purpose of achieving performance accountability or the professional development of the person. Typically, personnel evaluations are technically or procedurally flawed in that they have little or nothing to do with the employees job, they do not achieve their stated or desired purpose, or both (at least in the field of education). This occurs because (a) the administrator is ignorant about more relevant approaches, (b) the procedures are part of formal agency policy, whose leaders should know better, but beyond the administrator's control, (c) the administrator lacks time to make the activity more relevant and meaningful or (d) however flawed and over simplistic, the procedures provide information in a form a lay audience (board of directors, school board) can understand, thus creating the facade of accountability.