Varieties of questions

Questions have a number of uses. 'Raising a question' may guide the questioner along an avenue of research (see Socratic method). A rhetorical question is asked in order to make a point, and does not expect an answer (often the answer is implied or obvious). Pre-suppositional questions, such as "Have you stopped beating your wife?" may be used as a joke or to embarrass an audience, because any answer a person could give would imply more information than he was willing to affirm. Questions can also be titles of works of art and literature (e.g. Leo Tolstoy's short story How Much Land Does a Man Need? and the movie What About Bob?).


In research projects
Descriptive question, used primarily to describe the existence of some thing or process.
Relational question, designed to look at the relationships between two or more variables.
Causal question, designed to determine whether one or more variables causes or affects one or more outcome variables.[1]


In surveys (there are a few types of questions)
Dichotomous questions, usually these questions require yes/no answers or require a person to answer by choosing an option(s) from a multiple choice of possible answers.
Nominal questions, these types of questions are designed to inquire about a level of quantitative measure. Usually these questions form correlations between a number and a concept. For example:

Occupational Class: 1= Moderate 2= Severe 3= etc. [2]
Qualifying questions (a.k.a. filter questions, or contingency questions. These types of questions are designed to determine if the individual answering the question needs to continue on to answer subsequential questions.

Bloom's Taxonomy of Questions (Categories of questions)
Knowledge

who, what, when, where, how..? Describe...?
Comprehension

retell...
Application

How is...an example of...?; how is...related to...?; why is...significant?
Analysis

What are the parts or features of...? Classify...according to...;
Sythesis

what would you infer from...? What ideas can you add to...? How would you design a new..? What would happen if you combined...? What solutions would you suggest for...?
Evaluation

do you agree that...? What do you think about?...What is the most important..? Place the following in order of priority...? How would you decide about...? What criteria would you use to assess...? [3]

In syntax
Yes/no-questions
Yes/no questions can be answered with a yes or no, hence the name.
Wh-questions
Wh-questions use interrogative words to request information. In some languages, wh-movement may be involved. They cannot be answered with a yes or no.
Tag questions
Tag questions are a grammatical structure in which a declarative statement or an imperative is turned into a question by adding an interrogative fragment (the "tag"). Tag questions can be answered with a yes or no.