Hypotheses are based upon similar logic. As a researcher you do not know about a phenomenon, asituation, the prevalence of a condition in a population or about the outcome of a programme, but you do have a hunch to form the basis of certain assumptions or guesses. You test these, mostly one by one, by collecting information that will enable you to conclude if your hunch was right. The verification process can have one of three outcomes. Your hunch may prove to be: right, partially right or wrong.Without this process of verification, you cannot conclude anything about the validity of your assumption.Hence, a hypothesis is a hunch, assumption, suspicion, assertion or an idea about a phenomenon, relationship or situation, the reality or truth of which you do not know. A researcher calls these assumptions, assertions, statements or hunches hypotheses and they become the basis of an enquiry. In most studies the hypothesis will be based upon either previous studies or your own or someone else’s observations.There are many definitions of a hypothesis. According to Kerlinger, ‘A hypothesis is a conjectural statement of the relationship between two or more variables’ (1986: 17). Webster’s Third New International Dictionary (1976) defines a hypothesis as: a proposition, condition, or principle which is assumed, perhaps without belief, in order to draw out its logical consequences and by this method to test its accord with facts which are known or may be determined.Black and Champion define a hypothesis as ‘a tentative statement about something, the validity of which is usually unknown’ (1976: 126). In another definition, Bailey defines a hypothesis as:a proposition that is stated in a testable form and that predicts a particular relationship between two (or more) variables. In other words, if we think that a relationship exists, we first state it as a hypothesis and then test the hypothesis in the field. (1978: 35) According to Grinnell:A hypothesis is written in such a way that it can be proven or disproven by valid and reliable data – it is in order to obtain these data that we perform our study. (1988: 200)