In the Philippines, research is rarely introduced as a tool for discovery. It is introduced as a labyrinth. Students do not enter defense rooms expecting a question-and-answer discussion. They enter bracing themselves for humiliation, anticipating the verbal grilling we know as pangigisa. Let us stop pretending that the fear students feel during research defense is an unfortunate side effect of creating an open discussion about the output. It is the product of a culture that has learned to mistake cruelty for competence.
If we take a look at the viral video circulating social media of a teacher acting as a panelist for a group of student researchers, it makes this thought painfully clear. The aggression, the tone, the poorly hidden attempt at ridicule—none of which was trying to improve the paper. It felt like it was about imposing authority. And when moments like these go viral, they do not shock students; they confirm what many fear from research defenses.
This is why many students grow to hate research. The outputs are more often than not introduced not as a tool for inquiry but as a graduation requirement. Instead of being framed as a means of exploration, it becomes a burden, with the final defense acting as some sort of boss that you need to defeat. If you win, you graduate. Lose, and you repeat the trauma.
To be clear, research discourse is not the problem. Research deserves scrutiny. Claims must be interrogated, methods questioned and conclusions tested. But discourse without guidance is not excellence. It is negligence. When questioning is stripped of intent to teach, it stops being academic and starts being punitive.
The fear that students feel does not begin on the defense day. It is built gradually, through the whispered warnings of upper level students, terror from panelists still talked about to this day, and now, viral videos that immortalize humiliation online. Long before students write their chapter 1 introduction, they are already conditioned to expect hostility. Research becomes something to survive, not experience and learn from.
This fear shapes how students think. They stop asking bold questions and start trying to be safe. They avoid originality, not because they lack ideas, but because they fear being punished for them. The research paper becomes a shield, carefully crafted to avoid attacks rather than to pursue truth. Instead of allowing intellectual curiosity to grow, it just retreats.
Supporters of this type of teaching may argue that the fear produces stronger students. But fear does not sharpen thinking, it only narrows it. A fearful student may be less open to clarifying a confusion, less likely to defend a position based on how they prepared, and more likely to freeze under the pressure. What panels interpret as not knowing the answer is just knowledge being tamed by fear.
If we want students to value research, we must stop teaching them to fear it. Research should be demanding, yes—but it should never feel traumatic. A system that trains students to associate academic thinking with fear is not producing better students. It is producing timid and fearful ones. And silence, in research, is the real failure.
Written by Ash Malig, Insight PH
Ash Malig, Insight PH is a dedicated campus journalist and contributor. Their insightful writing sparks meaningful conversations and keeps the community informed.
