Research proposal writing entails a lot of research and regular formatting.
A research proposal is a detailed plan for your study, which is to be submitted to the supervisor. It consists of four parts:
- Introduction
- Methods/Research design
- Results & Conclusions
- References section
Write your statement of purpose.
In this section, you’ll state the goal of your research and its significance. You should also include a summary of the main points of your research.
In this section, you will discuss:
- Why you want to conduct this research
- What problem or question are you trying to solve?
- How does it relate to another line of research? If there is no relationship, can there be a connection between what others have done and what you are doing now? Will this help answer an existing question in the field or open up new avenues for further exploration?
Write a literature review.
Write a literature review.
- Introduce your topic. In this section, you need to clearly state what your research question is and why it’s important.
- Discuss sources. You’ll want to include an overview of the existing literature (which means citing any previous studies), along with the relevant findings and theories that relate directly or indirectly to your own study.
- Provide an overview of findings. This section will be organized around each research question listed in the proposal—so if there are five questions on which you’re focusing, this should contain five sections dedicated specifically to them (each addressing one).
- Provide a conclusion/analysis. In this section, you should address how these findings fit into existing knowledge and/or explain how they contribute to our understanding of the problem at hand (i.e., give some context). Be sure not just state facts but also provide analysis so that readers understand why those facts matter! Also here would be where we’d see any limitations pointed out as well as any other factors that may affect interpretation such as sample size or methods used in data collection/analysis etc…
Explain your methodology and data analysis.
Now that you’ve established the problem, explained why it’s important, and described how your research will help solve it, it’s time to get into the nitty-gritty of your methodology. This is where you explain what techniques you’ll use to collect data and analyze it. It’s also where you can demonstrate that you understand what questions need answering and are prepared to do so in an effective way.
The most important thing here is that all these components must be clearly linked together so that your reader can follow along. Be sure to include relevant details about any equipment involved (e.g., cameras) or software used (e.g., Excel). You should also make clear what kind of data will be collected (i.e., interviews vs focus groups vs surveys) and why this particular method was chosen over others available in the field today (if applicable).
Now comes one of the most challenging parts: analyzing all those findings! But don’t worry—we’ve got some tips for tackling this obstacle head on!
Justify your research.
Justify your research.
Research is a lot of work and requires a lot of time, but it’s also fun! So, make sure you can justify why your research is important and interesting. Your professor won’t want to hear that you’re doing it just for fun or because someone else is paying for it (unless those reasons are true!). Instead, explain how your proposal will contribute to an existing body of knowledge or help solve a problem in society. Explain how the project fits with its specific course requirements and/or contributes to other courses taken by students who could benefit from knowing what they learned during this project while they were still in college.
Finally, if possible, show that there exists a major gap in current knowledge on the topic within academia (i.e., no one has done any undergraduate work with this topic before). This way, even if the project doesn’t turn out exactly as planned (which almost always happens), at least it’ll be something new that hasn’t been done before!
Developing a research proposal is the final step before you begin writing a research paper.
A research proposal is a detailed description of the work you intend to do in order to complete your project. It allows you to think through the important aspects of your project, including what kind of information you will need and how much time it will take you to find that information.
A research proposal isn’t just an outline; it also includes specific details about how you plan on conducting your research. You should describe:
- What kinds of resources are available for this type of project?
- How long will it take for me to complete my research?
- What kind of questions do I want answered?
