Research Paper

All right.

Welcome back.

Today we are moving on to another common college writing a sign which is the research paper a research

paper is usually going to be your most lengthy writing assignment.

You’ll have to do in at the university but it can also be one of the most rewarding because it allows

the most individual exploration of topics that interest us.

Right.

Because so much of it relies on outside sources is important.

Look at some key strategies of how to find the good topic what to do when reading sources and authors

do it effectively and efficiently and then how to build the paper.

So began by talking about different types of research papers and what’s expected of course these shifts

from Professor to Professor.

So don’t take these as the authority of course always follow the exact instructions given to you by

your individual Fessor.

However these are some of the general expectations of research papers in the various fields.

First we have the humanities which is to use outside sources to support your own original argumentative

thesis in the social sciences were two different types of research.

The primary research which is where you showcase your own data and information and there’s secondary

research where you analyze and evaluate the research of other experts within the natural biological

sciences.

We have two different types of common research papers.

First is the informative mulches to present others findings or explain a scientific process.

And then there’s also the argumentative which is to use the findings of others to create your own argument.

And what we’re going to talk about today applies at least in some degree to each of these various research

paper types or research paper assignment types.

So the strategies that I’ll share with you today will be useful to write a successful research paper.

In any of these fields.

And the first thing we need to discuss is topic is very important to identify first and interesting

but also a narrow topic.

The general rule if you think the topic is boring your reader will even more so.

So find a topic that interests you to do that.

It’s helpful to first do some initial background research.

So basic research often uncovers new potential topics.

So don’t call and read full books or even full articles simply browse common databases even things like

Wikipedia to get a basic idea of what research has been done what the common knowledge is and then you’ll

be able to begin to identify new potential topics or subtopics to contribute or to on that common knowledge

base.

It’s important to be specific.

Never try to cover too broad of an issue.

This is a very common problem in Student Research Training is that students try to take on such a huge

issue.

Remember that the general rule again depth rather than breadth.

We’re looking for depth.

OK we can make sure we’re being specific enough is to begin with the broader issue of interest and to

break that broader issue into subtopics and then to choose from those subtopics which one you think

is most interesting khush one strikes you which one you want to learn more about.

Remember a research paper should be guided by your own desire to learn something more to discover something

new.

And that desire should be reflected in Pershore topic.

And then in your actual writing the paper finally look at the specific topic from a different perspective

to discover other possible approaches to the topic.

So force yourself to think of different ways of thinking about the topic that you’ve chosen are that

smaller subtopics that you’ve chosen and consider whether or not a different perspective or a different

approach would be more appropriate more interesting and more persuasive.

Once you’ve identified your topic or subtopic it’s now time to do some research.

But there are some key tips or strategies of doing research to save you a lot of time research can turn

into a never ending process.

If we’re not careful.

So there are two main sources that we turn to for academic research.

One is a journal article so academics journals the best way to find these central articles for your

topic is to first skim through the titles of course for the titles that stand out to you as being relevant.

Read the abstracts most journals will publish the abstracts within the database on.

The abstract will describe the basic claims and methodology of the paper of those abstracts that you

find to be relevant or interesting.

Pull out the full the full article and read the introduction and identify the thesis statement.

If those continue to be relevant and interesting then read the full article.

So only read the full article if it is directly related to your topic.

Or if you simply find it extremely interesting.

So it’s also important don’t only narrow your research to your very very specific topic especially early

on because if you find other interesting articles your topic may shift in very productive ways.

So there should be a little bit of flexibility.

The other sources Pook’s.

My academic books the best way to filter through the thousands and thousands of books that are going

to come up in the library the general library search of the topic is to read book reviews so book reviews

are much like the abstracts of journal articles.

They’re from other renowned scholars in the field who summarize the basic claims and the contributions

of the book after you’ve done that you’ve identified books that will be useful for you like the journal

articles.

Read the introductions and then read the conclusions.

If it continues to be of interest to you and seems to be useful then go through the Table of Contents

and identify the specific chapters that are related to your specific topic.

So you read the introduction the conclusion and the specific chapters related to your topic you’ll sell

them have to read an entire academic book for a research paper and while you’re doing all of this research

once you’ve found the ones that you are interested in reading the article or the full chapters it’s

important to take notes.

It’s really saves time in the long run.

And here are some ideas of what to include in those notes.

First is the bibliographic information.

So the things you need to be able to find the original source again.

We often have to leave our research and come back to it.

So the bibliographic information is absolutely vital.

Under that you should also quickly summarize the main argument or the topic.

If you find in your reading any pertinent quotations or really key quotations put those in your notes.

And last but not least very important.

Write down your own thoughts reactions or ideas for incorporating in your paper and make sure to write

those down immediately.

Lots of times we forget.

We think we all remember that idea we had in relation to the reading and then we go back to be in writing.

We don’t remember so write down those immediate reactions and thoughts because it’s likely that you

will have time to go back and reread the entire chapter or reread the entire entire article from there

once we’ve seen what’s out there in the field we found our topic and we’ve revised our topic according

to some of the research we found within developer our thesis and a thesis for research paper very similar

to other thesis statements we’ve talked about.

And then you need to assert a claim that provides a new insight or perspective.

It’s important though not to simply develop a thesis out of the research that you’ve found.

So don’t simply copy a thesis or combine a number of different theses from the research see looked at

instead develop a thesis that is a reaction to what you find or you don’t find in your research.

So again thesis is proving your individual engagement with the topic.

Remember to focus on the narrow topic and to announce that narrow topic within your thesis.

Remembering that depth is better than Brett from the thesis we move on to the introduction the introduction

like other introductions needs to arouse reader curiosity provide necessary background information and

explain why you’re writing the paper so not because it isn’t assignment but rather why your idea is

that you’re about to write about are going to be so significant.

Remember for more ideas of how to write a good introduction we have the whole lecture on introductions

earlier on moving onto the body.

Remember to begin each paragraph with a topic sentence that links the single remember one topic of the

paragraph back to your thesis.

Make sure to use summary paraphrase and direct quotations from your research.

Making sure to cite them correctly of course to illustrate how your ideas engage with with the larger

field and stylistically it’s important to use a variety of summary paraphrase and their expectations

in your research so don’t simply directly quote every single one of the ideas you are incorporating

into your paper.

Use a nice combination nice balance between the three ways of inserting others ideas.

Finally remember that your cited sources so these other ideas that you bring in from your research are

there to support your own ideas.

They should never outweigh your right is your analysis interpretation and exploration of your research

of the topic through your research is what needs to be highlighted all the way throughout the paper.

Now let’s move on to that conclusion.

Conclusion.

Again like other conclusions restate your thesis in different words summarize your main points explain

the implications of your overall thesis by for example making a prediction about the future giving advice

issuing some kind of call to action.

Connecting to the larger context or theme and emphasizing the significance of how your ideas shift the

common perspective understanding discourse and so on.

And then finally it’s time to revise again remember to go large to small beginning with Unity issues

overall argument issues and so on.

And then to pay within research papers pay a special attention to how you have incorporated your outside

sources.

So have you introduce them and discuss them adequately.

Remember our purpose of life strategy.

Have you cited them properly.

Remember to check the style guide or citation guide assigned to you by your professor.

And finally have you relied too heavily on the sources rather than developing your own ideas.

Never let the sources or the research outweigh your ideas or your engagement with the research.

All right and that’s it.

I would love to hear some of your research topics.

I can help you identify whether they are too broad or too narrow.

I’d be happy to field some thesis statements as well so send them on my way or post them into our forum

to get some some feedback from your peers and fellow students.

All right thanks.