Getting Started With Your Research Project: A Guide for Students

By: David A Webb
Submitted: 2007-01-17 16:26:34
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Carrying out a research project is an integral and extremely important component of most college and university courses, programs and degrees.

It should be the most enjoyable and rewarding piece of work undertaken. More often than not, however; planning, executing and writing up research, be it a thesis, dissertation or project becomes a source of great stress and worry for many students.

With this in mind, particularly in my capacity as a research supervisor I put together the following guidance notes for my students, which I hope you will find useful.

Getting Started

In many cases the first thing you'll be asked to do is to submit, or at the very least think about putting together a project/research proposal. At this stage, any general ideas you have will probably be too broad or too vague.

Don't worry, you belong to the 99.9% of students who find themselves in the same position.

The good thing about putting together a research or project proposal so soon into the process is that it will force you to refine your ideas sooner rather than later. What follows, is designed to get you thinking about the early key stages in the research process.

Stage 1: Developing a focus within a general area of interest.

This stage of the research process assumes that you have a general research idea in mind. Whether you consider this idea to be somewhat vague or well developed (the former being the most likely) you must establish and maintain a clearly defined focus throughout your investigation. I can't emphasise this point enough because it really will determine how smoothly your research goes and ultimately how well you do.

The main reason for this is that it will provide the foundation for what is known as the golden thread, i.e. the major concept within your research that influences every stage of the research process; and just as importantly can be seen developing within each section of your dissertation/thesis write-up. In developing your focus of inquiry remember that practicality and ethics must be taken into account.

The Literature Review

Another benefit of narrowing your focus is that you will have a structured search strategy in place when conducting your literature review. It might sound obvious but having a clear idea of what to look for will save you valuable time and energy. It never ceases to amaze me the amount of time and effort students spend collecting information that they will never use.

Unless you are researching something unique, most topic areas will have an established body of research from which to draw upon. In such cases you must familiarise yourself with both the traditional/classic studies in the field, as well as the most up-to-date research.

Stage 2: Developing research questions.

The main way to demonstrate and maintain your focus of inquiry is to develop appropriate research questions or hypotheses. There are no hard and fast rules as to what constitutes an ideal research question/hypothesis. Nevertheless, a sensible rule of thumb is that you are able to provide a clear rationale for the question/prediction being posed.

Essentially you have to take each research question/hypothesis in turn and justify its inclusion. More often than not, this justification will have emerged from your literature review e.g. this research question approaches a particular topic from a new angle, it taps into current debate etc. Incidentally, you should be able to provide a similar rationale for your research as a whole).

Also, again don’t forget practicality, is the research question over ambitious given your ‘time-scale’, ‘word limit’, ‘resources’ etc? Developing simple and straightforward research questions does not mean you cannot undertake sophisticated research. You will know if you are on the right track if you can ask yourself, and confidently answer the following questions.

What am I hoping to explore in the course of my research?

What is the thinking behind my study's research questions/hypotheses?

Can I access a wide range of background material?

Will it be relatively straightforward to access my target population?

Ethically, am I on safe ground?

The best advice I can give you in the early stages of your research is to make sure you get it right before you start. keep it simple and be pragmatic. Remember research is a process, and you will be assessed on how well you undertake that process.

You can get hold of more research advice and tips by visiting my webite http://www.all-about-forensic-psychology.com.

Having worked as a lecturer in psychology in the UK, I recently moved to sunny Spain with my family, where I now work as a distance learning tutor and research dissertation supervisor.

Since 2000, I've been involved in collaborative research with teams of forensic scientists in the UK, US and Canada.

To find out more about the fascinating world of forensic psychology Visit my website http://www.all-about-forensic-psychology.com.

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