HOW TO CHOOSE A RESEARCH TOPIC?
Try to pick a topic that you find interesting. This will ensure the research process is as engaging and fun as possible. Ask yourself: What am I curious about? What questions do I have? What topic would I like to learn more about? [If you’re still not sure, think of 3 things that interest you, even if you don’t think they relate to your class. You might be surprised at the connections you can make!]
Also consider: How long does my research paper need to be? Choose a topic that seems appropriate for the length of the paper. For example, “American Literature of the 1950s” is too broad of a topic for a university research paper. You could write a whole book on that topic! “Depictions of Advertising in American Literature of the 1950s” is a more manageable topic to start with.
Be flexible Understand that choosing a research topic is a cyclical process. No topic should be set in stone. Be prepared to change your topic as you search for information, read about your topic, and learn more.
Learning
Choose a topic
Read
Search
Search for information on your topic
Search for information resources, such as scholarly articles and books, in the library catalogue and relevant databases. What do you find? If you find too many information resources, your topic might be too broad. To make your topic more specific and narrow, try to zero in on a single aspect of your topic. Here are some questions to ask yourself to help narrow your topic:
Could you focus on a more specific region, time period, or group (age, gender, ethnicity)?
Could you focus on a specific aspect of your topic? (eg. Instead of just video games, how about video games and socialization?)
Can you narrow your topic to a specific problem or question? (eg. Instead of just video games and socialization, how about “how do first person shooter games affect adolescents’ ability to learn social behaviours?” )
Narrow your topic and search again.
If you cannot find enough information resources, your topic might be too specific. To broaden your topic, consider removing some of your criteria from your research topic. For example, instead of investigating the use of Instagram by university students at funerals, you might broaden your topic to the use of Instagram by university students at funerals. Alternatively, you might need to adjust the keywords you have been using – talk to a librarian for help! Broaden your topic and search again.
Read about your topic
As you read through your chosen information resources, you will learn more about your topic. In response to what you learn, you may wish to tweak your topic further. Don’t be afraid to change your topic to reflect what you read. Begin writing Even while you’re writing, your topic may change slightly. In many ways, writing is a way of thinking through your topic. As you write—and think—you may decide to refine your topic to better reflect the content of your research paper.
Guidelines to help guide the topic selection:
1. The research topic should be one in which the student is interested, but not one about which the student is already an expert. If a student has been a diabetic for ten years, worked closely with the Juvenile Diabetes Association, and has been a volunteer in the children’s diabetic ward in a local hospital, he or she probably knows a great deal about the subject juvenile diabetes. Unless that student pursues a new approach to diabetes, that topic may not yield much new learning.
2. The research topic may be one that requires cumulative knowledge across grade levels and content area. It should be a natural outgrowth of interest and combined skills of all, or most content areas. For example, a student who researches the changes in the ozone layer is using cumulative knowledge from at least English, math, science, and history.
3. The research topic is challenging to the student academically and creatively. The student should take care not to choose a topic that is limited to relatively simple ideas or one that has little application or extension possibilities. The topic should require an academic and creative stretch/risk.
4. Preliminary research may be helpful. By reading about a certain topic, the student may expand his/her areas of interest. Possibilities for new areas of exploration may surface. It may be wise, therefore, to explore the possibilities for personal interviews, informal surveys, empirical observation, etc., before making a final topic selection.
5. Students should avoid choosing topics that might involve expenses they are not prepared to handle. For example if the research involves travel or long distance calls, the student may want to make another choice. If the product that grows out of the research will require materials, the student may want to make another choice. Remember, the student is not required, encouraged, or advised to spend money in order to complete the Senior Experience. Expenditures will not enhance the evaluation of the Senior Experience.
6. Students should avoid choosing topics that might endanger themselves or others. For example, experiments which are potentially explosive or activities such as handling poisonous snakes are not appropriate. Remember that the student must have Experience Proposal approved by the Senior Experience Capstone Steering Committee and Faculty Advisor prior to beginning the Experience.
7. The research topic should be one that is broad enough to allow the student access to enough information, yet narrow enough to make the research scope reasonable. For example, a student choosing the career cluster Health Science would find it impossible to include everything about health science (home remedies, history of emergency services, the treatment of burns, how to stop bleeding, evolution of first aid courses, etc.) On the other hand, a student choosing to research The Application of Band-Aids to Skin Abrasions probably will not find enough information. A better choice would be Bandaging for Sports Injuries.
Simple strategies for evaluating potential research topics
It is quite common for undergraduate psychology students to develop a list potential research topics. The difficulty arises when students must choose atopic from their list, and develop a research proposal. Often students ask me if they can submit two or three proposals, with the hope that I will inform the of the best idea and therefore make the decision for them. Supervisors are generally not in a position to do this, as it is unethical for anyone but the student to make this decision – this decision-making is, in itself, part of the research process. The following are three very essential questions that you can ask yourself regarding your potential research topics, as illustrated in Figure 3.1.
1. Does the topic elicit interest and curiosity in you? The first decision you should make regards how you actually feel about the topics on your list, and whether you could stick with the topic through to the completion of a research project. It is very important that the topic you choose is of interest to you and that it also elicits curiosity within you. Your interest and curiosity should manifest themselves by adding to your enthusiasm about your project, and therefore have the potential to act as a powerful motivational device.
2. Is the topic worthwhile?
It is very important that you pick a topic that is worthwhile. As already noted in Chapter 2, poor science is unethical. It is unethical to ask people to participate in your study if it has little or no likelihood, because of poor conceptualisation and design, of producing meaningful results or furthering scientific knowledge. If your topic is not worthwhile, not only is it unethical, but you are also failing to satisfy the requirements of meaningful results with theoretical and practical implications. Hence, you will fail to meet the full requirements for an under graduate project in psychology, and you will ultimately loose precious marks. If the examiner of your project reads your project and thinks ‘well so what’, then you have not met the full requirements of your psychology project. It is important to note that it is your responsibility to come up with valid topics that are worthwhile. Your supervisor’s role is to guide you through there search process, not to generate topics for you.
3. Is the topic do-able?
As recently noted, it is of paramount importance that the topic for your project is feasible. You must make critical decisions regarding whether you will be capable of collecting primary data to answer your potential research question. For example, students are often interested in topics related to psychopathologies, such as schizophrenia or multiple personality disorders, however, at undergraduate level, it is not appropriate or permissible to gather information from such a sample, due to the code of competent caring for example. A topic that Irish students are often interested in is the prison service. They may want to investigate in-mates’ quality of life, or they may be interested in the prison staff. At undergraduate level, students have great difficulty in gaining access to such sensitive samples, regardless of the aims of their study. Some students, due to family connections etc., go through the process of getting per-mission to get into such places, and can spend numerous weeks waiting for a response, which is usually ‘no’. Precious time is lost, which would have been saved by making critical decisions as mentioned above. It is also important to decide whether you would have enough time to gather the information and carry out your analyses. Undergraduate students, for example, often do not have the time or resources to invest in participant observation studies, and should settle for some other method of inquiry that suits their research goals. Once you have narrowed down your list of topics, the next step in setting down the foundations for a successful psychology project is to develop your research question.
The Role of the Research Proposal
Your research proposal describes what your proposed research is about, what it is trying to achieve, how you will go about achieving it, what you find out, and why it is worth finding out (Punch, 2001). Often undergraduate students under-estimate the importance of the research proposal, and fail to see the vital functions that it serves.
Introduction – literature review
The literature review is generally incorporated into the introduction. The main purpose of this section is to provide the necessary background or context for your research problem. The framing of the research question is the most crucial aspect of the research proposal. If you frame your research question in the context of a general long-winded literature review, the significance of your research question could ultimately be lost and appear inconsequential or uninspiring. However, if you frame your research question within the framework of a very focused and current research area, its importance will be markedly apparent.
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