The Anatomy Of A Research Paper

A research paper can be a tiresome task if you are unsure about what you need to write about. Equally if you are unsure of how to write it and what is expected of you, then you can spend a lot of time and energy and then discover that it was not needed anyway.

Therefore, it makes sense to speak to your tutor about how to write the research paper before you begin. Once you know how, the process of writing a long paper is not too complicated. This article intends to explain this process to help you as go along.

The Title Page

This seems straight forward, but remember it will be the first thing that the reader will see and so it is important that it conveys the right meaning. As a rule of thumb the title should include the main reason for the research and should not be too lengthy. Perhaps it is a good idea to look at similar titles used by other authors in your field in order to gain some inspiration.

The Abstract

The purpose of the abstract is to provide a brief and accurate account of the entire research paper. It must include the purpose of the research and your subsequent results and conclusions. With this in mind it is best to write this section after you have completed the rest of the research paper.

The Introduction

The main function of the Introduction is to give the reader a brief insight into the subject matter. This section does not need to be any longer than three paragraphs and simply needs to provide background on the topic, reference to some of the seminal research done in the field, a brief outline of your hypothesis and the reasons why this research is important.

Methodology

In this section you need to write an accurate, step by step account of how you carried out the experiments or research. In theory it should be possible for the reader to take your methodology and then recreate your research without need for clarification.

When writing this section you will need to provide details on who the subject study group were, how they were selected and how permission was sought. It is also necessary to provide information on what equipment was used during the course of the research. Finally, you will need to describe how the data was collected and analyzed. You need to say which tests were used and why.

Results Section

This area should be fairly straight forward. You only need to include the raw data as it relates to the study. Although there are no hard rules, it is better to list the results in a logical fashion as they occurred during the research or experiment.

Discussion

In some ways this section is the easiest to write because it is your interpretation of the results. So once you have conducted the research and analyzed the results you need to argue what this all means in relation to the original research hypothesis. Do the results validate the claims or are they totally unexpected? If the latter is true then you can make suggestions for why this was the case.

References

Finally you will be expected to include a section that includes all of the resources that you have used throughout the research and write up of the experiment. Although most reference systems are the same, you should check with your tutor before submission.

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