Show that you understand the current state of research on your topic.
The length of a research proposal can vary quite a bit. A bachelor’s or master’s thesis proposal can be just a few pages, while proposals for PhD dissertations or research funding are usually much longer and more detailed. Your supervisor can help you determine the best length for your work.
One trick to get started is to think of your proposal’s structure as a shorter version of your thesis or dissertation , only without the results , conclusion and discussion sections.
Download our research proposal template
Writing a research proposal can be quite challenging, but a good starting point could be to look at some examples. We’ve included a few for you below.
Like your dissertation or thesis, the proposal will usually have a title page that includes:
The first part of your proposal is the initial pitch for your project. Make sure it succinctly explains what you want to do and why.
Your introduction should:
To guide your introduction , include information about:
Professional editors proofread and edit your paper by focusing on:
See an example
As you get started, it’s important to demonstrate that you’re familiar with the most important research on your topic. A strong literature review shows your reader that your project has a solid foundation in existing knowledge or theory. It also shows that you’re not simply repeating what other people have already done or said, but rather using existing research as a jumping-off point for your own.
In this section, share exactly how your project will contribute to ongoing conversations in the field by:
Following the literature review, restate your main objectives . This brings the focus back to your own project. Next, your research design or methodology section will describe your overall approach, and the practical steps you will take to answer your research questions.
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To finish your proposal on a strong note, explore the potential implications of your research for your field. Emphasize again what you aim to contribute and why it matters.
For example, your results might have implications for:
Last but not least, your research proposal must include correct citations for every source you have used, compiled in a reference list . To create citations quickly and easily, you can use our free APA citation generator .
Some institutions or funders require a detailed timeline of the project, asking you to forecast what you will do at each stage and how long it may take. While not always required, be sure to check the requirements of your project.
Here’s an example schedule to help you get started. You can also download a template at the button below.
Download our research schedule template
Research phase | Objectives | Deadline |
---|---|---|
1. Background research and literature review | 20th January | |
2. Research design planning | and data analysis methods | 13th February |
3. Data collection and preparation | with selected participants and code interviews | 24th March |
4. Data analysis | of interview transcripts | 22nd April |
5. Writing | 17th June | |
6. Revision | final work | 28th July |
If you are applying for research funding, chances are you will have to include a detailed budget. This shows your estimates of how much each part of your project will cost.
Make sure to check what type of costs the funding body will agree to cover. For each item, include:
To determine your budget, think about:
If you want to know more about the research process , methodology , research bias , or statistics , make sure to check out some of our other articles with explanations and examples.
Methodology
Statistics
Research bias
Once you’ve decided on your research objectives , you need to explain them in your paper, at the end of your problem statement .
Keep your research objectives clear and concise, and use appropriate verbs to accurately convey the work that you will carry out for each one.
I will compare …
A research aim is a broad statement indicating the general purpose of your research project. It should appear in your introduction at the end of your problem statement , before your research objectives.
Research objectives are more specific than your research aim. They indicate the specific ways you’ll address the overarching aim.
A PhD, which is short for philosophiae doctor (doctor of philosophy in Latin), is the highest university degree that can be obtained. In a PhD, students spend 3–5 years writing a dissertation , which aims to make a significant, original contribution to current knowledge.
A PhD is intended to prepare students for a career as a researcher, whether that be in academia, the public sector, or the private sector.
A master’s is a 1- or 2-year graduate degree that can prepare you for a variety of careers.
All master’s involve graduate-level coursework. Some are research-intensive and intend to prepare students for further study in a PhD; these usually require their students to write a master’s thesis . Others focus on professional training for a specific career.
Critical thinking refers to the ability to evaluate information and to be aware of biases or assumptions, including your own.
Like information literacy , it involves evaluating arguments, identifying and solving problems in an objective and systematic way, and clearly communicating your ideas.
The best way to remember the difference between a research plan and a research proposal is that they have fundamentally different audiences. A research plan helps you, the researcher, organize your thoughts. On the other hand, a dissertation proposal or research proposal aims to convince others (e.g., a supervisor, a funding body, or a dissertation committee) that your research topic is relevant and worthy of being conducted.
If you want to cite this source, you can copy and paste the citation or click the “Cite this Scribbr article” button to automatically add the citation to our free Citation Generator.
McCombes, S. & George, T. (2023, November 21). How to Write a Research Proposal | Examples & Templates. Scribbr. Retrieved August 5, 2024, from https://www.scribbr.com/research-process/research-proposal/
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A resource for interdisciplinary writers, photo ©2009 david frazier, research prospectus for seminar papers.
The prospectus is a fully-developed research plan that will help you pull together your research materials as you think about how to pursue your research question and develop your thesis. It describes your topic, introduces your working thesis, and explains the sources that you plan to use and pursue in building your argument.
Remember that your prospectus is a planning document; while it will provide the foundation for your finished presentation or paper, it is not intended to be the presentation or paper itself, or to state exactly what your presentation or paper will say (that is, it is not an abstract of an essay already written or a presentation already given, but an anticipation of what will come based on the preliminary research you’ve done). You will discover as you do further research that you might need to make changes to your initial plan and to your working thesis (sometimes substantial ones).
1. Summarize what you already know about the topic.
2. What is your proposed title?
3. Who is your intended audience?
4. What is the purpose of your paper; that is, what will this paper do for the reader? For you? Be specific.
5. What is your proposed thesis?
6. What major question(s) do you hope to answer in this paper that pertain to your purpose?
7. What is your proposed outline or organization (e.g., what will you discuss first, second, third,etc.)?
8. Tentatively, what sources will you be using? Cite those sources, and document them at the end of your prospectus on a Works Cited page.
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Faq- prospectus.
Check out this handout on writing abstracts from the UWF Writing Lab, or this handout from UNLV. This page from Wichita State University is a good guide for writing a prospectus.
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Research Paper Prospectus : You are required to create a research paper prospectus on a topic of your choosing. This is a semester-long assignment and the earlier you start the better your paper will be. Many of the smaller writing assignments, including your bibliographies, thesis exercises, outlines, and draft paragraphs, will be designed to help you complete this assignment. Those assignments and their due dates are available on your course canvas site.
Guidelines for the Assignment For secondary sources include:
1) Full citation
2) One sentence explaining of the main argument of the book/article
3) 1-2 sentences explaining how you expect to use the reading (relevant topics, themes, ides).
Guidelines for primary sources include:
2) 2-3 sentences about why you think the source will be useful
Topic: Benjamin Franklin’s diplomatic mission to Paris during the American Revolution.
Adams, John. Diary and Autobiography of John Adams, volumes 1–4, L. H. Butterfield, Editor. Cambridge, Mass, 1961.
The differences between Franklin and Adams will be helpful to contrast. I also think Adams will offer another not so perfect perspective of Franklin while in France. His papers include letters, diary, and writings.
Franklin, Benjamin. 1984. The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin. New York: Buccaneer Books.
Franklin’s autobiography will help me to see how Franklin perceived himself and his life in politics. This will also be informative to the formation of his early life and its effect on his later life in France.
The purpose of a research prospectus is to describe and plan a paper you will later be writing. A good prospectus should:
Think of your prospectus as a work-in-progress. 1.As you gather secondary literature on your topic, either thinking broadly or narrowly, you should focus on how your study fits into the historiographical literature.
2.As you begin to analyze the primary sources you are able to retrieve, you may discover that you need additional sources, which you should add to the your annotated bibliography entries.
3. And, as you look over the evidence in both your primary and secondary sources, you may discover that your thesis ideas/points may have changed, and that you need to revise, or rethink altogether, your thesis question.
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The American Psychological Association (APA) is an official style format that is used by researchers and authors for academic and scientific writing. It is basically a standardized style guide used in psychology, education, and social science. It provides a framework for structuring research papers, presenting findings in a clear and concise manner and for accurately cite sources. The other commonly used style guides are the MLA and the Chicago style formats.
In the APA style, you need to adhere to specific formats and guidelines throughout the research paper. Some of these are explained below:
The APA format allows different types of fonts. Some of the recommended ones include 12-point Times New Roman, 11-point Georgia, 11-point Calibri and 11-point Arial. The chosen font should be consistently used throughout the document. Figure images have to be in sans serif font with size between 8 and 14 points. Footnotes should be smaller than the text font and the line spacing will also be different.
APA style provides for five levels of headings, each having its own format. Level 1 is the main heading, level 2 corresponds to the sub-heading of level 1, level 3 corresponds to the sub-heading of level 2 and so on. The headings should be double spaced and should not be numbered or lettered.
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Generally, the APA format recommends double spacing throughout the text with few exceptions.
A one inch margin is to be provided on each side of the paper. For dissertations and thesis, experts’ advice considering specific instructions provided by your institution.
Text should be aligned to the left margin leaving the right margin uneven or “ragged”. The first line of each paragraph in the text should be indented 0.5 inches from the left margin.
Under the APA format , there are also certain guidelines to be followed while preparing different sections of the research paper. These include –
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In the APA format, the author-date citation system is followed. Here, a brief in-text citation is provided in the text of your paper of a research paper. It can even appear in tables, figures, footnotes or appendix. Only the author and date of publication is provided here. The readers can refer to the corresponding entry in the reference list where the full citation is provided.
While writing in-text citations, it is important to ensure that spelling of author names and publication dates are same in the in-text and reference list. The reference provides an alphabetical listing. Following are some examples of citations in APA format for different sources.
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Research department working papers, explaining the great moderation exchange rate volatility puzzle.
This paper seeks to contribute to a better understanding of the drivers of trends in exchange rate volatility. Using data from the last five decades, the authors find that, against the USD, the volatility of financial center currencies (CHF, DEM/EUR, and JPY) has declined, while the volatility of commodity producer currencies (AUD, CAD, and NZD) has risen. Through the prism of the Great Moderation hypothesis—that macroeconomic volatility has decreased around the world since the mid-1970s—they study how macroeconomic factors relate to these trends. The authors do so using both a reduced-form approach and a novel asset-pricing-based decomposition of exchange rate changes that is disciplined with professional forecasts.
COMMENTS
A prospectus is a formal proposal of a research project developed to convince a reader (a professor or research committee, or later in life, a project coordinator, funding agency, or the like) that the research can be carried out and will yield worthwhile results. It should provide: a working title for your project, a statement of your research ...
2. Use standard formatting. Unless you're told otherwise, you typically want to format your prospectus the same way you'd format any other research paper or assignment you are turning in for a class in the same department. Type your prospectus in a standard, legible font such as Times New Roman or Helvetica.
Prospectus writing format - how to apply it. Just like any other important document, the contents of a prospectus should be written in a systematic outline. The order of the prospectus should be as follows: The topic of your prospectus- this is basically what the document is all about. In longer research proposals, you may have to give a ...
A research prospectus is a preliminary plan for conducting a study. This is not a detailed, technical research proposal, but, rather, a considered analysis of the issues you are likely to confront in such a study. ... This should be a thoughtful, reflective paper that presents a balanced view of the proposed study - both its problems and its ...
A prospectus does not need to have all the answers to its own questions. It is better to lay out issues and concerns you intend to explore in writing the thesis than to pretend to have already solved all the problems. There is no "right" way to write a prospectus, or a thesis: critical theses are as different from
Writing a Prospectus. There are many different kinds of prospectuses for different purposes. Ph.D. students are asked to submit dissertation prospectuses to their committees; most research grant applications require them; academic job candidates often include short prospectuses with their application materials; and book publishers request them as part of the process of considering a manuscript ...
Writing your prospectus is the first step towards completing your dissertation. It represents an opportunity to identify your project goals, create a roadmap for completing your graduate work, and to frame the significance of your work. Your committee will provide you with feedback on the prospectus. While different departments and disciplines ...
When starting your thesis or dissertation process, one of the first requirements is a research proposal or a prospectus. It describes what or who you want to examine, delving into why, when, where, and how you will do so, stemming from your research question and a relevant topic. The proposal or prospectus stage is crucial for the development ...
Main text. The order in which you must write your proposal. Content - Title. good title is: short (try to aim for 15-20 words max), simple - avoid very technical terms or jargon, concisely and precisely indicates the nature and the direction of your project. To create a good title, ask yourself the questions below:
The prospectus, or proposal, is the first step of your dissertation. It serves as a plan for your project, an identification of your research goals and method (s), and an articulation of the importance of your work. Alongside its preparation, you will also select members of your committee, who will provide you with important feedback. Beginning ...
A Research Prospectus is a formal research proposal. You should design the Research Prospectus to convince readers you can complete the research. It should contain: A title. A research statement or question. An overview of scholarly work already done around your topic; the background and context of your proposed research .
A dissertation prospectus or proposal describes what or who you plan to research for your dissertation. It delves into why, when, where, and how you will do your research, as well as helps you choose a type of research to pursue. You should also determine whether you plan to pursue qualitative or quantitative methods and what your research ...
A prospectus is a proposal of what you are going to argue or examine, produced in as clear and concise a manner as possible. Some professors may have their own guidelines that should be fol-lowed regarding a prospectus. In the absence of specific guidelines, follow this general format. Please note that a prospectus is different from an abstract.
Several viewers have asked for a video about how to write a research prospectus, which is a description of research to be conducted, typically by a graduate ...
After you write your prospectus: The final paper may deviate from your prospectus. As you begin to research more deeply and think more critically, you might decide to use entirely different sources or make an entirely different argument or even ask a different question. That's ok. That's part of the researching and writing process ...
Research proposal examples. Writing a research proposal can be quite challenging, but a good starting point could be to look at some examples. We've included a few for you below. Example research proposal #1: "A Conceptual Framework for Scheduling Constraint Management".
To help organize your research so as to prepare for serendipity--and also to help you figure out which documents you don't need to research--I suggest that you draft an essay outlining your overall research strategy for the project. The prospectus should be about 10-15 pages long, and should include the following elements: 1. A section defining ...
Research Prospectus for Seminar Papers. The prospectus is a fully-developed research plan that will help you pull together your research materials as you think about how to pursue your research question and develop your thesis. It describes your topic, introduces your working thesis, and explains the sources that you plan to use and pursue in ...
What is a Prospectus? A dissertation prospectus is a document that shows the researcher's plan for the dissertation project. This document should provide enough information to verify the need for their study, the way it is situated amongst existing literature, and how the research will be facilitated. A committee will use this document to ...
The prospectus is simply a plan for your dissertation. Your prospectus does not commit you to particular answers, but rather is a preliminary statement of what you know and think, and what you plan to do. There are two primary audiences: yourself and the members of your dissertation committee. (You also might share your prospectus in a workshop ...
Mar 11, 2020 440. Check out this handout on writing abstracts from the UWF Writing Lab, or this handout from UNLV. This page from Wichita State University is a good guide for writing a prospectus. Writing.
Research Paper Prospectus: You are required to create a research paper prospectus on a topic of your choosing. This is a semester-long assignment and the earlier you start the better your paper will be. Many of the smaller writing assignments, including your bibliographies, thesis exercises, outlines, and draft paragraphs, will be designed to ...
Before conducting a study, a research proposal should be created that outlines researchers' plans and methodology and is submitted to the concerned evaluating organization or person. Creating a research proposal is an important step to ensure that researchers are on track and are moving forward as intended. A research proposal can be defined as a detailed plan or blueprint for the proposed ...
Abstract: This paper discusses a first-year writing research prospectus prompt designed to support first-year undergraduate students transitioning from high school writing---which often focuses on summary and synthesis---to college-level writing. In college, ``research papers'' often require knowledge production: developing research questions that address gaps in existing scholarship.
Here, a brief in-text citation is provided in the text of your paper of a research paper. It can even appear in tables, figures, footnotes or appendix. Only the author and date of publication is provided here. The readers can refer to the corresponding entry in the reference list where the full citation is provided.
Next to cryptocurrencies, tokens are a widespread application area of blockchains. Tokens are digital assets implemented as small programs on a blockchain.
We use data on stock portfolios of Norwegian households to show that stock market wealth increases entrepreneurship by relaxing financial constraints. Our research design isolates idiosyncratic variation in household-level stock market returns. An increase in stock market wealth increases the ...
View our prospectus for ways to support the conference and garner exposure for your organization. ... Research and education on micro/nanoscale heat and mass transfer have advanced rapidly over the last two decades through many dedicated individuals and team efforts, with direct impact now extending into various fields in both science and ...
This paper seeks to contribute to a better understanding of the drivers of trends in exchange rate volatility. Using data from the last five decades, the authors find that, against the USD, the volatility of financial center currencies (CHF, DEM/EUR, and JPY) has declined, while the volatility of commodity producer currencies (AUD, CAD, and NZD) has risen.
The SBTi releases research on considerations for a more effective approach to scope 3 emissions. This is an early step in the review of the Corporate Net-Zero Standard; guidance remains unchanged until process is complete. ... Scope 3 discussion paper: A discussion paper setting out the SBTi's initial thinking on potential changes being ...