The elements of research:
Students in writing their research gets confuse. Although they have great ability to explain their view point but still they feel a great difficulty in disseminating their concepts. Through this article one will feel easy to know that what they should include in writing the elements of research and how to write it.
The parts of research include the following:
- Introduction
- Literature review
- Methodology
- Data Analysis
- Conclusion
- Bibliography
Let’s start exploring that what all the above heading must has in it briefly.
1. Introduction:
The introduction part of the research is the beginning of the research writing in which one explains the background of the research, establishes the framework of the research, tell about the particular topic to be researched, the purpose of the study, the main aims and objective of research and the research questions that will be going to be studied.
Introduction part has been sub divided so that it can become easier for writing into following sub headings:
a. Background: The background of the research must tell the main concept of the selected topic and must talk about the context in which topic is going to be studied. It starts with the general focus and then narrow downs to more specific focus. It educates the reader about the topic, develop their interest, lay foundation and describe that who will be the basic audience for the study.
b. Problem statement: It tells about the basic problem that is to be studied. One should write the problem statement in declarative manner. It must state the in a manner that I will answer that what is the problem? Who has the problem? And what is the possible resolution for the problem?
c. Aims and Objective: The aims and objective part must be written in the manner that it will explain that what are the basic aims and what are objective of doing the research. It beings by stating: The basic aim of the research is to find or is to explore or is to uncover etc
d. Research question or hypothesis: The research questions should be aligned with the aims and objective and it must tell that what are you intended to study. It should developed in a manner that it should not be too vast or too narrow (dichotomous), it must not be leading questions who has its own answer (biased and have personal judgment) and it must not contain too much vast scope and ambiguity. It should start with words like: what, why, when, where, who, how, would/could or should. It should be in the form of questions.
e. Purpose statement: The purpose statement tells the significance of the research, for which the research will be help and how it will help them. It must be written in the descriptive form. It must start as: “The purpose of this research is….”.
f. Justification: The justification part will tell the target audience under study and the benefits they can gauge from the research.
g. Scope: Scope delimits the area of the research and tells about the specific domain to be studied.
h. Limitations: The limitation part will tell that what cannot perform in the available resources. It tells the boundary of the research and limitizes the area which the researcher will not incorporate in the study.
i. Basic assumption: This section will explain the basic assumptions that have been assumed for the study.
j. Definition of the key words: The definitions of the difficult terms
2. Literature review:
Literature review is very important part of the research as it tells about the researches previously done. The conclusion obtained from those researches and the limitation will try to help you in finding the gap from where you can initiate your research. It also makes sure that no work is being duplicated as it will waste resources and will not be useful. It ensures that your study will add something new to the existing knowledge.
3. Methodology:
The methodology part must consist of the following parts:
a. The methodology must be in-line with the aims and objective of the research.
b. The description about the population.
c. The way to select the samples.
d. The sample size for the study.
e. Designing and the development of instrument for the research.
f. The validity and the reliability of the instrument.
g. Data collection techniques.
h. Technique to analysis the data.
i. Strength and limitations of the above selected methodology.
All the above mentioned points will cover the methodology part.
4. Data Analysis:
This section of the research explains the statistical information and the outcomes that have obtained from the data. This section will tell the summary about the results obtained from the data. This part will tell whether the stated hypothesis has been accepted or not. It will show the results in the form of tables and figures and will give the description about them. It will also describe the confidence interval selected and the directions of the relationship among the depended and independent variables.
5. Conclusion:
The conclusion part will summarize the research and will tell that what results were obtained and how they are applied in the current scenario. It will also tell the implications of the findings. It is stated in brief and concise manner. It also gives the recommendations and tells that what should be done in the future regarding to the problem studied.
6. Bibliography:
The bibliography is the reference part which must be written in APA format. Word 2007 gives the direct option for inserting the references. But for those who do not have word 2007 the proper format is as:
Last name of the author (space) initials of first name (space) middle name (space) (year) (space) name of the topic (space) journal name in which the topic is published {should be in italic} (space) volume no. (space) page no.
For example:
Atkin, K. C. (1978). Observation of Parent-Child Interaction in Supermarket Decision-Making. The journal of Marketing, Vol. 42, No. 4 , 41-45.
