Study Advice Service
Research Proposals
Author: Peter Wilson
Writing a research proposal is like any other form of writing. Any piece worth writing is unique. It is
saying something new and personal. It may be like a thousand other pieces, but it should be
different.
Like any other form of writing, a research proposal is different in its own way. (If it weren’t, it would
hardly be worthy of the name of ‘research’!) But the same general principles hold good, for the
research proposal as for any writing:
1.
Audience. Think of your readers. What do they want to know? Why do they want to
know it?
2.
Purpose. Why are you writing this? What do you want to tell your readers?
3.
Style. What should your writing sound like? What will keep your readers’ attention?
There are two main reasons for students to write a research proposal. The first is the most obvious
one – they want to gain entry to a research course, or funding or other support while they follow the
course. This is the reason for post-graduate students – or those applying for post-graduate study – to
write a research proposal.
The second is as an undergraduate exercise, to prepare you for making a real research proposal,
either in Higher Education or outside it. Even if you may do no more academic study after the end
of your undergraduate degree, your ability to write a research proposal may be of great value in
some vocational areas, notably in Business.
Those who become professional researchers, after leaving University, need research proposals as a
way of attracting work. Each proposal is like a job application. In commercial fields, you might be
tendering for a contract to find out something of value to your client. In Social Sciences, the
commonest client is probably the Government, or Government agencies. In the medical field, and
some others, you may be working for a mix – a commercial pharmaceutical company AND the N.H.S.
(One difference that may be worth noting is that the undergraduate may have difficulty in finding
enough words to reach the guideline word count, where the ‘real life’ research proposal is well
advised to be as succinct as possible. Apart from that, all the following advice applies to both
undergraduate ‘practice’ exercises and genuine research proposals.)
Web: www.hull.ac.uk/studyadvice
Email: [email protected]
Tel: 01482 466199
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Your purpose is to begin the research you want to carry out, by getting the appropriate approval from
the appropriate people. In other words, the writer should aim to sell the idea. This should not be a
crude form of advertising, but a way of convincing someone else that the ideas proposed are worth
supporting. So your first job is to have something worth doing.
Say what you want to do; why you want to do it; and why anyone else in the world will benefit from it.
Take it for granted in the academic field that your reader believes that you will benefit; and, in the
commercial field, that your reader, or client, is not interested in whether you will benefit.
Research is simply a way of finding things out. That is something that most of us do for ourselves
much of the time, with pleasure and without support. (Today, for example, I have researched a journey
to London, the prices and availability of several goods I want for the house, the University library
catalogue, how to use a new feature on my computer, and what is on television tonight – all for my
own uses, and all with some pleasure, or at least interest. Except the television programmes; they are
all awful.) When you write a research proposal, you should be aiming to show how what you are
finding out fits into the broader scheme of things.
If you are working in the business field, you should be clear as to why a ‘client’ or ‘boss’ might benefit
from what you are proposing to do – and therefore permit or even fund you to do it. ‘This research is
designed to analyse the strengths and weaknesses of our major competitor’, or ‘I intend to weigh up
the different avenues that have been suggested for the expansion of the company’, or ‘This case
history should show how the ZZZ company came to dominate the market for its products in Asia’ are
possible examples.
For the undergraduate, the more serious research student, and the business researcher alike, the
three principles hold good. Be clear about your purpose; have a good idea of your audience; and
think about your style.
The basic instructions are to tell your reader:
1. what you intend to find out;
2. why you intend to find it out;
3. what good you hope your findings will do;
4. how you intend to go about finding it out;
5. how much time, funding or other expenses this will take;
6. … and any other details that are relevant.
1a. What you intend to find out
The proposal you write should be the simplest way of describing the subject of your research, in
words that show how it meets the needs of your course, etc.
In the Business world, you may suggest to your manager that you should spend time (and money) in
analysing the pricing practices in your market, or anything else. A consultant may be employed to
collect and analyse specific data. Some firms exist by offering research facilities to their customers,
who will specify what they want to be researched.
In the academic world, research students and their teachers want to attract funding and other forms
of support in order to pursue topics of interest and value.
Some examples: an undergraduate student in Business Studies may be told to submit a proposal for a
case study of marketing practices. ‘I propose to examine the ways in which Coca-Cola uses
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sponsorship in sporting events’, or ‘The case study I suggest is of different approaches to marketing
beers in three breweries in the People’s Republic of China’, or ‘The proposed case that I will study is of
different ways of marketing shampoo in the British market’ would all state clearly and concisely the
subject you will look at. ‘I will look at the ethics of marketing sugar-rich foods to schoolchildren’ might
be classified as inappropriate to the particular course you are studying, or outside the parameters your
teacher has laid down; but at least the description is clear enough for the teacher to disallow it – or even
allow it! (It is of course up to real students of Business Studies to come up with better examples than I
can.)
If you want to write a thesis for a PhD in History you might suggest ‘The proposed topic of research is
the development of the Labour Party in the East Riding in the first decades of the twentieth century’ (or
‘of Methodism in Hull in the eighteenth century’, or ‘the use and sale of tobacco in Britain in the
seventeenth century’; or, further afield, ‘The Portuguese Empire in the Gulf in the early sixteenth
century’). You will probably have a fair idea of what has already been written in your chosen area
before you think of doing a PhD on it. Make sure that you have chosen an area that has not already
been researched – or be sure that your research marks a development of (or an improvement on)
existing knowledge.
A research project may be based on testing a given hypothesis. This is not uncommon in the physical
and social sciences. ‘It is widely believed that reading difficulties are more common among boys than
girls. This research is designed to investigate the hypothesis that such a disparity in gender is related
to the culture of the society in which the teaching of reading is being carried out’ might be a valuable
topic in the study of Comparative Education. ‘This research will investigate the hypothesis that adding
x% of substance YY to the nutrients of the important food crop ZZ will increase the yield, as
suggested by the theoretical work of …’ could be a useful contribution to knowledge in the Life
Sciences.
A research topic can be very large, or very small. In your own subject, you will know the value of the
different scales. Chemists, I believe, can spend three years examining a particular reaction in minute
detail – to the great benefit of the scientific community. Astro-physicists might work on the amount of
matter in the Universe – there could hardly be a bigger subject. The knowledge so gained will be of
equal value to the scientific community.
It is also true that a negative result can be very disappointing. No one wants to spend three years
investigating an hypothesis that turns out to have been ill-founded. But negative results can be
valuable. If a nursing student has investigated the hypothesis that a particular routine of feeding
patients will improve recovery rates and finds that it does not, then it is useful for other nurses to
know that. It would have been wonderful if a pharmaceutical researcher had realised that
Thalidomide could cause abnormalities in the foetus before it was brought to market.1
One thing that can sap students’ confidence in their ideas is a lack of certainty in what they are
doing. This is entirely to be expected. Never forget that the purpose of real research in the ‘pure’
sense is to learn something new. Therefore you cannot know what you are going to find out. In
‘applied’ research, of course, the real duty is more often to answer the question that has been
posed. ‘Will the company benefit from adopting the new process?’ or ‘Is there a more efficient way
of making the product?’
In real life, much pure research produces outcomes that were not predicted in the proposals.
(Christopher Columbus expected to find Japan, but instead discovered a continent unknown to
Africans and Europeans.) If all research merely confirmed what was already known, there would be
much less point in society funding it; although sometimes it is necessary to do research to prove
something that is generally believed. (Before society brings in new laws of licensing video and 3
cinema material, for example, it is worth careful research into the common belief that watching violent
acts encourages the imitation of them.)
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In ‘pure’, or academic, research, don’t be too worried, therefore, if you find that during the course of
your research, your subject, emphasis, or even hypothesis changes. In applied, or practical,
research you may be much more circumscribed. If you have committed yourself to learning more
about the effects of common salt in the formulation of shampoos, you must continue to work with salt
and shampoo.
Again, remember why you are doing the research. If you are carrying out an analysis of a market to
find out why company ZZZ dominates, you cannot instead start investigating why company 123, in a
different sector, failed – however tempting it may be. But if your original aim is to look at a particular
period of history, and in your first few weeks stumble across a hitherto unpublished diary that you
and your supervisor agree is of fundamental importance, your final thesis may be an edition of the
newly found work. It might even lead to publication, and the launch of a phenomenally successful
career!
(Some ‘training’ exercises in such topics as ‘Practising Research Methods’ will produce results that
are unexpected only by the student, of course – the learning of how to do the research is personal
and individual, and still valuable to the student. The knowledge that is gained from the research may
be already well known to the teacher – indeed, the fact that s/he knows it may be the very reason
why s/he chose it for the exercise.)
1b. Writing up what you intend to find out
When you write down what you want to study, describe it as clearly and concisely as possible. If
you write at great length, you might as well write up your research and have done with it!
The nouns you use should be quite easy; but choose the verbs you use to label what you are going to
do with great care. Students in examined courses are warned to read the ‘instructions’ in exam
questions with care. Apply this knowledge to the language in which you phrase your research
proposals. You may want to analyse, describe, or investigate a phenomenon; you may want to
prove, falsify or test an hypothesis; you may want to discuss or report the present state of
progress in a debate or issue. These words are important: they are often more important than the
actual topics that you choose.
2.
Why you intend to find it out
Much of the time, it is obvious – at least to the researcher – why a given research proposal is
relevant. Nevertheless, it is worth saying so. ‘The subject given for this exercise is to investigate
the competitive strategies employed by two large companies in the same sector. I propose to
analyse Adidas and Nike, in the sports equipment sector, because they are major players whose
struggle for competitive advantage is known to everyone’ may be a sound reason.
3.
What good you hope your findings will do
Again, this may be obvious. You may have discussed this with your supervisor, or the leader of your
research team. But the writing of your proposal should mention it. This is particularly true if you are
seeking external funding.
‘This statistical research should identify the extent to which the absorption of pharmaceuticals XX
and ZZ varies with the intake of food. It should develop a more efficient and cost-effective regime on
the ward.’ ‘The analysis of Larkin’s poetry from this standpoint should deepen our awareness of
certain aspects of his work, and suggest ways of analysing other poets.’ ‘The proposed development
of new formats for handling data storage should allow a quicker and more economical handling of
large amounts of non-numerical data.’ ‘This analysis should lead to greater control of the use of IT
systems in industry.’
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4.
How you intend to go about finding it out
Here is the opportunity for many students to deploy the skills they have been taught. In the social
sciences, there are often key decisions to be made about whether the focus will be on qualitative or
quantitative research, and how the relevant data will be collected. In the physical sciences, there
may well be a tentative description of the experiments that will be carried out – tentative, because
the design of an experiment is often changed with the practical experience of trying out in the
laboratory what looks fine in theory. In the Arts – and all academic subjects, to some extent – the key
research tool is the written word, whether in the Library or in some electronic form on the Internet.
Here, proposers of research should indicate where they will seek the knowledge. Again, over the
research period, the details may change. An historian may want to look in a certain archive, or
collection of papers; on inspection, it may prove very disappointing. So the final product of the
research may actually concentrate on quite a different archive. That is normal. If you know exactly
what is in the archive before you start researching, what is the point? It is hardly research any longer.
In this part of your proposal, you may consider sketching a ‘Literature Review’, to give an outline map
of what is already known in the area in which you are interested – at least the part of it that you know.
See the Study Advice Service leaflet on the web at www.hull.ac.uk/studyadvice. (This may form the
basis of the Bibliography of your finished work. You might consider using a semi-automatic computer
program, for example EndNote 6, to store bibliographical information throughout your research.)
5.
How much time, funding or other expenses this will take
This is your opportunity to explain what you need, and with any luck to be given the means to do what
you want. You may want to obtain travel expenses to go to see a collection of papers in another city;
you may need access to some expensive equipment in the laboratory; you may need a particular set
of software development tools. Or you may simply need to apply for financial support to enable you to
undertake the research for a two- or three-year research degree. In the commercial world, your
overheads may include the (expensive) subscriptions payable for the use of highly developed on-line
resources.
If your research is likely to involve you – or your sponsor – in any expense out of the ordinary, you
should be sure to mention it at the proposal stage. You don’t want to make a loss; your sponsor
does not want to find a bill that has never been planned for.
Finally,
6.
… and any other details that are relevant
This is your opportunity to ask yourself what have you not written that your reader would want to
know. This may include issues of:
ethics: are your enquiries within the bounds of what your profession allows? Have the
relevant permissions been obtained, for example for drugs trials? (In some subject areas
this may not be important. In others, such as medical subjects and some criminological
topics, it is absolutely necessary to get it right.)
confidentiality: is the right to privacy adequately protected? Is commercially sensitive
information safe from those who have no right to see it? Is copyright properly respected?
the degree of confidence that you anticipate may be placed in your findings. Not all
research gives definite answers. You cannot recommend any course of action without
some risk. What are the risks inherent in the sort of work you are proposing to do?
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other research: you may be aware of similar research, maybe among your colleagues
in a team or Department which may be very helpful to you – and to which you may
contribute – or among ‘competitors’.
There are many details which might come up here. Whether or not they should be included is, as in
so much writing, a question of judgement and balance. Here is where discussion in your
Department, with your supervisor or other academics whose interests are close to your own, or with
classmates (in the ‘real world’, your colleagues), can be very valuable.
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There are claims that some research was done but ignored; these claims have not apparently been substantiated.
All web addresses in this leaflet were correct at the time of publication
The information in this leaflet can be made available in an alternative
format on request. Telephone 01482 466199.
©
11/2007
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