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Blank receipt book for Research and Development

Narrator: Have a looming deadline for a major research project? Whether you’re an undergrad writing your first paper, or an established author with multiple publications, navigating the research ecosystem can be daunting. That’s why the Libraries at Columbia University have created "From Books to Bytes: Navigating the Research Ecosystem" a set of online resources that: define the research cycle, provide you with practical strategies, and guide you through the vast resources available to you at Columbia. The stages of the research cycle recommend that you: plan, explore, manage, draft, preserve and share your work. These stages are not necessarily linear, but they are all connected and all necessary to produce your best research work. Develop a Research Strategy. Because the research process is often non-linear, it can be hard to know where to begin. At Columbia, we recommend you Develop a Research Strategy whereby you: Develop a research question, create a project timeline, identify appropriate resources, and draft an outline. When you’re ready to develop a research question, it should be a question that you feel motivated to unpack, one that will keep you intellectually stimulated throughout the length of your project. Beware though: you don't want your question to be either too narrow or too broad. If it's too narrow, there won’t be enough resources to consult, and if it's too broad, you will never have the time to complete it. Take for example this question: What impact does social media have on society? As interesting as this may sound, it’s too broad. Why? Because first, you have to decide which impact you are trying to address. Is it social? Emotional? Political? Second, which social media platform are you exploring? Twitter? Instagram? Facebook? To narrow down your focus, consider for example demographics, geography, and the specific type of social media on which you’d like to focus. Here’s what that research question could look like: What is the impact of retweeting on pre-teens’ feelings of validation and self-worth in North America? By introducing a demographic of “pre-teens”, the geographic region of “North America”, the social media platform, “twitter” and the emotional impact of “validation and self worth”, this question has become more focused and manageable to answer. Practice conducting pre-research to narrow down your research question. Pre-research involves learning more about your topic of interest and gathering background information from various resources, including encyclopedias, dictionaries, or wikis. An internet search, and yes, even a wikipedia article can be a good place to start gathering background information. The insight you gain from these resources may be the initial steps to composing the research question right for you. Create a Project Timeline. Every research project has a deadline. Creating a project timeline helps alleviate some of the pressure. Try marking your submission date on a calendar. Then, work backwards and be honest with yourself about how long each task will take. When it comes to time management, pay attention to your assignment requirements and research goal. The driving force behind your research strategy is YOU. Identify Appropriate Resources. To conduct your research, try consulting a variety of credible sources that are appropriate for your research question. Take time to critically evaluate each source, and reflect on its application to your research. You will be expected by your professors and the academic community to draw information from scholarly sources. Often in academic research, sources are broken down into the following categories: Primary, Secondary, and Tertiary Sources. Keep in mind that some instructors might describe these sources using different terms such as background or theoretical sources, based on their function in your research project. Primary Sources can be defined slightly different in each discipline, but always contain original information. In the humanities, they are often first-hand accounts of specific events or historic periods. These sources can include correspondence, novels, music, photographs, speeches, and artifacts. In the sciences, they are often raw and experimental data. These include: lab results, research data, graphs and surveys. Primary Sources allow you to critique an original work through unfiltered eyes. For example, in the humanities, you can analyze a poem by Emily Dickinson as your primary source and extract common themes, relying only on close reading, your personal knowledge, and experience with language, unaided by any external resources. Secondary Sources offer interpretations, critiques, analyses, and commentaries. These can include: papers that discuss the results of other articles with original research data, books that offer an in-depth examination of a topic or field, magazine articles that critique an artwork, or newspaper articles that analyze or discuss events or ideas. Secondary sources expand your awareness of the various perspectives on a specific topic. For example, you could look at how Emily Dickinson’s critics have interpreted her tone and style of writing. Tertiary Sources offer summaries or distillations of a topic. These include encyclopedias, dictionaries, and handbooks. Tertiary sources help you understand a topic without delving deeply into its intricacies. For example, if you need to understand how an ellipsis works as a literary device in an Emily Dickinson poem, using a literary handbook helps you identify and recognize an ellipsis’ impact on the poem’s tone and overall message. As researchers, we’re ethically obligated to present our research fairly and accurately. Citing a number of high quality sources demonstrates the depth of your research and knowledge in a specific topic. Citing also highlights your respect for other scholars and acknowledges their ideas and hard work. Draft an Outline. From the research and notes you’ve gathered, start to develop a unique argument by drafting an outline. Try including this activity as a target goal in your project timeline. Drafting an outline will help you position your argument and insert your ideas within the scholarship. It will also illuminate areas in your argument where you might need more sources to prove your point, resulting in a better informed research paper. There is no one size fits all formula for drafting an outline or even drafting your final paper. What's most important is that you develop the right method for YOU. For additional support in drafting and writing your research papers, please reach out to the Columbia Writing Center, where you will have access to experts and resources that can help you with your academic writing journey. We hope this video has offered some insight into the research cycle and how best to Develop a Research Strategy. We encourage you to familiarize yourself with the other videos and resources in the From Books to Bytes series, as they all delve deeper into the resources available to you at the Columbia University Libraries. And remember, you can always consult with your subject librarian and visit our Ask a Librarian service on the Columbia Libraries website.