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Overview: An Introduction to Research Processes

This guide provides an introduction to research writing.

Choosing Your Topic

Often, although not always, your instructor will allow you to choose the topic for your research writing assignment. This kind of freedom comes with a price, however. If you don’t spend time thinking carefully about topics you’d like to research, you may end up deciding midway through your research project that you’ve chosen the wrong topic. It may be too broad; it may be too narrow; it may be impossible to locate useful sources for your project.

It’s usually best to select a topic that interests you and, ideally, your audience. To generate ideas for a research writing assignment, consider the following questions:

Conducting a Preliminary Search

Before you commit yourself to a topic, conduct a preliminary search. A preliminary search is ideal for getting a good overview of a topic. It can also help you begin narrowing your topic by helping you learn which aspects of a particular topic you find most interesting.

You might start a preliminary search by looking up your topic in an encyclopedia and reading the general articles about it. Then you might visit your library's reference room and check the Readers' Guide to Periodical Literature, an index of recent articles in popular magazines. It will direct you to the latest information and opinion, classified by many subjects. You can also look in a newspaper index such as NewsBank, a computerized index now available in many libraries. Browsing in an introductory textbook, if any seems likely to help, is also a useful early step.

You can spend time on the Internet, visiting sites on the World Wide Web and reading messages posted to newsgroups or Web discussion forums. Searches on some of the leading Web search sites, such as AltaVista, Excite, Lycos, Google, and Yahoo, can lead to you a wide range of Web pages that might be of interest to you. Similarly, searches of the Deja News and Liszt Web sites can help you locate newsgroups and mailing lists that deal with your topic. The number of sources you can locate on the Internet is large — and growing on a daily basis — so you'll need to exercise discipline when it comes to spending time online, especially in this early research stage. Depending on your topic, however, it can be time well spent.

Finally, consider discussing your topic with an expert in the field. If you're interested in a topic such as gun control legislation, consider meeting with a professor, such as a political scientist or a sociologist, who specializes in the area. Or talk with friends or acquaintances who are particularly passionate about the issue. Or spend time at a gun show talking with the people who attend.

Narrowing Your Topic

Many writers of research papers begin with a general topic and try to learn everything they can about it. They quickly learn that it’s best to work with a "narrow" topic – that is, one that you can address in a limited number of pages. Rather than writing about the general topic of gun control, for instance, you might choose to write about the impact of a particular piece of gun control legislation, such as the Brady Bill, on a specific group of people, such as police officers.

A preliminary search can be the first step in narrowing your topic. It can help you learn about information resources available on your general topic. It can also help you learn more about which aspects of your topic interest you the most. After searching on the general topic of gun control, for instance, you might find out which periodicals, books, and Web sites can provide you with useful information about the topic. You might also find yourself most interested in particular aspects of the gun control issue, such as pending legislation, effectiveness in crime prevention, or the activities of specific organizations campaigning on each side of the issue.

Once you’ve narrowed your topic, you can move to the next step in research writing: defining a research question.

Defining a Research Question

Once you’ve narrowed your research topic, you can ask a definite question. Having begun with a broad, general interest in, for instance, social problems in large cities, you might ask, "What happens to teenage runaways on the streets of Manhattan?" Or, if you started with a general interest in contemporary architecture, a definite question might be "Who in America today is good at designing sports arenas?" Keep in mind that the question you ask should be debatable and of interest to both you and your readers.

Brainstorming

A brainstorming session can help you define your research question. For fifteen or twenty minutes, let your thoughts revolve, and jot down whatever questions come to mind — even useless ones. Then, looking over your list, you may find one that appears promising. Remember not to edit your ideas during the brainstorming session. Save your evaluation skills for later.

Sizing Up Your Question

A workable question has to be narrow enough to allow a fruitful investigation in the library, on the Internet, and/or in the field. Many interesting questions are too immense — the research they would require would take years, not the few weeks you have available: "How is the climate of the earth changing?" "Who are the world's best living storytellers?" "Why does poverty exist?" "What's going on in outer space?" As you consider your question, think carefully about whether it is one that you could answer within your time and length constraints.

You should also consider whether your question is too narrow. If you restrict your topic too far ("How did John F. Kennedy's maternal grandfather influence the decisions he made during his first month as president?"), it may be impossible to find relevant sources.

A question may also be so narrow that it becomes uninteresting — avoid questions that can be answered with a simple yes or no or by stating a few statistics ("Are there more black students or white students in the freshman class this year?"). If a mere source or two could answer your research question, the resulting paper will be a thin summary, not a true research paper. Instead, ask a question that will lead you into the heart of a lively controversy: "How does the ratio of black students to white students affect campus relations?" The best research questions are those about issues that other people take seriously and spend time arguing about. Not only will you find better sources if you focus on a significant, debatable issue, but your paper is more likely to be of real interest to both you and your readers.

Honing Your Question

When you have tentatively stated your question, you can hone it by asking several questions about it:

Developing a Working Bibliography

After you’ve defined your research question, you should begin compiling a working bibliography, a detailed list of books and articles you plan to consult. Your working bibliography is a tool that will change and grow as you find new sources, eliminate others, and shift the focus of your research. It has two purposes:

Your preliminary search should have given you a good rough notion of where your most promising material lies. Now you need titles and other publication information.

Recording Publication Information

Many writers find that a convenient and efficient way to compile such a working bibliography is on 4-by-6-inch note cards, one source to a card. Cards are handy to work with: you can arrange and shuffle them. Other writers keep track of everything in a notebook small enough to fit in a pocket. Still others use a word processing program or a computer database to keep track of bibliographical information. Whatever method you use, the more care you take in recording your tentative sources, the more time you'll save later, when at the end of your paper you compile a list of works you actually used and cited. At that point, you'll be grateful to find all the necessary information about titles, authors, dates, and page numbers or URLs (Internet addresses) at your fingertips. Otherwise, you'll have to make a frantic, time-consuming trip back to the library or onto the Internet.

Creating Source Notes for Books

Include the following for books so that you can find the source later as well as to write the final list of sources to be placed at the end of your paper:

For each source note, you may also want to include a brief annotation to yourself on your impression of the usefulness of the work — "GREAT INFO!" or "Maybe a few gems here" or "Probably not much use."

Creating Source Notes for Periodicals

Include the following for periodicals so that you can find the source later as well as to write the final list of sources to be placed at the end of your paper:

For periodicals, your source note does not need the library call number, but if your library classifies periodicals, the call number will be useful. You may also want to include a brief annotation to yourself on your impression of the usefulness of the work — "Worth checking out in more detail" or "Take a look at the works cited page" or "Marginal at best."

Creating Source Notes for Electronic Sources

Include the following for electronic sources, such as entries in the databases in your library, sites on the World Wide Web or on Gopher, or messages posted to a newsgroup or mailing list, so that you can find the source later as well as to write the final list of sources to be placed at the end of your paper:

For each source note, you may also want to include a brief annotation to yourself on your impression of the usefulness of the work — "Use in the introduction" or "Best I've seen yet" or "Use only if other sources don't work out."

Creating Source Notes for Field Sources

Include the following for field sources, such as interviews or observations, so that you can find the source later as well as to write the final list of sources to be placed at the end of your paper:

For each source note, you may also want to include a brief annotation to yourself on your impression of the usefulness of the work — "The first half of this is perfect" or "Best interview yet!" or "A great source of info."

Citing Your Sources

You can choose to list information on a source note in virtually any format. However, you can save time in the long run by using the citation format you need to use for your final paper. This may seem like a lot of record keeping. But it will save time when you need to compile your works cited list.

Finding Sources in a Library

The emergence of the World Wide Web as a major source of information has given libraries something of a rival as the premiere repository of information, but libraries continue to be your best source of information for most topics. The information in libraries is carefully reviewed for accuracy and importance. Each book, journal, magazine, newspaper, government document, and so on is catalogued and its location recorded. And you’ll find that a growing amount of information -- as well as tools for locating information -- is available in electronic formats.

Asking Questions about Your Library

Before you start looking for sources for your paper, it pays to do a little research on the library itself. These basic questions about your library can start you off.

Using Your Library Catalog

A library catalog provides information about the books, periodicals, videos, databases, and other materials owned by a library. In the past, library catalogs were kept on cards in wooden drawers. Today, it is common for the records to be searchable by computer. Regardless of the form of access, the function is the same: to describe the materials owned by the library so that you can locate them by author, title, or subject. To read more about the role library catalogs can play in your research, view our unit on Using Library Catalogs.

Using Reference Materials

The reference collection in most libraries contains an amazing array of resources. It can be both a good place to start a project, where you can quickly familiarize yourself with a topic, and a place to fine-tune your research by filling in the details of definitions, dates, statistics, or facts.

Certain basic reference books are worth knowing about for almost any research project. This brief introduction can get you started exploring the reference shelves.

Encyclopedias

Back in high school when you had to do a research paper, chances are you went straight to an encyclopedia. An encyclopedia can still help you get an overview of your subject and may be especially valuable when you are first casting around for a topic. But when you start investigating more deeply, you will need to go to other sources as well.

General encyclopedias, such as the New Encyclopaedia Britannica and the Encyclopedia Americana, are written for readers who aren't specialists, who want an overview of a topic, or who want some fact they are missing. Encyclopedias generally have an index volume and cross-references to help you find what you need to know.

Specialized encyclopedias cover a field of study in much greater depth than general encyclopedias do. You might want to supplement your background reading by consulting one of these works, which often have useful bibliographies of related sources. A sampling of titles includes:

Dictionaries

In addition to desk dictionaries like those most college students own, libraries have a variety of large and specialized dictionaries. You'll find dictionaries covering foreign languages, abbreviations, slang, and regionalisms as well as dictionaries for the specialized terminology in a particular field, such as Black's Law Dictionary, Stedman's Medical Dictionary, or the Oxford Dictionary of Natural History. Libraries often have unabridged dictionaries available on dictionary stands, where you can find the most obscure words currently in use and learn what they mean as well as how to pronounce them.

The largest dictionary in any language is the monumental Oxford English Dictionary (OED), now in its second edition. It fills a shelf or more, having twenty volumes in all, and is available in some libraries in a computerized version. It is primarily a historical dictionary that not only defines each word but tells how the word was used from its earliest appearance in the language to the present and gives many examples of its use through history.

Handbooks and Companions

Between dictionaries and encyclopedias lies a species of reference book in which you will find concise surveys of terms and topics relating to a specific subject. The articles are generally longer than dictionary entries but more concise than those found in encyclopedias. Handbooks and companions can be a great help in clearing up the questions that a research project can generate. What is fabianism? What is the novel Bleak House about? What films have been made about angels? Which animals practice mimicry as a defense mechanism? Check with a reference librarian to see if there are specialized handbooks for your topic. The following list gives an idea of the variety of handbooks and companions that may be available in your library:

Statistical Sources

For some research, numbers are an essential type of evidence. Many sources for statistics are available in the library. Perhaps the most useful single compilation is the Statistical Abstract of the United States, a small volume that contains hundreds of tables of numbers relating to population, social issues, economics, and so on. For public opinion statistics, consult the surveys conducted by the Gallup Poll, published in annual volumes and in a monthly magazine format. The federal government collects an extraordinary amount of statistical data and has recently been releasing much of the data on the World Wide Web at http://www.census.gov. If you need more detailed statistics than those available in the Statistical Abstract, see if your library has the U.S. Census of Population and Housing or USA Counties on CD-ROM. Two other popular sources of statistical information, especially for economic topics, are the National Trade Data Bank and the National Economic Social and Environmental Data Bank, put out by the Commerce Department, also on CD-ROM.

Atlases and Gazetteers

If your research has a geographical angle, maps and atlases may come into play. In addition to atlases of countries, regions, and the world, there are atlases that cover history, natural resources, ethnic groups, and many other special topics. Gazetteers list place names and give basic information about them, including their location. The Columbia Lippincott Gazetteer of the World is one published gazetteer of note. The Geographic Name Server on the Internet (http://www.census.gov/cgi-bin/gazetteer) gives the precise latitude and longitude of places that you can search for by name.

Biographical Sources

If you want to know about someone's life and work, libraries provide a rich array of sources. Directories that list basic information — degrees, work history, honors, address — for prominent people include Who's Who in the United States, Who's Who in Politics, and American Men and Women of Science. For more detailed biographical sketches, try Contemporary Biography, Contemporary Authors, or Politics in America for elected officials. Several biographical sources contain substantial entries of people who have died: prominent Americans are covered in The Dictionary of American Biography, British figures in The Dictionary of National Biography, and scientists from all countries and periods in The Dictionary of Scientific Biography. To help you locate biographical sources, you can use tools such as Biography Index and the Biographical and Genealogical Master Index.

Using Periodical Indexes and Bibliographies

Sometimes writers head straight to the catalog and try to find all of their research sources there. Frequently they are disappointed — the books are too old, or there is nothing listed on their specific topic. If this happens to you, you may be looking in the wrong place. Often there is more information on certain topics — particularly current ones — published in the form of periodicals than in books. Periodicals are journals, magazines, newspapers, and other publications that are issued at regular intervals. Several indexes – print and electronic – exist to help you track down articles in periodicals. Another option is to use a bibliography (a list of sources on a particular topic) to lead you to relevant sources. Often you will find sources in bibliographies that you would never have thought to look up in a catalog.

Periodical Indexes

An index is a guide to the material published within other works, sometimes within books but more often within periodicals. In a periodical index, you'll find every article for the periodicals and the period covered, listed alphabetically by author, title, and subject. The index will also include the source information you'll need to find each article, usually the periodical title, issue number, and page numbers. Indexes are available in print and in electronic form. Electronic indexes – often referred to as periodical databases – usually include more information on each article than an index does, such as a short summary. To read more about electronic indexes, view our unit on Databases and Electronic Indexes.

Bibliographies

A useful way to find good research sources is to take advantage of the research other people have already done on your subject. Bibliographies are lists of sources on particular topics. Researchers compile them after completing their research, and they publish them so that other researchers (including you) won't have to duplicate their work. Bibliographies can give citations for a wide variety of materials — including not only books and articles but also films, manuscripts, letters, government documents, and pamphlets — and they will probably lead you to sources that you wouldn't otherwise find. Remember, though, that a bibliography is not a specialized version of your library catalog — not all of the sources will be available in your library or even available through interlibrary loan.

Sometimes you may be able to locate a book-length bibliography on your subject. For example, Essential Shakespeare is a bibliography that lists the best books and articles published on each of Shakespeare's works, a wonderful shortcut if you're looking for worthwhile criticism. To find a book-length bibliography in a computerized library, add the word "bibliography" to a subject or keyword search. If you're lucky, such a bibliography will include annotations that describe and evaluate each source.

If there aren't any book-length bibliographies devoted to your subject, you can still take advantage of the work that other researchers have done. Every time you find a good book or article, look to see what sources the author draws on; chances are, at least some of these sources will be useful to you, too. An author may record his or her source information in several different places and formats. A full-length book may have a section labeled "Bibliography" at the back, or perhaps a section called "For Further Reading." If the author has quoted or referred to other works, there should be a list called "References" or "Works Cited" at the end. If the book or article uses footnotes or endnotes, be sure to check those too for possible leads.

Using Microform Reference Resources

Most libraries have some of their resources available on microfilm or microfiche. This technology puts a large amount of printed material — for example, two weeks of the New York Times — on a durable strip of film that fits into a small box or on a set of plastic sheets the size of index cards. Machines are used to read microfilm or microfiche and in many cases full-sized copies of pages can be printed out.

In addition to newspapers and magazines, many libraries have other primary source material in microform format. For example, the American Culture Series reproduces books and pamphlets published between 1493 and 1875 and includes a good subject index. It is one tool for examining colonial-era religious tracts or nineteenth-century abolitionist pamphlets without having to travel to a museum or rare books collection. The American Women's Diaries collection reproduces diaries kept by women living in New England and the South and pioneer women traveling west and provides rare firsthand glimpses of the past.

Using Government Documents

The federal government is the most prolific publisher in the world and, in an effort to make information accessible to citizens all over the country, libraries in many locations serve as depositories for government publications. That is, they are sent a multitude of government publications and, in turn, make them available to the surrounding community. If your college library isn't a depository, there may be one nearby that serves that role. Large libraries often have collections of local and international documents as well. In addition, an increasing number of government documents are available via the World Wide Web.

When most people think of government documents they think of political information — congressional hearings, presidential papers, and reports from federal agencies — but government documents are not limited to governmental matters. In fact, the government has published something on practically any topic you can think of. The following sampling of government publication titles will give you an idea of what kinds of information you can find.

There are several indexes to government documents, and some are computerized. Among them are the Monthly Catalog of United States Government Documents, the most complete index to federal documents, the CIS Index, which specializes in congressional documents and includes a handy legislative history index, and the American Statistical Index, a detailed index to statistics in government publications. Some large series, like the Congressional Record, which reports what happens in Congress each day during each session, have indexes of their own.

Many government publications are now being released on CD-ROM. These make information, particularly statistical data, easier to find than ever before. You can print out a detailed population profile of your hometown, including age groups, income, education level, and ethnic origins, using the Census on CD-ROM. You can find Country Reports on Human Rights Practices, U.S. Industrial Outlook, and The Year in Trade using the National Trade Data Bank (NTDB). The National Economic Social and Environmental Data Bank (NESE) covers small-business statistics, the cost of pollution abatement programs, regional and state business conditions, and a wealth of other economic data. Every year more and more databases like these are being released. If you plan to use government documents in your research, don't be shy about asking a librarian for help. The documents can be difficult to locate on the shelves, and since new computerized sources are coming out all the time, it's wise to get an expert on your side.

Using Pamphlets and Annual Reports

When journalists need information, they typically get on the phone and make contacts, going directly to sources that can fill them in. You too can get pamphlets, brochures, reports, and annual reports by calling organizations or companies directly. The Encyclopedia of Associations is a useful guide to organizations, categorized by name and subject. For government agencies, try the United States Government Manual.

Your library may have already done some of the legwork for you. Many libraries maintain a vertical file in which you can find pamphlets organized by subject. Take information from such sources with a grain of salt — annual reports tend to paint a glowing picture of the companies they cover, and organizations advocating particular points of view will not hesitate to put their information in the most persuasive terms possible.

Using Interlibrary Loan

If your library does not have some of the materials that you need for your research project, consider using interlibrary loan. Interlibrary loan allows you to obtain materials from other libraries without having to travel to them. Typically, libraries have an interlibrary loan desk where you can learn how to fill out a request form – either on paper or on a computer.

At some colleges and universities, you can make interlibrary loan requests from a computer in your home or dorm room or from a computer lab. If you've been using a library catalog at another university or college, you may have found materials there that your own library does not have. You can request those materials through interlibrary loan.

Working with Librarians

One of the most overlooked resources in the library is its staff. Librarians know the library more thoroughly than anyone else. They are constantly working with its catalog, reference books, and databases. They are aware of new additions to the library's collections, sometimes even before those materials are entered into the catalog. In many larger libraries, you'll find librarians whose sole responsibility is to work in a particular part of the library, such as the social sciences reference desk or the government documents section. If you need help locating materials, want to learn how to use a particular database, or simply want to know how to use the library catalog, consult a librarian. They are the most valuable resource available to you.

Finding Sources on the Internet

What is the Internet

The Internet — a network of computers connected by telephone lines, high speed fiber-optic networks, microwave relays, and satellite links — was developed by the United States government to maintain communication across the nation in the case of a national emergency, such as a nuclear war or widespread natural disasters. For many years, its primary users were government officials, scientists in colleges and universities, and the military. Over the past decade, however, the Internet has become an increasingly important part of daily life. Today, people use the Internet to send electronic mail to relatives, friends, and coworkers, to learn about and purchase goods and services, to keep up with the latest news in a variety of fields, and to participate in online communities that cross state and national boundaries.

The Internet contains a startling amount of information — startling not only because of the amount that is available, but also because that amount is growing so rapidly. The number of sites on the World Wide Web alone is growing at a phenomenal rate, with most sites containing dozens, hundreds, thousands, and in some rare cases hundreds of thousands of pages of information. And the World Wide Web is only part of the Internet. You can find information in tens of thousands of newsgroups and mailing lists. You can search for information using Gopher, an information distribution system that predates the World Wide Web. And you can use the Internet to interact with other people via electronic mail and real-time discussions.

Unfortunately, because of the shear bulk of information on the Internet, searching for material that is relevant to your topic can be both too easy and too difficult. Searches of the Yahoo World Wide Web search site for the keywords "zel" and "miffle," for instance, produced four and nine items, respectively. It would seem that you can find almost anything you want on the Internet, even when you're using nonsense words. On the other hand, finding information that is actually useful can be a time-consuming process, just as it is in library and field research. And just as in those two forms of research, it helps a great deal if you understand a few basic principles.

Users of the Internet should be aware that most information on it is not subject to the careful review that is typical of most information available through your library. That said, you can still find a great deal of useful information on the Internet. The key issues are knowing where and how to look for information, and how to evaluate it once you've found it.

Researching the World Wide Web

Many people think of the World Wide Web and the Internet as the same thing. But the Web is actually only part of the Internet. The World Wide Web is a collection of electronic documents, or "pages," that can be viewed on your computer using a Web browser, such as Netscape Navigator or Microsoft Internet Explorer. Pages on the Web are linked to each other, allowing you to move from one page to another, or "browse" the Web.

Researching Newsgroups and Mailing Lists

Newsgroups and mailing lists are among the oldest forms of communication on the Internet. Their goal is similar: to support discussions of particular topics, such as adult education or immigration, among people connected to the Internet. Newsgroups achieve this goal by collecting messages sent by individuals and posting them to a particular site. To read these messages, you can use a software program called a newsgroup reader (which is often built into a Web browser), which lists the messages on newsgroups and allows you to read them. Mailing lists use a different strategy. Rather than collecting each message and displaying it in a central location, each message is sent as an electronic mail message to every member of the list.

Researching Online Document Collections

One of the most useful forms of information on the Internet is the online document collection. Online document collections contain electronic versions of printed texts, often classic texts on which the copyright has expired. Analogous to libraries, online document collections are growing in number and scope.

Researching Chat and MOOs

One of the most intriguing sources of information on the Internet — but also among the most confusing — is real-time communication. Two of the most common forms of real-time communication on the Internet are Chat and MOOs. Chat programs allow you to type messages to other people and to record your conversations for later review. MOOs (and the related MUDs and MUSHes) are similar to Chat rooms, but use architectural metaphors to organize discussions. When you enter a room in a MOO, for instance, you can receive a detailed description of the room and its inhabitants.

Researching Gopher

The World Wide Web makes it easy to view formatted text, full-color graphics, audio, and video on your computer, regardless of where the document is located on the Internet. But the Web is a relatively recent development in the history of the Internet. Before the Web was developed, the easiest way to view information on the Internet was through a system called Gopher, which allows you to read unformatted (or plain) text documents on computers connected to the Internet. Although the Web has eclipsed Gopher as the method of choice for viewing information on the Internet, you can still find a great deal of useful information only on Gopher.

Finding Sources in the Field

Conducting field work is an important way to collect information. If you enjoy meeting and talking with people and don't mind what news reporters call "legwork," you will relish the fun and satisfaction of obtaining ideas and information at first hand. Perhaps you will even investigate matters that few researchers have investigated before. Many rich, unprinted sources of ideas and information lie beyond the library and the Internet. To read more about conducting field research, click on the items below:

Combining Field Research with Library and Internet Research

The goal of field research is the same as that of library and Internet research: to gather the information you need to answer your research question and to marshal the evidence you need to present your conclusions persuasively in your research paper. The only difference is where you conduct the research. Far from being at odds with one another — either philosophically or practically — the three research techniques complement one another. In most cases, an assignment that calls for field research will also benefit from library and Internet research. You can use the library and the Internet as sources of background information that can help you prepare for going out into the field. You can also use library and Internet research to follow up on a hunch you develop through field research. Similarly, field research can be used to extend and support research conducted in the library and on the Internet. After reading information, for instance, you can enrich your understanding of an issue by conducting personal observation or interviews.

Observing

A visit to observe at first hand may well be essential in field research. Before conducting an observation, find out if you will need permission to visit a site. If you decide to observe a setting such as a private business or a school, you will need to make an appointment. As soon as you arrive, identify yourself and your business. Some receptionists will insist on identification. You might ask your instructor for a statement on college letterhead declaring that you are a bona fide student doing field research. Follow-up field trips may be necessary if, while you are writing, you find gaps in your research or if new ideas occur that you'll need to test by further observation.

You will want to take notes while conducting an observational visit, lest you forget any important details when it comes time to incorporate your ideas into your paper. In addition to jotting down any interesting facts you learn, record any telling details or sensory impressions.

You may also want to consider using a still camera or a videocamera. Even if you are only an amateur photographer, taking pictures in the field may greatly advance your research. Some photographs may serve as illustrations to include in your paper; others may help you remember details while you write. One student of architecture, making a survey of the best-designed buildings in her city, carried a 35mm camera and photographed each building she intended to describe. A student of sociology, looking into methods used to manage large crowds, found it effective to carry a videocamera to a football game. Later, watching a few crowd scenes in slow motion, he felt better able to write lively and accurate accounts of how police and stadium guards performed their jobs.

Interviewing

People in all walks of life are often willing, sometimes even eager, to talk to a college student writing a research paper. Many, you may find, will seem flattered by your attention. Interviews — conversations with a purpose — may prove to be your main source of material. Choose your interview subjects carefully. Whenever possible, try to arrange an interview with an expert in the field you are researching. Or if you are researching a particular group of people, interview a typical member of the group, someone who may or may not have any special knowledge of the field but is representative of the group.

Regardless of who you interview, preparation is central to conducting a good interview. Chapter 4 of the Bedford Guide to Writing, "Writing from Conversation," offers advice that may come in handy here:

In an interview, be sure to take notes so that later, when you reconstruct events in your paper, your memory of the interview will be accurate. Even if you use a tape recorder, you should take notes. This will allow you to distill the most important information as you interview. In addition to recording important points and quotations, you should record any telling details that might prove useful later — the interviewee's appearance, the setting, the mood, any notable gestures. All of these details will be useful as you work with your sources to write the paper.

For ease of note taking, we suggest you use a small journalistic notebook with a spiral at the top. Because you will be conducting an interview at the same time you're taking notes, use abbreviations as you take notes. At the end of the interview be sure to confirm all direct quotations.

If you can't talk to an expert in person, your next best resource may be a telephone interview. Make a phone appointment for a time convenient for both you and your interviewee. A busy person whom you call during a working day may not be able to give you a half hour of conversation on the spur of a moment, and it is polite to ask for a time when you may call again. You will waste the person's time (and yours) if you try to wing your interview; have written questions in hand before you dial. Take notes.

Federal regulations, by the way, forbid recording an interview over the phone without notifying the person who is talking that you are recording his or her remarks and without using a recorder connector with a warning device that emits a beep signal every fifteen seconds.

Conducting Surveys

Surveys and questionnaires are part of contemporary life. Many people, in our experience, enjoy having their knowledge tapped or their opinion solicited. Indeed, filling out a questionnaire has a gamelike appeal, as you can tell from the frequency with which self-quiz features appear in popular magazines and tabloid newspapers: "How Ambitious Are You?" followed by a thirty-question quiz to score yourself. You may have responded to one in People or Glamour magazine.

Used judicioulsy, and with the following points in mind, you may find it useful to conduct a small survey:

Understand Survey Basics

As a rule, when researching a particular question, professional pollsters, opinion testers, and survey takers survey thousands of individuals, chosen to represent a certain segment of society or perhaps a broad range of the populace (diversified in geography, income, ethnic background, and education). Their purpose may be to inform manufacturers who are test-marketing new products or trying to identify a new market. It may be to help a politician in planning a campaign. Questionnaires are widely used because they deliver large stores of useful information quickly and efficiently.

Few writers of research papers conduct such extensive surveys. As a result, you may find it best to avoid using statistics to report the results of your survey. It's one thing to say that "many of the students" who filled out a questionnaire on reading habits hadn't read a newspaper in the past month; it's another to claim that this is true of seventy-two percent of the student population at your school — especially when you gave questionnaires to only the twenty-two percent who attended the dining hall the day you were there and when half of those people just threw their questionnaires in the trash bins. A far more useful and reliable way for you to use questionnaires is to treat them as group interviews: assume that the information you collect from them is representative, use them to build your overall knowledge of the subject, and cull them for interesting or persuasive details or quotations. Use a questionnaire when you want to collect the same type of information from a large number of people, when you're more interested in what a group thinks as a whole than in what a particular individual has to say, or when an interview that would cover all the questions you're interested in is impossible or impractical.

Know Your Purpose

If you think you want to use a survey to gather information for your paper, ask yourself: What am I trying to discover with this questionnaire? You will want to define the purpose of your questionnaire and then thoughtfully invent questions to fulfill it. If, for instance, you want to know how effective a day-care center is in the eyes of working mothers who entrust their children to it, you might ask questions like these: "Do your children report that they are happy there?" "Have you ever had reason to complain? If so, about what?"

Keep It Simple

Any questionnaire you design has to be one that people are willing to answer. The main point to remember in writing a questionnaire is to make it easy and inviting to fill out. If you make it too complex and time-consuming, the recipient will throw it away. Ask questions that call for a check mark in a list of alternative answers, a simple yes or no, or one word or a few words. Ask yourself as you write each question what information you want to acquire with the question. Then read it over to be sure that it is not ambiguous and will elicit the response you are looking for. It's a good idea to ask for just one piece of information per question.

Ask Open Questions When Appropriate

In addition to simple yes/no questions and multiple-choice questions, you might find it worth while to add to your questionnaire some "open questions," questions that call for short written responses. Although responses to these questions will be difficult to tally and you are likely to get a smaller number responding, the answers might supply you with something worth quoting or might suggest ideas for you to consider when you mull over the findings.

Avoid Slanted Questions

Write unbiased questions that will solicit factual responses. Do not ask, "How religious are you?" Instead ask, "What is your religious affiliation?" and "How often do you attend religious services?" From the responses to the latter two questions, you could report actual numbers and draw logical inferences about the respondents.

Make It Easy for People to Respond

Whenever possible, distribute your questionnaire to your interviewees at the end of your discussion. If not, assemble a group of people (at, say, an evening coffee for parents of children in a day-care center) and have them fill out your questionnaire on the spot. Facing the group, you can explain the purpose of your research, and to enlist their confidence you can invite questions and answer them. If you must mail your questionnaire to people, include a concise letter or note explaining what you are trying to do and what use you will make of the replies. You might say, "This questionnaire should take no more than ten minutes of your time to complete" or give some such estimate that will make the task look reasonable. To make it easy for the respondents, provide each with a stamped, self-addressed envelope. Some professional questioners offer a morsel of bait: a small check or a coupon good for a free jar of pickles. You might promise a copy of your finished paper or article, a brief report of the results, or a listing of each respondent's name in an acknowledgment.

Even with such enticements, professional poll takers and opinion testers find an acceptable response rate of fifty percent or higher difficult to achieve. That is why they often conduct surveys by telephone, with the phone caller filling in the questionnaire for the respondent. You might also use this technique, but better results will come if you distribute your questionnaire in person.

Tally Your Responses

When you get back all your questionnaires, sit down and tally the results. It is easy enough to count short answers ("Republican," "Democrat"), but longer answers to open questions ("What is your goal in life?") will need to be summed up in paraphrase and then sorted into rough categories ("To grow rich," "To serve humanity," "To travel," "To save my soul"). By this means, you can count similar replies and accurately measure the extent of a pattern of responses.

Corresponding

Is there a person whose knowledge or opinions you need but who lives too far away to interview? Write him or her a letter or send an electronic mail message. Make it short and polite. If you're sending a letter, include your questionnaire or ask a few pointed questions, and enclose a stamped, self-addressed envelope for a reply. If you're sending an electronic mail message, insert the questions from your questionnaire into the message.

Large corporations, organizations such as the Red Cross and the National Wildlife Federation, branches of the military and the federal government, and elected officials are accustomed to getting such mail. In fact, many of them employ public relations officers whose duty is to answer you. Sometimes they will unexpectedly supply you with a bonus: free brochures, press releases, or other material that they think might interest you.

Using Television and Radio Programs, Films, and Recordings

Intriguing possibilities for writing lie in the media. For a research paper about television, radio, movies, or contemporary theater or music, you may find yourself doing original field research. Because your material lies close at hand — in the case of television, it may be yours at the click of a remote control — our only advice to you is to get plenty of it. Watch (or listen to) a large amount of it and draw conclusions. Buy a stack of videotapes and use your VCR to keep track of what you discover and to review the information later.

For easy reference, the transcript or a tape of a broadcast or telecast may be available on request (or for a small charge) from a station or network; if the end credits do not proclaim that it is available, you can write or call to inquire.

Attending Lectures, Conferences, Online Forums, and Other Public Discussions

Professionals in virtually every walk of life — and also special-interest groups — sometimes convene for a regional or national conference. Such conferences bring together health care providers, legal experts, engineers, scientists, teachers, and assorted people bound together by some mutual concern. These meetings can be fertile sources of fresh ideas.

Often such conferences are open and free to students and the public, but to gain admission to others you might have to register and pay a fee. This drawback might discourage a casual researcher, but if your grade depends on material to be discussed at the conference or if you are thinking of a possible career in that profession, you might find it worthwhile to pay the fee. To attend a professional conference and to meet and talk with speakers and fellow attendees can be an excellent way to learn the language of a discipline. You can take notes on the lectures, which are usually given by experts in the field, and thus get some firsthand live opinions. You may even be able to ask questions from the audience or corner a speaker or two later for informal talk. You might also want to record information about who attended the lecture or conference, the reaction of the audience, or any other background details that may prove useful in writing your paper.

In addition, you might obtain a copy of the proceedings of the conference — usually a set of all the lectures delivered, sometimes with accompanying commentary. (Unfortunately, many proceedings are published months or even years after a conference.)

College organizations frequently bring interesting speakers to campus — the science club might sponsor a nationally known marine biologist or the film club might bring in the producer of a successful television program. Check the schedules of events listed on bulletin boards and in your campus newspaper.

Be on the lookout, as well, for online discussions — such as the Chat sessions sponsored by Web sites such as Yahoo or CNN Online — that are relevant to your research topic (see the discussion of Chats and MOOs in our unit on Other Internet Resources). You can participate in the discussion as an observer, or perhaps even ask a question. Remember to use your Chat program to record the discussion for later review. You can learn how to record a transcript by consulting the program's online help.

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