Research proposal writing
Academic integrity
This guidance supports planning and revision of your own work. It does not offer ghostwriting, invented sources, or a guarantee that a journal will publish a manuscript.
A useful proposal tells a supervisor what you want to understand, why that matters to a specified reader, how you will go about it, and what you will not claim. It also shows that you have read enough to know the question is not already settled in the way you first assumed.
Write the method as actions: who or what, over what period, with what records, and with what care for people if people are involved. If you cannot describe access, say so. A proposal that hides a practical problem is weaker than one that names it.
A practical sequence
- State the problem without citing a solution you have already chosen.
- Write three questions and keep the one you could answer with the access you have.
- Sketch the design, the materials, and the limits.
- Ask a reader to point to any sentence that promises a result.
Examples
- Include a short section titled “What this study will not claim”.
- Replace “this research will prove” with “this study will describe” or “compare”, if that is all the design can support.
