00 Title page
APA 7 puts a running head at the top of every page, in capitals, with the page number.
RUNNING HEAD: TITLE OF RESEARCH PROPOSAL 1
- Proposed title of the project
- Your name
01 Abstract
A brief summary of the entire proposal, so a reader understands your study before reading the full paper. A quick summary — a teaser for what's coming.
Answer these questions
- What is the research topic?
- Why is this research important?
- What is the research question or objective?
- How will the study be conducted?
- What do you expect to find or contribute?
This is a proposal, so describe your expected outcomes and contributions. You will not have actual or original results yet, and you must not report any.
The formula
- Introduce the topic
- Identify the research problem or gap
- State your research question or objective
- Briefly describe the methodology
- Explain the expected significance or contribution
- Including detailed explanations of your methodology
- Citing sources in the abstract
- Writing more than one paragraph, or more than 150–250 words
- Reporting results that have not yet been collected
- Introducing information that does not appear elsewhere in the proposal
Keywords
End the abstract with a keyword line.
Keywords: Snow-melt runoff, Agriculture, Neurodegenerative disease
Write your abstract last. Once the introduction, literature review, methodology, and conclusion are finished, you understand your own project well enough to summarize it accurately in one paragraph.
02 Introduction
Four things happen here: you set the context, name the problem, ask the question, and argue that answering it matters.
Background and context
Lead the reader into the topic and the scope of your research.
Stress affects people.
Chronic stress is increasingly recognized as a major public health concern, affecting millions of adolescents worldwide. During adolescence the brain undergoes rapid structural and functional development, making this period particularly vulnerable to prolonged activation of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis. Recent neuroimaging studies suggest chronic stress may alter the hippocampus, amygdala, and prefrontal cortex, potentially leading to long-term cognitive and emotional consequences.
Use subheadings for structure
1. Introduction
1.1 What is chronic stress?
- Definition
- Biological stress response
- Difference between acute and chronic stress
1.2 Implications of chronic stress during adolescence
- Why adolescence is a sensitive period
- Brain regions undergoing development
- Prevalence among teenagers
1.3 Research problem
- Describe what is known and what remains unknown
1.4 Research question and objectives
- Present your research question, hypothesis, and objectives
1.5 Significance of the study
- Why it is worth studying
Problem statement
Describe the theoretical or practical problem you want to address: what is already known, and what is missing from current knowledge.
Researchers have shown that urban green spaces can reduce local temperatures during heat waves. However, relatively few studies have compared the cooling effects of different types of vegetation, such as trees, shrubs, and grasslands. Understanding which forms of green infrastructure are most effective could help cities better prepare for rising global temperatures.
Research question
State the specific question you aim to answer. It should be clear, focused, and answerable through the methodology you have chosen.
Does meditation work?
Does daily meditation reduce anxiety among high school students?
Hypothesis
A specific, testable prediction about what you expect to find. Common in experimental and quantitative STEM research, and it must be testable through data collection or analysis.
Adolescents with access to larger urban green spaces will report significantly lower perceived stress levels than adolescents with limited access to green spaces.
Notice that this is a prediction that can be tested with data.
A hypothesis is not required for every proposal.
- Tests a prediction or a relationship between variables
- Involves an experiment, survey, or quantitative data analysis
- Uses the scientific method to evaluate an expected outcome
- Is a literature review
- Uses qualitative methods such as interviews or case studies
- Is exploratory, aiming to understand a phenomenon rather than test a prediction
Each link should lead naturally to the next. If your methodology cannot answer your research question or test your hypothesis, go back and refine the experimental design.
Relevance and importance
Make clear what new insight you will contribute, why the missing knowledge matters, who it is relevant to, and why the research is worth doing at all.
Exercise: fill in the blanks
- This research is important because
- These findings will help
- The findings may contribute to
- This research is important because it addresses an understudied aspect of adolescent brain development.
- These findings will help neuroscientists gain new insight into adolescent brain development, and help adolescents through reforms.
- The findings may contribute to a better understanding of sex-specific vulnerabilities and improve therapeutic interventions.
03 Literature review
Summarize, compare, and critique the most relevant scholarly sources on your topic. Structures vary, but three things always belong here.
Key concepts, theories, and studies
- Compare, contrast, and establish the theories and concepts most important to your project
- Imply why these concepts matter for your experimental design
Key debates and controversies
- Identify points of conflict and situate your own position — your opinions, and the factors that influenced your choice of methodology
Gaps in existing knowledge
- Show what is missing and how your project fits in
- State this clearly. In a proposal, the gap is what justifies the whole document
Organize by theme, not by paper
- Study A found…
- Study B found…
- Study C found…
Group findings under thematic subheadings and compare studies inside each one.
2.1 Active learning strategies
- Compare studies examining how active learning influences student engagement and academic performance
- Discuss differences between classroom activities such as group discussions, problem-based learning, and flipped classrooms
2.2 Online vs. in-person learning
- Compare research evaluating the effectiveness of active learning in online and traditional classroom settings
- Highlight conflicting findings and the possible reasons for them
2.3 Remaining questions
- Explain that while active learning has been widely studied, relatively little research has investigated which approaches work best in hybrid learning environments
Introduction vs. literature review
These two sections are often confused. They do different jobs.
| Introduction | Literature review |
|---|---|
| Introduces the reader to the topic | Critically analyzes previous research |
| Broad overview | In-depth discussion |
| Explains why the topic matters | Explains what researchers have found, where they disagree, and what remains unknown |
| Ends with the research question | Ends with the research gap that justifies your study |
The same topic, in both sections
Introduction — help the reader understand the topic
1.1 Background
- Introduce the topic and why it matters
1.2 Research problem
- What is known and what remains unknown
1.3 Research question and objectives
- Question, hypothesis, objectives
1.4 Significance of the study
- Why it is worth studying
Literature review — what has the field already discovered?
2.1 Chronic stress and the hippocampus
- Compare several studies: (Smith et al., 2022), (Lee et al., 2019), (Turner & Chen, 2008)
- Do they agree? Do they use different methods? Are there conflicting findings?
2.2 Sex differences
- Discuss and compare papers investigating males vs. females
2.3 Remaining research gaps
- Explain exactly what previous studies haven't answered
04 Research design and methods
Explain your approach and the exact steps you will take to answer your question. Write it so a stranger could run your study without asking you anything.
Research design
- Explain how you will design the research
- Qualitative or quantitative?
- Original data collection?
- Primary or secondary sources?
- Descriptive, correlational, or experimental?
If none of those terms are familiar yet, work through Step 3: Design your method first.
Methods and sources
- Describe the tools, procedures, participants, and sources
- If you are collecting original data: what samples (animal or human models)? Which breed or demographic? What sample size? What experimental design?
- When, where, and how will you collect, select, and analyze the data?
If you don't know how to build an original methodology, take an existing one from your field and alter it so it produces results relevant to your question.
Practical considerations
Name the problems before a reviewer does.
- Potential obstacles
- Limitations
- Ethical or practical issues
- Weaknesses
- Potential biases
- How you will plan for and handle each of these
05 Expected results
Explain what you expect to happen — not because you know, but because previous research suggests it.
Based on previous findings, it is expected that adolescents exposed to chronic stress will demonstrate greater structural changes within the hippocampus than controls.
You can also add results tables and graphs to show expected results visually.
06 Conclusion
Your final chance to explain the significance of the research. Synthesize rather than introduce: answer your research question and discuss the broader implications.
Four steps
- Restate the research problem. Briefly remind the reader what issue your study addresses.
- Restate the purpose of the study. Explain what the project aims to investigate.
- Mention the proposed approach. Summarize the design in one sentence.
- Emphasize significance and contribution. Explain why the research matters.
A strong conclusion should
- Restate the research question or objective
- Summarize the key findings or arguments
- Explain why the findings matter
- Discuss implications, applications, or future research directions
- State clearly what your study contributes to the area
- Introducing entirely new evidence or sources
- Repeating the introduction word for word
- Listing findings without explaining their importance
07 References
Always APA 7.
- Only include sources you actually cited
- In-text citations are required throughout the proposal itself
Keegan, J. (1999). The First World War. Alfred A. Knopf.
08 Checklist
Run through this before you submit. Your ticks are saved in this browser.
The argument
The literature
The method
The document