Title Page of the Paper: The title of your paper should be brief but should adequately inform the reader of your general topic and the specific focus of your research. Keywords relating to parameters, population, and other specifics are useful. The Title Page must include the title, name, course name and number, date, and Professor’s Name.
Introduction, Research Question, and Hypothesis: This section shall provide an overview of the topic that you are writing about, a concise synopsis of the issues, and why the topic presents a “puzzle” that prompts your research questions, which you will include. This section will be 1-2 pages. End your introduction with your research question and hypothesis. If you struggle with writing hypotheses, then use the “If……then….” formula. Example, “If the United States fails to address vulnerabilities in the rail system then the frequency of security incidents will increase.” A corresponding research question could be: Why has the United States failed to adequately protect the rail system?
Review of the Literature: All research projects include a literature review to set out for the reader what knowledge exists on the subject under study and helps the researcher develop the research strategy to use in the study. A good literature review is a thoughtful study of what has been written, a summary of the arguments that exist (whether you agree with them or not), arranged thematically. At the end of the summary, there should still be gaps in the literature that you intend to fill with your research. It is written in narrative format and can be from 4-6 pages depending on the scope and length of the paper.
As a literature review, this section should identify the common themes and theories that the prior research identified. In this section, what you do is look at the conclusions of prior research and identify what the common themes are you see in those conclusions. You then identify those themes. The APUS online library has some helpful information on writing a literature review. Using the example above, you should approach your literature review from the perspective of “what have other researchers found on the failure of the U.S. to protect the rail systems?” You are telling your reader about the literature on your topic and not presenting any results of your research.
