How to Write Standard Research Paper

5 Steps for Writing a Research Paper

To know -How to write a research paper, it is very important for the student to understand that a research paper is a very important document that offers a path breaking solution to a particular field of academics. Being able to submit a well-researched document to a University means a lot, as it offers a rewarding experience to the researcher. Moreover, the research paper gets recognized and is used for further research in the respective field.

This article aims to guide you through 5 steps for writing a research paper. All the provisions are about understanding the process of writing an academically recognized research paper.

Step 1. Understanding Gap

Step 2. Get Organised

Step 3. Structuring & Writing

Step 4. Generating Drafts

Step 5. Review and Proofread

Step 1: Understanding Gap

This is the stage where it is very important that the researcher realises that there is the need for a research work in a particular domain. This stage brings in the step for the inception of the research purpose. It is this purpose that the researcher must keep as the core base for the ways to write a research paper. At this step the researcher needs to understand voracious readings as part of building authentic understanding about the research purpose and the contributions that have been made in this particular field.

As research paper means to offer path breaking solutions certain issues that are still unresolved, the researcher needs to accomplish the following steps-

• Gain a clear understanding of the selected field of research
• Collect reliable resources to support your understanding
• Initiate reading data from every valid Secondary source
• Review the former research works to identify the Gaps
• Develop a Topic

Step 2: Get Organised

The Step 2 for -How to write a research paper, is all about creating notes based on the background preparation to write a research paper. It needs clear knowledge about the field of research and a clear understanding of research purpose. The research paper begins at this stage but in a very intensive manner. This step demands that the researcher to get well equipped with relevant secondary data sources and prepares a framework for the research process. This will lead the research to identify the gaps as obtained from the secondary data sources. After the identification of the Gaps from secondary data, it is necessary for the researcher to collect data from primary sources.

Source of Primary Data and Secondary Data:-

Moreover, for different fields these data can vary in considerable manner-

Following the instructions and the regulations stated by the University to lead a dissertation, must remain intake.

At this step of research paper, the researcher must have-

• Confirmed aims and objectives through the Research Proposal
• Knowledge about the ethical criteria involved in the research process
• Writing and collecting data from the Primary sources
• Selection of right Referencing Style among – Chicago, APA, MLA, and Turabian.
• Categorical distributions timeframes for all the sections or the Gantt chart-

Step 3: Structuring & Writing

Research paper in general should have 6sections- Introduction, Literature Review, Research Methodology, Findings & Analyses, Discussion, and Conclusion & Recommendations.

• Introduction: Research writing starts with the Introduction section. This section offers all the details about the research aims and objectives, and its relevance in the respective field.
• Literature Review: The next writing session starts with the Literature Review, whereby the researcher can critically evaluate all the former research works and secondary sources. While reviewing the relevant research works, the researcher needs to attain more practically justified ways to establish and confirm the research purpose and relevance.
• Research Methodology: The research writing then leads to the Research Methodology, which decides the way through which the researcher will conduct the research. Selections of qualitative, quantitative, or mixed approaches get decided in this section.
• Findings &Analyses: The research paper then offers the Findings collected from the primary data sources and the same gets evaluated through critical Analyses.
• Discussion: The section for Discussion critically analyses and evaluates the information collected from both primary and secondary sources. In this section the evaluations are done to meet the research objectives.
• Conclusion & Recommendations: Eventually, the research paper gets accomplished by Conclusion & Recommendations. In this section the aims of the research gets expressed as per the derived data and critical evaluations.

Thus, to answer - How to write a research paper- the researcher must follow stages noted below-

• Investing relevant secondary data sources and writing the Literature Review
• Writing the Section for Introduction with declarations related to background and aims & objectives
• Structuring the Research Methodology as per the Research Philosophy and Research Approach
• Declaring all the data collected from the primary sources and Analyse them accordingly
• Analysing all the collected data on qualitative and/or quantitative approach lead the research to a Conclusion, with necessary Recommendations –

For analysing Data, there are some latest and well upgraded software applications, which need to be considered for high quality derivations under statistical approach. These software applications are-the SPSS, Microsoft Analysis, Nvivo, Analytical, Route, Matlab, IC Cube and JAVA.

Step 4: Generating Research Structure

The Step 4 is an extended part of Step 3. In the way of -How to write a research paper, the researcher prepares various drafts to gain approval from the Supervisor. In order to avoid all kinds of confusions in the ways to write a research paper, it is suggested that this process of generating drafts should be section-wise rather than topic-wise. Typical emphasis should be led upon the selected Aims & Objectives and the Research Methodology. Selection of right Research Methodology in the research paper is the most important decision that a researcher needs to make. This decision must be taken in accordance to the research domain, the process of considering the empirical and theoretical research initiatives and the research philosophy related to the study. For this purpose, in Research Methods for Business Students (2018), Prof Mark N. K. Saunders, Dr Philip Lewis and Adrian Thorn hill have illustrated the entire research methodology in a very comprehensive manner –

Figure 1: Saunders’ Research Onion

Source: Adapted from Saunders, et al. (2018)

Following Saunders’ Research Onion, the research paper must generate drafts. The first draft must be generated by considering-

• Natural feelings that the researcher attains while reading all the former research works
• Writing the important points that the secondary data have provided to the researcher
• Enlisting all the theoretical and empirical derivations
• Write the outline of the research paper and consider it as the map to research paper
• The sense of gaining vision about the research outcomes.

The 1^st draft will soon be followed by the 2^nd draft, where the researcher must accomplish-

• The connection with the vision attained through the 1^st draft
• The task of meeting assumptions with necessary justifications
• The research paper must be based on absolutely substantiated clarifications
• The absolute arrangement of the ideas and the purpose of the research paper
• The process of discarding points that cannot be established or justified by any source.

Step 5: Review and Proofread

To write a research paper, there is the need for constant review and continuous proofreading. Being an academic document, there cannot be any compromise made in terms of quality of the research paper. Since the research paper is an academic representation of analysing a path breaking provision in the respective field, its important is severe in the academic domain. Any kind of grammatical or syntactical error can make the research paper get rejected for various future recognitions. There is also zero-tolerance to the act of plagiarism. The entire research paper must be very much original. It should make clear declarations about all the sources that it considers for leading the research paper. Every secondary and primary source must get well cited and mentioned, respectively. Thus the core checklist for review and proofread is-

• Review the structures of the sentences, grammatical & spelling errors, typos and incomprehensive sentences & words, and formatting as per selected Journal
• Check the paper for plagiarism by using software such as Urkund or Turnitin
• Check consistency in the research paper and connection between the paragraphs
• Review the documents that will support the entire research paper
• Proper Inclusion of Ethical and Consent Forms, Primary and Secondary data sources.

The ways to write a research paper can be hugely overwhelming and can full of anxieties. Even the submission process must undergo all the considerations mentioned by the Reviewer/s. However, with the 5 systematic steps mentioned above, it can be accomplished in a very formal manner. Please note the Research Writing Cycle for clear understanding- 

Figure 2: The Research Writing Cycle

Thus, to answer the question – How to write a research paper, it is imprtnant to have a clear understanding about the subject and the selected topic. The researcher must make the right selection between research methodology by attaining clear understanding of research philosophy as established by Saunders’ Research Onion. The procvess of data analysis must remain under strict follow up selected tools and within the timesale as mentioned in the Gantt chart.