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Research 101: Pick a Topic

Research 101

You'll search better when you know what you're looking for.

  1. Brainstorm or do an exploratory search
  2. Learn more with background research
  3. Narrow your topic to a manageable size

Always keep assignment details from your teacher in mind. When in doubt, ask your instructor for feedback.

 

Brainstorming Topics

Brainstorm

Jot down any and all ideas that come to mind. Consider the following questions:

  • If you were provided with a list of possible topics by your professor, which do you find interesting?
  • What do you find interesting about the course?
  • How does the topic of the course relate to your hobbies or interests? This may be a cool paper topic.
  • Are there any controversial aspects to this topic or area of study you could explore?

Exploratory Searching

What are people talking about? 

If you aren't sure what you want to write about yet, try looking at what others are writing about.

  • Browse a current events library database.
  • Search for a broad topic, like "women's basketball," and then skim the titles that come up. (In a library database, check out the terms listed under the Subject filter for an overview of result topics.) For an argumentative essay, consider filtering by recent news articles to find ongoing conversations.
  • Go to a website that cares about your assignment topic to browse recent posts. This could be a professional organization, a non-profit, a company, or a government organization. 
Example: A Paper About a Gender Issue
Brainstorming and doing background research helps identify a specific topic for an assignment
 
  1. I wrote down gender issues discussed in class and any others I could think of.
  2. I looked up a Wikipedia page about gender inequality for background information.
  3. I decided to focus on gender issues for female athletes. 
  4. I searched to see what people are saying about this narrower topic.
  5. I decided to write about how women don't receive equal pay in professional sports.

Exploring Your Topic Visually

Creating a mind map or concept map can help you explore your topic. This may help you narrow down your topic, find a specific research question, or think about alternative ways to search.

The example below shows how a single topic such as American culture, can expand into many smaller or related topics like religion, marriage, art, language, holidays, and beyond. Each subtopic can usually expand further. For example, the topic of American art includes painting, photography, comedy, film, Broadway, etc. 

 

A diagram showing concepts like religion, art, and gun culture shooting off from American Culture.

This image by Vmarss is licensed under CC BY SA 4.0 and can be found at https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:American_culture_mind_map.png 

Get More Info

Learning more about a topic is an important first step in research, sometimes called background research.

  • Learn important context
  • Identify new search terms
  • Find new subtopics to explore
Current Events Databases

Browse these for topic ideas or to learn more about today's debates.

Encyclopedias and Dictionaries

Find short explanations of different concepts, events, people, and places.

To find more, search for a topic in Spartan Search and select the Resource Type filter "Reference Entries." 

Narrowing

Pick a Bite-Sized Topic

While you may want to solve world hunger, that's not likely to happen in a short paper due next week. Instead, you will need to find a smaller topic.

Try narrowing big topics by:

  • a time period (i.e. the Great Depression)
  • a geographic category (i.e. rural areas)
  • a specific place (i.e. Illinois, Australia, or Europe)
  • a category of people (i.e. single-parent households, men, children, or Asian Americans)
  • a mode of conversation (i.e. in music)
  • an approach or theory (i.e. cognitive behavioral therapy or social learning theory)

You can also narrow by who, what, when, where, and/or why. These can be informed by what you find when you do some exploratory searching or background research.

Example Paper Topic
Too Broad: How can we ensure everyone has enough food?
More Manageable: What policies have successfully reduced food insecurity in rural communities in America?

 

Can a Topic Be Too Specific?

Yes! Some very specific questions may not have been written about yet.

Sometimes, this can be resolved by combining the existing evidence. Other times, it can be a gap in the literature. Unless you're planning to do some original research, you may need to adjust your question. 

Before abandoning your topic, do some search troubleshooting or ask a librarian.