Research Paper Writing Tips for College Students

September 10, 2021

research paper writing tips

Do you need some research paper writing tips and  strategies that you can implement right now?

You've come to the right place.

If there's one thing that's certain, it's that writing a detailed research paper isn’t a walk in the park.

You’ll spend more late night hours in the library when you should be asleep. You’ll have to do in-depth research online when you should rather be watching YouTube videos, browsing the Internet for fun, and chatting on Facebook.

You’ll find yourself racing behind the set deadline to make sure your instructor gets the research project on time. Not to mention less time for yourself and almost none to spend with your friends.

However, those sacrifices will get you to a point where you effortlessly organize your thoughts in a way that makes writing a research paper much easier than you can imagine. 

That’s why in this article, we’ll give you some handy research paper writing tips to help you complete your research paper and score an A-grade. 

Tips for Writing a Research Paper Fast 

Use the following tips to write a comprehensive research paper. 

1. Choose a Useful and Engaging Topic 

Sometimes your instructor will ask you to choose a research topic for your research paper. If that’s the case, you want to treat that as a great opportunity to choose an engaging, useful, and unique topic for your project. 

Don’t just choose any topic, though. Instead, pick something that scholars have already investigated.

This will make it easy for you to come up with approaches, techniques, and hypothesis that can easily generate substantial results for your research project.

It helps to note down questions related to the subject to see if you can find relevant answers to them.

If a question makes you curious, add it to your topic checklist and then ask your instructor if the question would make a good research topic.

Leave out topics that don’t have substantial angle. And if it’s boring, avoid it otherwise your research project may fail. 

2. Research Your Topics Widely 

Many students fail to earn good marks on their research paper because they failed to do in-depth topic research, and you don’t want to make the same mistake.

Get down to thorough research as soon as you find an engaging topic to cover.

Your school’s library is a good place to start because it has literally dozens of books, articles, and journals. The information you get from here will often be enough.

Still, you may want to extend your research to other sources such as Google Scholar and Books. This way, you can find more information to add to your research phase and make your paper easy to write. 

3. Write a Convincing Research Proposal 

Now that you have a solid research topic, it’s time to impress your instructor by writing a detailed research proposal. It’s an important document that provides a clear blueprint for your research project. 

A well-written proposal will not only show your competence but also unveil the value of your research project. 

Submit your proposal to your professor as early as you can. Then give them time to evaluate the viability and usefulness of your research project in relation to the topic in question.

During their assessment, your instructor will be able to tell you if your proposal is good enough for research or otherwise. 

4. Cite Reliable and Trustworthy Sources 

Your research paper not only has to be relevant to the topic covered in your proposal, it also has to be authoritative, trustworthy, and factual. So include facts and statistics to make the document easy to trust.

Examples of places to get trustworthy information for your research paper writing include Microsoft Academic, your school’s online portal, Google Books, and Google Scholars. These platforms have hundreds of scientific materials that you can reference in your research paper.

If you must cite websites, then make sure they’re as authoritative as possible. You can learn how to cite sources so you do the citation right.

5. Create a Relevant Research Paper Outline 

Getting your research proposal approved is one thing. The next step would be to choose an outline to use. More often than not, your instructor may give you the type of outline to use.

Sometimes they may leave it up to you to choose an outline for the project. If that’s the case, you can use the alphanumeric, decimal, or full sentence outline.

It’s hard to overlook a research paper outline because it’s the only way to present your research paper to your instructor. Not to mention that your instructor may return your work for revision if you don’t use an outline for the paper. 

6. Plan and Schedule 

You shouldn’t wait until the final minutes to work on your research paper. Otherwise you’ll have a difficult time completing the assignment.

Remember, there’s a lot that goes into coming up with a comprehensive research paper, and you want each step to be a lot more precise.

Therefore, the only best way to get your research paper done and completed in good time is to start early.

You can create a writing schedule that will guide you through planning, researching, writing, and proofreading your assignment. This way, you’re able to challenge yourself to beat and meet the deadline set by your instructor. 

7. Always Proofread Your Work 

If you’ve followed all the steps to writing a research paper, you should have a well-written first draft ready for proofreading. 

There isn’t a lot of work to do at this point. All you have to do is to make sure the draft has the most important information that should go into the research paper. 

Delete irrelevant words and phrases from the paper. Fix grammatical and typographical errors. Crosscheck the sources you’ve cited to make sure they’re accurate.

Lastly, make sure there’s a natural flow of ideas from sentence to sentence and paragraph to paragraph. 

Do You Need Help with Your Research Paper? 

Sometimes you have a lot on your plate that completing a research paper in good time becomes a big challenge. If that’s the case with you, then you can ask for help from Help for Assessment Writers. We’ll provide the academic assistance that you need to complete your project in good time. You can check this research paper writing service guide for more information. Then, place your order and let us handle the rest of the work for you.

About the author 

Antony W is a professional writer and coach at Help for Assessment. He spends countless hours every day researching and writing great content filled with expert advice on how to write engaging essays, research papers, and assignments.

{"email":"Email address invalid","url":"Website address invalid","required":"Required field missing"}