Strategies for Generating Topics/Questions If you are researching a topic on which you already have definite opinions, you may have a thesis in mind before you consult the information sources. But if you are investigating a new area, you should start thinking about your purpose as soon as you start working with sources. What do you already know about the topic? In what ways could you expand on this knowledge by turning to sources? What uncertainties do you have about the topic that might be answered in sources?

Strategies for Focusing Your Research Goals What are your personal feelings on the topic? What are your values and beliefs on this topic? How might you find sources that support or contradict your views, values, or beliefs? From what perspectives can you view the topic? What are common beliefs on the subject? What do experts on the topic believe? What do those most directly affected by the topic believe? What might your own audience need to know about the topic?

Strategies for Focusing Your Research Goals Even though you may begin with a clear sense of direction, you may shift emphasis or narrow or expand your topic as your research continues. Don’t be so committed to your initial topic that you ignore information indicating that a different focus might be more appropriate or more interesting. If you have a thesis in mind, regard it as a first attempt to make sense of the issue without the benefit of all the relevant information. As you collect information, you may find that your preliminary thesis does not fit with all the facts and may need to be altered or even abandoned entirely. Thesis statements may be subject to revision as you research and write. If you cling to your initial thesis in spite of the information you collect, you may produce a paper that is inconsistent, illogical, or confusing.

Strategies for Focusing Your Research Goals Since you may have to shift direction, it is important to gather and evaluate information well in advance of your project's due date. Leave yourself enough time to shift emphasis and look for other information sources. With complex topics, you may need to make several shifts before you arrive at an approach that you can sustain throughout a lengthy paper.

Evaluating Information Sources As you search material, constantly judge whether it has direct relevance to your topic. If you collect a lot of information without exercising judgment, you may get a false sense of how well your research is proceeding. You could have a large number of sources and still not have the information needed to develop the paper in the direction you intend. Ask yourself how the sources fit in with your overall goals for the research paper. To what parts of the topic do the sources pertain? Do they support your preliminary thesis? What perspectives on the topic do they represent?

Evaluating Information Sources By urging you to exercise judgment in choosing sources, we are not suggesting that you ignore ideas that conflict with your own. Remember that your thesis is preliminary and subject to change. You may shift your point of view after you read some of the arguments presented in the sources.

Evaluating Information Sources In addition to evaluating the sources’ relevance to your topic, you should also judge their comparative quality and credibility. Don’t think you can have complete confidence in a source simply because you found it in a library. Libraries include wildly opinionated, even bizarre sources along with those that are logical and objective. There is nothing wrong with an author expressing a strong opinion, but it is a mistake for researchers to view all opinions as equally valid. Since research is a quest for understanding, researchers must work with the sources that are most helpful in making sense of the issue.

Utilizing Relevant Information from Sources Be aware that there is also a danger of using too much information. Some students compulsively collect every scrap of information that is remotely related to their topic, thinking that they will make sense of it all at their leisure. Don’t bury yourself with paper, whether it is note cards, pages of notes, etc. Take only what you think you might use. Research is a sense-making process. It is hard to make sense of something when you are overwhelmed with information.