The
Importance of Research in an Effective Paper
Saagar
Patel
Oklahoma
State University
The research
process is a long, crucial step in producing an effective, informative paper.
Being in the engineering field, I have been accustomed to doing research in the
past; however, this time it seemed different. I had much more difficulty. I
learned that the research question one may initially choose to write about may
not be the right one for the paper. It almost seemed like reading the sources
found from research dictated the topic of the paper rather than the topic
question dictating the research. Without a firm knowledge in the subject
beforehand, one does not know what to expect from the sources and this is what
makes the research process so important and powerful. The topic I researched
for my paper was the current status of private space companies as well as the
role that the private space industry should play in American space exploration.
Doing the research on this topic was not easy. There were definitely times I
had a great amount of difficulty such as choosing the correct topic, finding
recent articles, and using more credible search techniques. The research
process broadened my knowledge greatly and I will write the paper with much
more confidence now.
Coming up with my research topic was not as
easy as I thought it would have been. Honestly, at first, I wanted to choose
the same topic I did for the first paper which was whether spending money and
resources was a waste or not, but I did not know if I could do that so I
started searching for new topics. I considered choosing a topic potentially
dealing with airplanes for that is a major aspect of my major, but my interest
truly is in the space field so I did not think that I would get as passionate
about the paper, probably resulting in a poorer paper. So, I started “Googling”
vague word choices such as "space exploration topics" and was having
a really hard time finding a topic that I truly thought I could write a lot
about. I, then, searched "space" on Reddit and saw the topics with
the comments and discussions dealt with private space industry. I felt that a
subject where many people are discussing and arguing is one of controversy and
importance and potentially a topic with a great amount of available
information. Private space industry interests me a lot, for it is probably
where I want to work in the future. So, now I knew I was going to write about
the private space industry, but still did not know what exactly to write about
pertaining to this. After reading comments from earlier blog posts and
discussion posts, I came to the conclusion of writing about how private space
companies and NASA can work together. I wanted to write about what overall role
the private space industry would have on space exploration. Will they partner
with NASA? Will they do the small jobs for NASA? Will they do their own thing?
It truly took a good amount of researching to develop this topic. .
With a subject pertaining to space
exploration, updated and recent information is a must. This was an issue I came
across during the research process. I would think that I have found a very
useful source typically dated from 2008, but then I would find a source from a
few years later that would make the previous source meaningless. Space
exploration is truly still viewed as futuristic venture even though it is
occurring today. Due to this, an educated reader would view any paper with
information coming from outdated sources as not credible. I had to find the
most recent status and information of private space companies. Most of the
current information on private space companies could be found on their company
website. I, eventually, decided that a little bit older sources could be used
if they were trying to relay an idea about private space exploration, but the
most recent sources needed to be used for information on the current statuses
and goals of private space companies.
Until now, my methodology of research has
been limited to searching for the topic on global search engines such as
Google. This is how I began my research process for the current paper, as well.
I found a great amount of information, but the credibility of these sources
could not be confirmed. After about half of the way through the research
process, I started using the Oklahoma State Library databases found on their
website. At first, I had difficulty finding anything useful from the library
databases. After changing the words and word ordering in the search field, I
noticed different results. The slightest change in wording would result in a
greatly different list of results. . Proquest was the database that most of my
sources came from, but I also found a few on the LexisNexis Academic database.
I think readers will find the paper more credible when the majority of the
sources come from university databases rather than Google or Wikipedia.
Credibility of the sources is one of the most important factors that goes into
a strong research paper.
Overall, the research process for a paper
truly determines the strength of the paper. If the research is done in a
diligent and proper manner, the overall paper will reflect this. After going
through this process, I have come to the conclusion that the research process
is more influential to the overall paper than the writing. To write something
useful requires useful information, which ultimately comes down to having conducted
useful research. My appreciation for the research process has definitely gone
up. I have found many useful and reliable sources, as well as broadened my own
knowledge on the subject. I, originally, thought I could write a paper on this topic before doing any research,
but now that I have done the research, I realize that my paper would have been
very poor compared to what it will be now due to my gained understanding.
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