Elements of a Research Essay
Stephanie Ojeda Ponce
This section is an overview of the elements or parts of a research essay. Scholarly essays are long. There are several different styles of research essays and each have their own structure. For the argument-driven research essay, these are the main elements:
- Purpose or research question
- Your claim or thesis.
- One or more reasons for your thesis.
- Evidence for each reason.
- Others’ objections, counterarguments, or alternative solutions.
- Your acknowledgment of others’ objections, counterarguments, or alternative solutions.
- Your response to others’ objections, counterarguments, or alternative solutions.
The Purpose or Goal
Sometimes your professor will give you the research question, but probably more often you will need to develop your own research topic. Even though you are likely writing an essay for an assignment or as part of a class, you are also developing your own purpose for the research and writing. This part of the essay may not be written down, but it can be helpful to keep in mind a purpose or overall question. That question might even be something you answer through your research, but don’t have
Examples: Purpose and Goal for Research Essays
- How do at least some animals’ bones help control their weight?
- Did the death of his beloved daughter have any effect on the writings of Mark Twain?
Your Claim or Thesis
You write the claim or thesis–it doesn’t come directly from a source. Instead, it is the conclusion you come to in answer to your question after you’ve read/listened to/viewed some sources. So it is a statement, not a question or a hypothesis that you plan to prove or disprove with your research.
After you’ve read/listened to/viewed more sources, you may need to change your thesis. That happens all the time–not because you did anything wrong but because you learned more.
Examples: Claims (or Theses) for Hypothetical Essays or Term Papers
- Bone cells monitor whether more or less weight is pressing down on the skeleton and send biochemical signals to appetite centers in their brains to turn appetite down or up, accordingly.
- Mark Twain wrote more urgently and with less humor during the four years immediately after the death of his daughter.
One or More Reasons
You write what you believe makes your claim or thesis (the answer to your research question) true. That’s your reason or reasons. Each reason is a summary statement of evidence you found in your research. The kinds of evidence considered convincing varies by discipline, so you will be looking at different sources, depending on your discipline. How many reasons you need depends on how complex your thesis and subject matter are, what you found in your sources, and how long your essay or research paper must be. It’s always a good idea to write your reasons in a way that is easy for your audience to understand and be persuaded by.
Examples: Reasons in Hypothetical Essays or Term Papers
- Animals (including humans) have a biological tendency to regain any weight that they lose and lose any weight that they gain, seemingly in an effort to maintain whatever weight they have sustained for some time. Skeletons are logical places where any gains or losses could be noted, and recent studies seem to show that osteocytes (a kind of bone cell) are involved in whether appetites go up or down after weight gain or loss.
- My content analysis and a comparison of publication rates four years before and after Mark Twain’s daughter died indicate that his writing was more urgent and less humorous for four years after. It is reasonable to conclude that her death caused that change.
Evidence for Each Reason
You write this also. This is the evidence you summarized earlier as each reason your thesis is true. You will be directly quoting, paraphrasing, and summarizing your sources to make the case that your answer to your research question is correct, or at least reasonable.
Examples: Evidence for Reasons in Hypothetical Essays or Term Papers
- Report the results of studies about osteocyctes’ possible effect on weight grain or loss.
- Report the results of your comparison of writing content and publication rate before and after Twain’s daughter’s death.
Others’ Objections, Counterarguments, or Alternative Solutions
Do any of your sources not agree with your thesis? You’ll have to bring those up in your research paper. In addition, put yourself in your readers’ shoes. What might they not find logical in your argument? In other words, which reason(s) and corresponding evidence might they find lacking? Did you find clues to what these could be in your sources? Or maybe you can imagine them thinking some aspect of what you think is evidence doesn’t make sense.
Examples: Objections, Counterarguments, or Alternative Solutions in Hypothetical Essays or Term Papers
- Imagine that some readers might think: The hormone leptin is released by fat cells when they are added to animals’ bodies so it is leptin that tells appetite centers to turn down when weight is gained.
- Imagine that some readers might think: Computerized content analysis tools are sort of blunt instruments and shouldn’t be used to do precise work like this.
Your Acknowledgement of Others’ Objections, Counterarguments, or Alternative Solutions
So what will you write to bring up each of those objections, counterarguments, and alternative solutions? Some examples:
- I can imagine skeptics wanting to point out…
- Perhaps some readers would say…
- I think those who come from XYZ would differ with me…
It all depends on what objections, counterarguments, and alternative solutions your audience or your imagination come up with.
Examples: Acknowledgement of Others’ Objections, Counterarguments, or Alternative Solutions in Hypothetical Essays or Term Papers:
- Some readers may point out that the hormone leptin, which is released by fat cells, signals appetite centers to lower the appetite when weight is gained.
- Readers may think that a computerized content analysis tool cannot do justice to the subtleties of text.
Response to Others’ Objections, Counterarguments, or Alternative Solutions
You must write your response to each objection, counterargument, or alternative solution brought up or that you’ve thought of. (You’re likely to have found clues for what to say in your sources.) The reason you have to include this is that you can’t very easily convince your audience until you show them how your claim stacks up against the opinions and reasoning of other people who don’t at the moment agree with you.
Examples: Response to Others’ Objections, Counterarguments, or Alternative Solutions in Hypothetical Essays or Term Papers:
- But leptin must not be the entire system, since many animals do keep on the new weight.
- Unlike other content tools, the XYZ Content Analysis Measure is able to take into account an author’s tone.
Adaptations
This page has been adapted from Where you Get the Components from Choosing & Using Sources: A Guide to Academic Research Copyright © 2015 by Teaching & Learning, Ohio State University Libraries. CC BY 4.0 DEED.
