Professional Documents
Culture Documents
net/publication/359962342
CITATIONS READS
0 2,685
1 author:
Jayne Mugwe
Kenyatta University
113 PUBLICATIONS 2,391 CITATIONS
SEE PROFILE
Some of the authors of this publication are also working on these related projects:
EVALUATION OF WATER CONSERVING TECHNOLOGIES FOR SUSTAINABLE PRODUCTION OF YELLOW PASSION IN EMBU AND KIAMBU COUNTIES View
project
Scaling up soybean and climbing beans using a value chain approach in maize-based systems of central Highlands of Kenya View project
All content following this page was uploaded by Jayne Mugwe on 14 April 2022.
JOURNAL
PROPOSAL THESIS PAPER
What is a research proposal?
Document proposing a research project
Statement of intent
Three key components
1. What you plan to research (i.e. your research topic)
2. Why it is important (your justification)
3. How you plan to investigate (your practical approach).
Purpose: convince your research supervisor,
university board
1. Suitable (for the requirements of the degree program)
2. You have the Expertise
3. Manageable (given the time and resource constraints
you will face)
Importance of a research
proposal?
References
Appendices
Back Matter
Workplan
Budget
The Role of Supervisor
Start Here Write and Present Proposal
(Topic)
Collect Data
Examination
SUPERVISOR
sentences
Objectives of the study (write completely)
collected+analysis)
Outputs/Significance (one to two sentences)
Background
Topic of interest
global, regional and national overview of the
research topic is briefly discussed.
Flow from broad to specific – narrow a broad area
into a manageable problem
Contain
Brief overview of the problem
Rationale for choosing this problem
Magnitude of the problem: use numbers or
figures to show the extent of the problem
Review of the other work carried on the subject
with authoritative citations
Organisation of
Background
Background should be organised under:-
(i) Globally, what key debates and (gaps) exist
(ii) Regionally, what key debates (and gaps)
exist
(iii) Nationally; (The research problem is found
here)
BROAD TO SPECIFIC (FUNNEL SHAPE)
Declining yield of maize
Broad topic area due to low soil fertility
Specific problem
Statement of the problem
Nerve centre of any research
SOP clearly describes the research problem
already identified
Brief description of the issue, difficulty, problem
that will be addressed in the study
Summarizes “the context for the study” by
briefly describing the problem and clearly
showing the knowledge gap
SOP should be brief and precise (Not more than
2 paragraphs)
What is Knowledge gap?
Research objectives
Components of statement of the
problem
To examine
To evaluate
To assess
To compare
General objective
interventions
Proposed relationships
Socio-
ADOPT
Introductio economic
n and characteristics Awareness/ Adoptio
disseminati - education knowledge Formation n
on of water behavio
level of of water of attitude r REJECT
harvesting harvesting and
household head technologie decision
NOT-ADOPT
5 6
4
8
LITERATURE REVIEW
2.1 Overview
2.2 Soil Fertility Management Technologies
2.3 Communication Strategy and Knowledge Sharing
2.4 Participation of stakeholders in dissemination of
research outputs
2.5 Social Economic Factors that affect farmers’
preference on communication methods
2.6 Scaling Up soil fertility
Quality of resources of literature
Books
Thesis and dissertations
Peer reviewed journal articles
Non-reviewed journal papers (Be careful…Predatory)
Technical reports
Newspaper
Professional magazines
Recordings
Online articles; Wikipedia
Annual reports
Chapter 3: Methodology
Purpose
Provides a description of the exact (specific)
actions, plan, or strategies to be used to
achieve the research objectives
Link each of the specific objectives to the
methods so as to account for all activities of
the project
Chapter 3: Methodology
Concern from supervisors
Link each variable you will measure to
methods, apparatus, instruments and
procedures to be used
Linking components
Logical reasoning
References
Patel B, Kay Muir-Leresche, Richard Coe and Susan D
Hainsworth (2004). The Green Book: A guide to effective
graduate research in African Agriculture. The African Crop
Science Society, Kampala, Uganda
Creswell JW (2009). Research design. Qualitative,
Quantitative and Mixed methods approaches. 3rd Edition.
SAGE publishers, California, USA.
Locke, L.F., Spiduso, W. and Silverman, S.J. (2007)
Proposals that Work: A Guide for Planning Dissertations and
Grant Proposals. 5th ed. Sage, Thousand Oaks.
THANK YOU