The Structure of a Research Proposal

A proposal consists of:

0. Title
1. Introduction
2. Review of Literature
3. Research Method
4. References
 0. Title
 It provides a clear information about the study.
 It may contain a central phenomenon or variables.
 It shouldn’t be in the form of a complete sentence.
 The number of the words it contains shouldn’t be more
than 20 words.
e.g.: The acoustic characteristics of English stops and
vowels produced by students of English Department,
Trunojoyo University, Madura.
 1. Introduction
a. Background of the Study
b. Research Questions
c. Objectives of the Study
d. Significance of the Study
e. Scope and limitation of the Study
 a. Background of the Study

 It introduces the general topic of the study. For

example, if your topic is about language maintenance,
you should introduce it from the first paragraph of your
research background.
 You need to cite previous studies that motivate you to
do your own study.
 Your study cannot just come up out of the blue.
 b. Research Questions

 Your research questions emerge from your research

background.
 You should have 2-3 research questions.
 Each question should inform you what data you need,
how you collect them, and where you collect them.
 If you have different types of questions, make sure you
follow this order: what < why < how.
 Make sure your grammar is right.
 c. Objectives of the Study

 Objectives of the study should be closely related to

your research questions.
 If you have two research questions, you are expected to
have at least two research objectives; you can have
three or four as long as they are related to your research
questions.
 It is better for you to write your study objectives in
paragraph.
 d. Significance of the Study

 You should inform and convince the readers why your

study is worth doing, i.e. what contributions you want
to give after conducting the study.
 The contributions can be in two forms, i.e. theoretical
and practical, if possible.
 e. Scope and Limitation of the Study

 Your study must have scope and limitation. You should

inform this to the readers right here.
 Scope here can mean the specific field of linguistics on
which your study is based, e.g. phonetics, semantics,
sociolinguistics?
 You also need to state the limitation of your study in
terms of, e.g., the theory you use, the source of data and
the data, the participants, etc.
 2. Review of Literature
a. Review of literature provides information about the
concepts, theories, and previous studies of your chosen
topic.
b. If your topic is about language maintenance, you need
to provide its definition, concepts, theories, and a
number of studies closely related to it.
c. You need to discuss the relevant studies and show the
readers how your study is different from them.
 3. Research Method
a. Research Design
b. Source of Data and Data
c. Research Instrument
d. Data Collection
e. Data Analysis
 a. Research Design

 It provides information about your study design. You

should state what type of study it is (is it qualitative or
quantitative and why is it so; is it experimental or non-
experimental?; is it a library study or a field study?,
etc).
 You need to justify why you categorize your study into
a qualitative or quantative study. You can cite sources
that explain characteristics of each approach.
 b. Source of Data and Data

 You need to provide information where your data come

from.
 You also need to specify what your data is.
 If your study is about characteristics of stops and
vowels produced by students of English Department,
your source of data come from sound recordings they
produce while your data are their characteristics of
stops and vowels (measurement results).
 c. Research Instrument

 Research instrument (RI) is any instrument that you use

or help you to collect research data.
 RI depends on the type of data you need to collect. If
your data come from interviews, your research
instrument can be a recording device and a list of
interview questions.
 Basically everything you use to help you collect data.
 d. Data Collection

 You need to specify the method of your data collection

here. Are you using interviews, focus group discussion,
observations, questionnaires, pre-test and post-test?
 Whatever method you choose, you need to write every
step or procedure in doing it, i.e. how you end up with
your data.
 Remember the data you collect must be the ones that
can provide evidence or answers to your RQs.
 e. Data Analysis

 You need to explain to the readers how you will

analyze the data that you have collected.
 Again this should contain a list of steps or procedures
for analyzing the data.
 For qualitative data analysis, you can consult Miles and
Huberman (1994) and for quantitative data analysis,
you just need to state the statistical technique you use.
 4. References
a. References must come from reliable and credible
sources, e.g. from books, peer-reviewed journal articles
(scopus-indexed, or Sinta 1 or 2-indexed).
b. Don’t use introductory books for theories or
bachelor/master’s theses.
c. Use Mendeley for your citation. Never do it manually.
d. You must at least have 12 references, mostly coming
from peer-reviewed journal articles.