Contents of a Research Proposal

1. Introduction
2. Literature review
3. Problem statement,
4. Methodology,
5. Objectives,
6. Expected output,
7. Time frame,
8. Budget and
9. Reference
 Title Page (cover page)
1. Research topic: The research topic should be concise,
descriptive and fairly self-explanatory. Choose a title that is easy
to understand and represent the main theme of your research.
2. Your full-name/ Principal Investigator
3. Name of your supervisor or advisor
4. University/Institute/Department of study
5. Date of submission
pleIntroduction:
Introduce your research. This is a good place to place your research in
the broad context of an important science. You can define new
terminologies, important concepts and state brief outline of the
proposal.

An introduction is meant to give the readers, or audience, an idea of

what is going to be discussed in the body paragraphs. It helps the
audience to prepare themselves for the topic in discussion. Hence,
your introduction should perfectly tally with the contents of the body
paragraphs. It should briefly touch upon the main aspects of the
proposal without revealing the whole of it.
Literature Review
This section demonstrates that you are knowledgeable of the
primary, texts and secondary research studies done by other
researchers and ensure that you are not “reinventing the wheel”.
It is important to note that this section is not merely a summary
of the relevant literature you have read but instead, you have to
provide a critical review on it and be able to relate the literature to
your proposed research. You should point to areas overlooked or
inadequately addressed by previous studies and discuss how your
proposed research could contribute to the knowledge advancement
in the area.
This shows your ability to integrate and synthesize the literature and
 to develop new ideas and innovations.
The followings are the most common deficiencies of a literature
review and you should try to avoid all of them:

 Lack of organization and structure.

 Lack of focus and coherence.
 Being repetitive.
 Failing to cite influential papers or studies.
 Citing irrelevant and trivial references.
 Failing to cite the current papers or studies.
 Failing to critically evaluate cited papers.
Problem Statement

It is a concise description of the problem and significance of a

research.

Methedology

This section should include:


Site description;

The research design, e.g. a questionnaire study or a
laboratory experiment;

The subjects or data source, e.g. who will participate in the
data collection, the sample size and sampling methodology;
 
The instruments, e.g. the kind of measuring instruments or
questionnaires and the reason for choosing these
instruments;

The methods of analysis, e.g. modeling techniques or
statistical methods.

Objectives of the research

These are the general and specific objectives that you will be
pursuing.

Expected outputs
State the contribution of your research to the scientific knowledge
and in solving community problems.
Time frame
Provide a Gantt chart showing the time intervals over which specific
tasks will occur, and when milestones will be reached.
Budget

The Budget must contain details of costs that the candidate expects to
incur in the conduct of the research project.
References
A list of references should be provided in an appropriate academic
format such as:
Articles:
[1] Harrington, H.J. (2000), “Ree
Annual Quality Congress Proceedings, Vol.33 No.7, pp. 466.
Or
Ackoff, R.L. (1971), “Towards a syst
Management Science, Vol. 17 No. 11, pp. 661-71.
Books:
[2] Nunnally, J.C. (1978),-Hill, “PsychNewYork, NY.