Abstract

1. Introduction

be sharp, concrete, and ambitious. This is where you will sell that your idea is worthy.
The following could be subsections or just paragraphs without subheadings

● Set the scene, capture attention

● Background, definition and review (what is known)

● problem statement and gap

● Significance

● Purposes, objectives and/or research questions

● Scope, delimitations (YOUR FOCUS)

2. Literature review

Do NOT Tell Stories of other scholars.

E.g. Article 1 did this. They found tha,,, They used this method…. Article 2 did this. They found …

TELL YOUR STORY referring to others.

E.g. Topic one is … ( ref 1). Concept 1 affects concept 2 (ref 2). Concept 2 was also found to … (article 3.).
You can also (you don’t have to) disagree, challenge, critique or question some of the previous findings, so
long as you have argumentation.
Structurewise, just identify your main topics or concepts of interest, and have a section about each.
One of the sections usually focuses on theoretical framework.
2.1 Topic 1

● SUBTOPIC 1.1

● SUBTOPIC 1.2

● SUBTOPIC 1.3
2.2 Topic 2

● SUBTOPIC 2.1

● SUBTOPIC 2.2

● SUBTOPIC 2.3

2.3 MORE TOPICS (3, 4)… IF NECESSARY

2.4 Summary and Implications (OPTIONAL)

3. Methodology
This section is usually very straightforward. You are basically telling what you did and why. Sections are for
reference only, and may be different depending on study type and method.
3.1 Philosophy of science
3.2 Study design
3.3 Data
3.4 Data analysis
3.5 Ethics and limitations (optional)

4. Results / Analyses
Make sure you have a clear structure, with heading and subheadings. Topics can be derived from research
questions or objective, or from survey instruments.
4.1 TOPIC 1
4.2 TOPIC 2
...

5. Discussion
This is where storytelling mainly comes. You must compare your results (sec 4) with previous literature (sec
2 and more). Which of your results are 1) completely new, expected or unexpected, or 2) confirms 3)
contradict or 4) extends previous literature in what ways and why. You do not need to have subheadings, but
you can. Regardless, it must be well structured.

6. Conclusions
Make sure that your research questions are answered (or research objectives met) here in this section! And
also, you are supposed to go beyond the answer and say “so what?” How do your findings help contributes
or extends current knowledge, and how it can be used by practitioners. But all these should take no longer
than 1-2 pages max.
6.1 Brief summary
6.2 Theoretical implications/ contributions
6.3 Practical implications/ contributions
6.4 Limitations and future research directions

7. References
This is where students pay less attention to, but a quick look on references, helps the advisor to have a first
positive or negative impression about your project.
Use one and only one referencing style (e.g. APA) throughout the entire document and reference list. You
can use google scholar, endnote or similar tools but make sure you manually go through the list and fix
issues (there usually are).