Choosing a Topic

Overview

Research Justifications

Prewriting Strategies

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Downloadable Resources

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Diagram for choosing a topic: cartoon outline of a head with a cartoon brain inside, with cartoon lightning and wind. Cartoon wind leads to three clipboards, the one farthest to the left has two lines separated by arrows signaling a gap. The middle clipboard has the word "expectation", and the right one has dots connected by lines, signalling connections.

Choosing a topic is often one of the most challenging tasks a writer faces. In fact, many writers note that once they’ve settled on a topic (or research area, or research question, or theme), 50% of the work is done. But how do you choose what to write about in the first place? And, when you’ve decided, how do you know you’ve made a good choice?

Ideas for topics can come from a variety of places. Some helpful places to start might be a scholarly journal to see what the latest and greatest research is talking about. You can also chat with an expert, or even mine your own experiences. What you probably can’t do is conjure up a topic out of thin air.

Here is something that might help: most research topics engage with what will call the four research justifications. You can pretty much find at least one of these “justifications” in any research article you read. Read on for examples!

Gap in knowledge

A common reason for research is because there are gaps in what we know about a subject (or in what’s been written to this point), so more research needs to be done to fill in those gaps.

The typical goal of a literature review, in which writers summarize the scholarship on a certain topic, is to illustrate the “gaps” in the literature–based on what others have written, what still needs to be explored? We know the impact of, say, gamification on education, but what about gamifying the workplace? What if our physical workspaces became virtual ones, and our day-to-day activities became “games”?

So if you’re trying to come up with a good topic for your paper, the first place you might start is by looking for questions that still haven’t been answered. And if you can find a gap in current research, you can be pretty certain you’re choosing a good topic.

Violation of expectations

The violation of expectations says that within a certain topic or field or practice, we have expectations . . . and those expectations are being violated, so it’s up to us, the writers, to figure out why (or whether that’s okay).

One example of this is a policy paper that recognizes A). elementary students benefit from learning the arts, but B). elementary schools are cutting back on arts classes. Our “expectation” that arts classes are necessary for education is being violated, and so we research to see why that violation is occurring, whether the violation is okay, and whether we need to do anything about it.

Clash between beliefs

One way to think about writing is to remember the metaphor of a writing as a “conversation,” a conversation between the writer and the audience, the writer and other writers, the writer and a set of ideas, etc. Often, participants in conversations clash–or debate, or disagree–so you, as a writer choosing your topic, might choose to wade into the debate with your own arguments.

Example: some say that learning the arts is important for a child’s education; others, that STEM classes trump all. In choosing your topic, you might decide to enter this debate by wondering which side is correct. Or are both sides “right” in one way or another? Are both wrong? Is there a happy medium? Is there a third answer?

Previously unnoticed connection between two or more phenomena

You might consider this a subcategory within the gap knowledge – – in your review of the literature on a certain topic, you notice that a lot of scholars are talking about X while others are talking about Y, but they don’t seem to be talking about both X and Y together. Example: Some have written about Stephen Spielberg, legendary director of sci-fi films like ET, while others have written about Stephen Spielberg, legendary director of historical dramas like Schindler’s List, but what impact did his experience with ET have on his dramatic masterpiece? Can we talk about Stephen Spielberg the entertainer and Stephen Spielberg the historian at the same time?

Conclusion

Writers find thousands of different ways to come up with what to write about, from writing what you know to uncovering cutting-edge research questions. If the writing task you’re working on doesn’t allow you to choose a topic based purely on what interests you most, try looking for one of these research justifications. Chances are, even if you feel like you’ve conjured up your topic out of thin air, i.e. as a fan of Apple’s iPhone you decide to write about the impact the iPhone has had in popular culture, your topic is still going to connect to one of these four justifications. Perhaps there’s an unnoticed connection between how the iPhone has influenced the way we think about social media, or maybe there’s a clash between beliefs (Google vs Apple, Android vs. IOS, etc).

Choosing a Topic

How do you choose what to write about in the first place? And, when you’ve decided, how do you know you’ve made a good choice?

Gap in knowledge

Violation of expectations

Clash between beliefs

Previously unnoticed connection between two or more phenomena

Conclusion

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