Greetings. I’m Dr. James Patterson. I’m an English professor at a community college, a junior college, in the United States, state of California. I’m putting together this video series of tutorials on how to write a research paper in right format of research paper to assist students who are preparing for the research demands of their junior and senior years at a university where they’re working in their field of study. In preparing to do this series I’ve come across the number of different terms that are used to describe or define a research paper in right format of research paper. I’d like to go over those four with you. Number 1, the most common phrase used to describe a research paper in right format of research paper is an expanded essay. That is, you the student, the writer, have prepared your essay expositing your ideas, and you bring in research to support, to clarify, or to demonstrate your expanded essay, your points in the paper. The second most common phrase used to describe a research paper in right format of research paper is the term investigative report. Particularly in the social and hard sciences, oftentimes you will be conducting actual experiments in the field and then putting together a report for your professor on the findings of, and the data of, your research, and so an investigative report is where you’ve done the investigation, and now you’re putting together a research paper in right format of research paper that gives the report of your investigation. A third common phrase that’s used in describing a research paper in right format of research paper is the term formal presentation. Now that means in very simple terms that the research paper in right format of research paper needs to be in a particular format as you’re preparing it for your professor. In the academic world there are probably four dominant style manuals out there. I’m an English professor in the Humanities, and so I often utilize the Modern Language Association or MLA style. In the social sciences, the most common is the American Psychological Association or APA style. Many schools across the country and across the world will use the Chicago Manual of Style, and then the fourth one is the Oxford University style manual in the European states.
There is another type of style out there that causes a lot of confusion for many students, and that’s called the AP style. That’s The Associated Press style, and much of the websites, many of the articles and magazines that students look at in doing their research is written in The Associated Press style, which is the journalism style. And a lot of students have difficulty then converting that style over to the accepted and required format for their professors. So once you get to the university, I recommend that you get a clear understanding of which style manual you’ll be using in your junior and senior classes and get a manual for that particular style. The fourth thing that’s often used to describe a research paper in right format of research paper, although not as common as the first three types, is the term evidence. When you submit a research paper in right research paper format to your professor, you are publishing that paper to the professor, and it is evidence of learning. I have a book here the “10 Steps in Writing a Research paper in right format of research paper” by Markman, Markman, and Waddell, and in this particular book Markman and Markman say that a research paper in right format of research paper is “a valid criterion for judging the disciplined work habits and the intellectual maturity of the student.” So when you turn in your research paper in right research paper in right format to your professor, understand that it is evidence of your knowledge, evidence of your disciplined work habits or lack thereof, and evidence of your intellectual maturity as a student or lack thereof. And then the question is asked why is a research paper in right research paper format important. And for that I want to take a quote from Laurie Rozakis in her book “Writing Great Research paper in right format of research papers.” In this book Laurie Rozakis says a research paper in right format of research paper “shows your instructor that you can gather, evaluate, and synthesize information in short that you can think.” Now let me paraphrase that and do it again. A research paper in right format of research paper shows your instructor that you can gather good information, that you can evaluate the information to make sure you’re using good credible information, that you can synthesize that information and incorporate it into your own thoughts, your own ideas, in your paper; in short, a research paper in right research paper format demonstrates to your professor that you know how to think.
In the following videos I’ll talk about other short topics as we go through this, but I wanted to take just a moment and explain what is a research paper in right research paper format. Thank you.