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How to write a research plan: Step-by-step guide

Last updated

30 January 2024

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Today’s businesses and institutions rely on data and analytics to inform their product and service decisions. These metrics influence how organizations stay competitive and inspire innovation. However, gathering data and insights requires carefully constructed research, and every research project needs a roadmap. This is where a research plan comes into play.

Read this step-by-step guide for writing a detailed research plan that can apply to any project, whether it’s scientific, educational, or business-related.

• What is a research plan?

A research plan is a documented overview of a project in its entirety, from end to end. It details the research efforts, participants, and methods needed, along with any anticipated results. It also outlines the project’s goals and mission, creating layers of steps to achieve those goals within a specified timeline.

Without a research plan, you and your team are flying blind, potentially wasting time and resources to pursue research without structured guidance.

The principal investigator, or PI, is responsible for facilitating the research oversight. They will create the research plan and inform team members and stakeholders of every detail relating to the project. The PI will also use the research plan to inform decision-making throughout the project.

• Why do you need a research plan?

Create a research plan before starting any official research to maximize every effort in pursuing and collecting the research data. Crucially, the plan will model the activities needed at each phase of the research project .

Like any roadmap, a research plan serves as a valuable tool providing direction for those involved in the project—both internally and externally. It will keep you and your immediate team organized and task-focused while also providing necessary definitions and timelines so you can execute your project initiatives with full understanding and transparency.

External stakeholders appreciate a working research plan because it’s a great communication tool, documenting progress and changing dynamics as they arise. Any participants of your planned research sessions will be informed about the purpose of your study, while the exercises will be based on the key messaging outlined in the official plan.

Here are some of the benefits of creating a research plan document for every project:

Project organization and structure

Well-informed participants

All stakeholders and teams align in support of the project

Clearly defined project definitions and purposes

Distractions are eliminated, prioritizing task focus

Timely management of individual task schedules and roles

Costly reworks are avoided

• What should a research plan include?

The different aspects of your research plan will depend on the nature of the project. However, most official research plan documents will include the core elements below. Each aims to define the problem statement , devising an official plan for seeking a solution.

Specific project goals and individual objectives

Ideal strategies or methods for reaching those goals

Required resources

Descriptions of the target audience, sample sizes , demographics, and scopes

Key performance indicators (KPIs)

Project background

Research and testing support

Preliminary studies and progress reporting mechanisms

Cost estimates and change order processes

Depending on the research project’s size and scope, your research plan could be brief—perhaps only a few pages of documented plans. Alternatively, it could be a fully comprehensive report. Either way, it’s an essential first step in dictating your project’s facilitation in the most efficient and effective way.

• How to write a research plan for your project

When you start writing your research plan, aim to be detailed about each step, requirement, and idea. The more time you spend curating your research plan, the more precise your research execution efforts will be.

Account for every potential scenario, and be sure to address each and every aspect of the research.

Consider following this flow to develop a great research plan for your project:

Define your project’s purpose

Start by defining your project’s purpose. Identify what your project aims to accomplish and what you are researching. Remember to use clear language.

Thinking about the project’s purpose will help you set realistic goals and inform how you divide tasks and assign responsibilities. These individual tasks will be your stepping stones to reach your overarching goal.

Additionally, you’ll want to identify the specific problem, the usability metrics needed, and the intended solutions.

Know the following three things about your project’s purpose before you outline anything else:

What you’re doing

Why you’re doing it

What you expect from it

Identify individual objectives

With your overarching project objectives in place, you can identify any individual goals or steps needed to reach those objectives. Break them down into phases or steps. You can work backward from the project goal and identify every process required to facilitate it.

Be mindful to identify each unique task so that you can assign responsibilities to various team members. At this point in your research plan development, you’ll also want to assign priority to those smaller, more manageable steps and phases that require more immediate or dedicated attention.

Select research methods

Once you have outlined your goals, objectives, steps, and tasks, it’s time to drill down on selecting research methods . You’ll want to leverage specific research strategies and processes. When you know what methods will help you reach your goals, you and your teams will have direction to perform and execute your assigned tasks.

Research methods might include any of the following:

User interviews : this is a qualitative research method where researchers engage with participants in one-on-one or group conversations. The aim is to gather insights into their experiences, preferences, and opinions to uncover patterns, trends, and data.

Field studies : this approach allows for a contextual understanding of behaviors, interactions, and processes in real-world settings. It involves the researcher immersing themselves in the field, conducting observations, interviews, or experiments to gather in-depth insights.

Card sorting : participants categorize information by sorting content cards into groups based on their perceived similarities. You might use this process to gain insights into participants’ mental models and preferences when navigating or organizing information on websites, apps, or other systems.

Focus groups : use organized discussions among select groups of participants to provide relevant views and experiences about a particular topic.

Diary studies : ask participants to record their experiences, thoughts, and activities in a diary over a specified period. This method provides a deeper understanding of user experiences, uncovers patterns, and identifies areas for improvement.

Five-second testing: participants are shown a design, such as a web page or interface, for just five seconds. They then answer questions about their initial impressions and recall, allowing you to evaluate the design’s effectiveness.

Surveys : get feedback from participant groups with structured surveys. You can use online forms, telephone interviews, or paper questionnaires to reveal trends, patterns, and correlations.

Tree testing : tree testing involves researching web assets through the lens of findability and navigability. Participants are given a textual representation of the site’s hierarchy (the “tree”) and asked to locate specific information or complete tasks by selecting paths.

Usability testing : ask participants to interact with a product, website, or application to evaluate its ease of use. This method enables you to uncover areas for improvement in digital key feature functionality by observing participants using the product.

Live website testing: research and collect analytics that outlines the design, usability, and performance efficiencies of a website in real time.

There are no limits to the number of research methods you could use within your project. Just make sure your research methods help you determine the following:

What do you plan to do with the research findings?

What decisions will this research inform? How can your stakeholders leverage the research data and results?

Recruit participants and allocate tasks

Next, identify the participants needed to complete the research and the resources required to complete the tasks. Different people will be proficient at different tasks, and having a task allocation plan will allow everything to run smoothly.

Prepare a thorough project summary

Every well-designed research plan will feature a project summary. This official summary will guide your research alongside its communications or messaging. You’ll use the summary while recruiting participants and during stakeholder meetings. It can also be useful when conducting field studies.

Ensure this summary includes all the elements of your research project . Separate the steps into an easily explainable piece of text that includes the following:

An introduction: the message you’ll deliver to participants about the interview, pre-planned questioning, and testing tasks.

Interview questions: prepare questions you intend to ask participants as part of your research study, guiding the sessions from start to finish.

An exit message: draft messaging your teams will use to conclude testing or survey sessions. These should include the next steps and express gratitude for the participant’s time.

Create a realistic timeline

While your project might already have a deadline or a results timeline in place, you’ll need to consider the time needed to execute it effectively.

Realistically outline the time needed to properly execute each supporting phase of research and implementation. And, as you evaluate the necessary schedules, be sure to include additional time for achieving each milestone in case any changes or unexpected delays arise.

For this part of your research plan, you might find it helpful to create visuals to ensure your research team and stakeholders fully understand the information.

Determine how to present your results

A research plan must also describe how you intend to present your results. Depending on the nature of your project and its goals, you might dedicate one team member (the PI) or assume responsibility for communicating the findings yourself.

In this part of the research plan, you’ll articulate how you’ll share the results. Detail any materials you’ll use, such as:

Presentations and slides

A project report booklet

A project findings pamphlet

Documents with key takeaways and statistics

Graphic visuals to support your findings

• Format your research plan

As you create your research plan, you can enjoy a little creative freedom. A plan can assume many forms, so format it how you see fit. Determine the best layout based on your specific project, intended communications, and the preferences of your teams and stakeholders.

Find format inspiration among the following layouts:

Written outlines

Narrative storytelling

Visual mapping

Graphic timelines

Remember, the research plan format you choose will be subject to change and adaptation as your research and findings unfold. However, your final format should ideally outline questions, problems, opportunities, and expectations.

• Research plan example

Imagine you’ve been tasked with finding out how to get more customers to order takeout from an online food delivery platform. The goal is to improve satisfaction and retain existing customers. You set out to discover why more people aren’t ordering and what it is they do want to order or experience. 

You identify the need for a research project that helps you understand what drives customer loyalty . But before you jump in and start calling past customers, you need to develop a research plan—the roadmap that provides focus, clarity, and realistic details to the project.

Here’s an example outline of a research plan you might put together:

Project title

Project members involved in the research plan

Purpose of the project (provide a summary of the research plan’s intent)

Objective 1 (provide a short description for each objective)

Objective 2

Objective 3

Proposed timeline

Audience (detail the group you want to research, such as customers or non-customers)

Budget (how much you think it might cost to do the research)

Risk factors/contingencies (any potential risk factors that may impact the project’s success)

Remember, your research plan doesn’t have to reinvent the wheel—it just needs to fit your project’s unique needs and aims.

Customizing a research plan template

Some companies offer research plan templates to help get you started. However, it may make more sense to develop your own customized plan template. Be sure to include the core elements of a great research plan with your template layout, including the following:

Introductions to participants and stakeholders

Background problems and needs statement

Significance, ethics, and purpose

Research methods, questions, and designs

Preliminary beliefs and expectations

Implications and intended outcomes

Realistic timelines for each phase

Conclusion and presentations

How many pages should a research plan be?

Generally, a research plan can vary in length between 500 to 1,500 words. This is roughly three pages of content. More substantial projects will be 2,000 to 3,500 words, taking up four to seven pages of planning documents.

What is the difference between a research plan and a research proposal?

A research plan is a roadmap to success for research teams. A research proposal, on the other hand, is a dissertation aimed at convincing or earning the support of others. Both are relevant in creating a guide to follow to complete a project goal.

What are the seven steps to developing a research plan?

While each research project is different, it’s best to follow these seven general steps to create your research plan:

Defining the problem

Identifying goals

Choosing research methods

Recruiting participants

Preparing the brief or summary

Establishing task timelines

Defining how you will present the findings

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How to plan a research project

Whether for a paper or a thesis, define your question, review the work of others – and leave yourself open to discovery.

by Brooke Harrington   + BIO

is professor of sociology at Dartmouth College in New Hampshire. Her research has won international awards both for scholarly quality and impact on public life. She has published dozens of articles and three books, most recently the bestseller Capital without Borders (2016), now translated into five languages.

Edited by Sam Haselby

Need to know

‘When curiosity turns to serious matters, it’s called research.’ – From Aphorisms (1880-1905) by Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach

Planning research projects is a time-honoured intellectual exercise: one that requires both creativity and sharp analytical skills. The purpose of this Guide is to make the process systematic and easy to understand. While there is a great deal of freedom and discovery involved – from the topics you choose, to the data and methods you apply – there are also some norms and constraints that obtain, no matter what your academic level or field of study. For those in high school through to doctoral students, and from art history to archaeology, research planning involves broadly similar steps, including: formulating a question, developing an argument or predictions based on previous research, then selecting the information needed to answer your question.

Some of this might sound self-evident but, as you’ll find, research requires a different way of approaching and using information than most of us are accustomed to in everyday life. That is why I include orienting yourself to knowledge-creation as an initial step in the process. This is a crucial and underappreciated phase in education, akin to making the transition from salaried employment to entrepreneurship: suddenly, you’re on your own, and that requires a new way of thinking about your work.

What follows is a distillation of what I’ve learned about this process over 27 years as a professional social scientist. It reflects the skills that my own professors imparted in the sociology doctoral programme at Harvard, as well as what I learned later on as a research supervisor for Ivy League PhD and MA students, and then as the author of award-winning scholarly books and articles. It can be adapted to the demands of both short projects (such as course term papers) and long ones, such as a thesis.

At its simplest, research planning involves the four distinct steps outlined below: orienting yourself to knowledge-creation; defining your research question; reviewing previous research on your question; and then choosing relevant data to formulate your own answers. Because the focus of this Guide is on planning a research project, as opposed to conducting a research project, this section won’t delve into the details of data-collection or analysis; those steps happen after you plan the project. In addition, the topic is vast: year-long doctoral courses are devoted to data and analysis. Instead, the fourth part of this section will outline some basic strategies you could use in planning a data-selection and analysis process appropriate to your research question.

Step 1: Orient yourself

Planning and conducting research requires you to make a transition, from thinking like a consumer of information to thinking like a producer of information. That sounds simple, but it’s actually a complex task. As a practical matter, this means putting aside the mindset of a student, which treats knowledge as something created by other people. As students, we are often passive receivers of knowledge: asked to do a specified set of readings, then graded on how well we reproduce what we’ve read.

Researchers, however, must take on an active role as knowledge producers . Doing research requires more of you than reading and absorbing what other people have written: you have to engage in a dialogue with it. That includes arguing with previous knowledge and perhaps trying to show that ideas we have accepted as given are actually wrong or incomplete. For example, rather than simply taking in the claims of an author you read, you’ll need to draw out the implications of those claims: if what the author is saying is true, what else does that suggest must be true? What predictions could you make based on the author’s claims?

In other words, rather than treating a reading as a source of truth – even if it comes from a revered source, such as Plato or Marie Curie – this orientation step asks you to treat the claims you read as provisional and subject to interrogation. That is one of the great pieces of wisdom that science and philosophy can teach us: that the biggest advances in human understanding have been made not by being correct about trivial things, but by being wrong in an interesting way . For example, Albert Einstein was wrong about quantum mechanics, but his arguments about it with his fellow physicist Niels Bohr have led to some of the biggest breakthroughs in science, even a century later.

Step 2: Define your research question

Students often give this step cursory attention, but experienced researchers know that formulating a good question is sometimes the most difficult part of the research planning process. That is because the precise language of the question frames the rest of the project. It’s therefore important to pose the question carefully, in a way that’s both possible to answer and likely to yield interesting results. Of course, you must choose a question that interests you, but that’s only the beginning of what’s likely to be an iterative process: most researchers come back to this step repeatedly, modifying their questions in light of previous research, resource limitations and other considerations.

Researchers face limits in terms of time and money. They, like everyone else, have to pose research questions that they can plausibly answer given the constraints they face. For example, it would be inadvisable to frame a project around the question ‘What are the roots of the Arab-Israeli conflict?’ if you have only a week to develop an answer and no background on that topic. That’s not to limit your imagination: you can come up with any question you’d like. But it typically does require some creativity to frame a question that you can answer well – that is, by investigating thoroughly and providing new insights – within the limits you face.

In addition to being interesting to you, and feasible within your resource constraints, the third and most important characteristic of a ‘good’ research topic is whether it allows you to create new knowledge. It might turn out that your question has already been asked and answered to your satisfaction: if so, you’ll find out in the next step of this process. On the other hand, you might come up with a research question that hasn’t been addressed previously. Before you get too excited about breaking uncharted ground, consider this: a lot of potentially researchable questions haven’t been studied for good reason ; they might have answers that are trivial or of very limited interest. This could include questions such as ‘Why does the area of a circle equal π r²?’ or ‘Did winter conditions affect Napoleon’s plans to invade Russia?’ Of course, you might be able to make the argument that a seemingly trivial question is actually vitally important, but you must be prepared to back that up with convincing evidence. The exercise in the ‘Learn More’ section below will help you think through some of these issues.

Finally, scholarly research questions must in some way lead to new and distinctive insights. For example, lots of people have studied gender roles in sports teams; what can you ask that hasn’t been asked before? Reinventing the wheel is the number-one no-no in this endeavour. That’s why the next step is so important: reviewing previous research on your topic. Depending on what you find in that step, you might need to revise your research question; iterating between your question and the existing literature is a normal process. But don’t worry: it doesn’t go on forever. In fact, the iterations taper off – and your research question stabilises – as you develop a firm grasp of the current state of knowledge on your topic.

Step 3: Review previous research

In academic research, from articles to books, it’s common to find a section called a ‘literature review’. The purpose of that section is to describe the state of the art in knowledge on the research question that a project has posed. It demonstrates that researchers have thoroughly and systematically reviewed the relevant findings of previous studies on their topic, and that they have something novel to contribute.

Your own research project should include something like this, even if it’s a high-school term paper. In the research planning process, you’ll want to list at least half a dozen bullet points stating the major findings on your topic by other people. In relation to those findings, you should be able to specify where your project could provide new and necessary insights. There are two basic rhetorical positions one can take in framing the novelty-plus-importance argument required of academic research:

• Position 1 requires you to build on or extend a set of existing ideas; that means saying something like: ‘Person A has argued that X is true about gender; this implies Y, which has not yet been tested. My project will test Y, and if I find evidence to support it, that will change the way we understand gender.’
• Position 2 is to argue that there is a gap in existing knowledge, either because previous research has reached conflicting conclusions or has failed to consider something important. For example, one could say that research on middle schoolers and gender has been limited by being conducted primarily in coeducational environments, and that findings might differ dramatically if research were conducted in more schools where the student body was all-male or all-female.

Your overall goal in this step of the process is to show that your research will be part of a larger conversation: that is, how your project flows from what’s already known, and how it advances, extends or challenges that existing body of knowledge. That will be the contribution of your project, and it constitutes the motivation for your research.

Two things are worth mentioning about your search for sources of relevant previous research. First, you needn’t look only at studies on your precise topic. For example, if you want to study gender-identity formation in schools, you shouldn’t restrict yourself to studies of schools; the empirical setting (schools) is secondary to the larger social process that interests you (how people form gender identity). That process occurs in many different settings, so cast a wide net. Second, be sure to use legitimate sources – meaning publications that have been through some sort of vetting process, whether that involves peer review (as with academic journal articles you might find via Google Scholar) or editorial review (as you’d find in well-known mass media publications, such as The Economist or The Washington Post ). What you’ll want to avoid is using unvetted sources such as personal blogs or Wikipedia. Why? Because anybody can write anything in those forums, and there is no way to know – unless you’re already an expert – if the claims you find there are accurate. Often, they’re not.

Step 4: Choose your data and methods

Whatever your research question is, eventually you’ll need to consider which data source and analytical strategy are most likely to provide the answers you’re seeking. One starting point is to consider whether your question would be best addressed by qualitative data (such as interviews, observations or historical records), quantitative data (such as surveys or census records) or some combination of both. Your ideas about data sources will, in turn, suggest options for analytical methods.

You might need to collect your own data, or you might find everything you need readily available in an existing dataset someone else has created. A great place to start is with a research librarian: university libraries always have them and, at public universities, those librarians can work with the public, including people who aren’t affiliated with the university. If you don’t happen to have a public university and its library close at hand, an ordinary public library can still be a good place to start: the librarians are often well versed in accessing data sources that might be relevant to your study, such as the census, or historical archives, or the Survey of Consumer Finances.

Because your task at this point is to plan research, rather than conduct it, the purpose of this step is not to commit you irrevocably to a course of action. Instead, your goal here is to think through a feasible approach to answering your research question. You’ll need to find out, for example, whether the data you want exist; if not, do you have a realistic chance of gathering the data yourself, or would it be better to modify your research question? In terms of analysis, would your strategy require you to apply statistical methods? If so, do you have those skills? If not, do you have time to learn them, or money to hire a research assistant to run the analysis for you?

Please be aware that qualitative methods in particular are not the casual undertaking they might appear to be. Many people make the mistake of thinking that only quantitative data and methods are scientific and systematic, while qualitative methods are just a fancy way of saying: ‘I talked to some people, read some old newspapers, and drew my own conclusions.’ Nothing could be further from the truth. In the final section of this guide, you’ll find some links to resources that will provide more insight on standards and procedures governing qualitative research, but suffice it to say: there are rules about what constitutes legitimate evidence and valid analytical procedure for qualitative data, just as there are for quantitative data.

Circle back and consider revising your initial plans

As you work through these four steps in planning your project, it’s perfectly normal to circle back and revise. Research planning is rarely a linear process. It’s also common for new and unexpected avenues to suggest themselves. As the sociologist Thorstein Veblen wrote in 1908 : ‘The outcome of any serious research can only be to make two questions grow where only one grew before.’ That’s as true of research planning as it is of a completed project. Try to enjoy the horizons that open up for you in this process, rather than becoming overwhelmed; the four steps, along with the two exercises that follow, will help you focus your plan and make it manageable.

Key points – How to plan a research project

• Planning a research project is essential no matter your academic level or field of study. There is no one ‘best’ way to design research, but there are certain guidelines that can be helpfully applied across disciplines.
• Orient yourself to knowledge-creation. Make the shift from being a consumer of information to being a producer of information.
• Define your research question. Your question frames the rest of your project, sets the scope, and determines the kinds of answers you can find.
• Review previous research on your question. Survey the existing body of relevant knowledge to ensure that your research will be part of a larger conversation.
• Choose your data and methods. For instance, will you be collecting qualitative data, via interviews, or numerical data, via surveys?
• Circle back and consider revising your initial plans. Expect your research question in particular to undergo multiple rounds of refinement as you learn more about your topic.

Good research questions tend to beget more questions. This can be frustrating for those who want to get down to business right away. Try to make room for the unexpected: this is usually how knowledge advances. Many of the most significant discoveries in human history have been made by people who were looking for something else entirely. There are ways to structure your research planning process without over-constraining yourself; the two exercises below are a start, and you can find further methods in the Links and Books section.

The following exercise provides a structured process for advancing your research project planning. After completing it, you’ll be able to do the following:

• describe clearly and concisely the question you’ve chosen to study
• summarise the state of the art in knowledge about the question, and where your project could contribute new insight
• identify the best strategy for gathering and analysing relevant data

In other words, the following provides a systematic means to establish the building blocks of your research project.

Exercise 1: Definition of research question and sources

This exercise prompts you to select and clarify your general interest area, develop a research question, and investigate sources of information. The annotated bibliography will also help you refine your research question so that you can begin the second assignment, a description of the phenomenon you wish to study.

Jot down a few bullet points in response to these two questions, with the understanding that you’ll probably go back and modify your answers as you begin reading other studies relevant to your topic:

• What will be the general topic of your paper?
• What will be the specific topic of your paper?

b) Research question(s)

Use the following guidelines to frame a research question – or questions – that will drive your analysis. As with Part 1 above, you’ll probably find it necessary to change or refine your research question(s) as you complete future assignments.

• Your question should be phrased so that it can’t be answered with a simple ‘yes’ or ‘no’.
• Your question should have more than one plausible answer.
• Your question should draw relationships between two or more concepts; framing the question in terms of How? or What? often works better than asking Why ?

c) Annotated bibliography

Most or all of your background information should come from two sources: scholarly books and journals, or reputable mass media sources. You might be able to access journal articles electronically through your library, using search engines such as JSTOR and Google Scholar. This can save you a great deal of time compared with going to the library in person to search periodicals. General news sources, such as those accessible through LexisNexis, are acceptable, but should be cited sparingly, since they don’t carry the same level of credibility as scholarly sources. As discussed above, unvetted sources such as blogs and Wikipedia should be avoided, because the quality of the information they provide is unreliable and often misleading.

To create an annotated bibliography, provide the following information for at least 10 sources relevant to your specific topic, using the format suggested below.

Name of author(s):

Publication date:

Title of book, chapter, or article:

If a chapter or article, title of journal or book where they appear:

Brief description of this work, including main findings and methods ( c 75 words):

Summary of how this work contributes to your project ( c 75 words):

Brief description of the implications of this work ( c 25 words):

Identify any gap or controversy in knowledge this work points up, and how your project could address those problems ( c 50 words):

Exercise 2: Towards an analysis

Develop a short statement ( c 250 words) about the kind of data that would be useful to address your research question, and how you’d analyse it. Some questions to consider in writing this statement include:

• What are the central concepts or variables in your project? Offer a brief definition of each.
• Do any data sources exist on those concepts or variables, or would you need to collect data?
• Of the analytical strategies you could apply to that data, which would be the most appropriate to answer your question? Which would be the most feasible for you? Consider at least two methods, noting their advantages or disadvantages for your project.

Links & books

One of the best texts ever written about planning and executing research comes from a source that might be unexpected: a 60-year-old work on urban planning by a self-trained scholar. The classic book The Death and Life of Great American Cities (1961) by Jane Jacobs (available complete and free of charge via this link ) is worth reading in its entirety just for the pleasure of it. But the final 20 pages – a concluding chapter titled ‘The Kind of Problem a City Is’ – are really about the process of thinking through and investigating a problem. Highly recommended as a window into the craft of research.

Jacobs’s text references an essay on advancing human knowledge by the mathematician Warren Weaver. At the time, Weaver was director of the Rockefeller Foundation, in charge of funding basic research in the natural and medical sciences. Although the essay is titled ‘A Quarter Century in the Natural Sciences’ (1960) and appears at first blush to be merely a summation of one man’s career, it turns out to be something much bigger and more interesting: a meditation on the history of human beings seeking answers to big questions about the world. Weaver goes back to the 17th century to trace the origins of systematic research thinking, with enthusiasm and vivid anecdotes that make the process come alive. The essay is worth reading in its entirety, and is available free of charge via this link .

For those seeking a more in-depth, professional-level discussion of the logic of research design, the political scientist Harvey Starr provides insight in a compact format in the article ‘Cumulation from Proper Specification: Theory, Logic, Research Design, and “Nice” Laws’ (2005). Starr reviews the ‘research triad’, consisting of the interlinked considerations of formulating a question, selecting relevant theories and applying appropriate methods. The full text of the article, published in the scholarly journal Conflict Management and Peace Science , is available, free of charge, via this link .

Finally, the book Getting What You Came For (1992) by Robert Peters is not only an outstanding guide for anyone contemplating graduate school – from the application process onward – but it also includes several excellent chapters on planning and executing research, applicable across a wide variety of subject areas. It was an invaluable resource for me 25 years ago, and it remains in print with good reason; I recommend it to all my students, particularly Chapter 16 (‘The Thesis Topic: Finding It’), Chapter 17 (‘The Thesis Proposal’) and Chapter 18 (‘The Thesis: Writing It’).

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How to Do Your Research Project: A Guide for Students

Student resources, welcome to the digital roadmap and resources.

Work your way through  interactive exercises  for each stage of the research project roadmap and watch  videos   from your pocket supervisor, Gary Thomas. Explore real-world practice through  case studies   and  journal articles . Reflect, revise, and take your learning on the go with  worksheets  and get to grips with key terms and concepts using digital  flashcards .

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How to Get Started With a Research Project

Last Updated: October 3, 2023 Fact Checked

This article was co-authored by Chris Hadley, PhD . Chris Hadley, PhD is part of the wikiHow team and works on content strategy and data and analytics. Chris Hadley earned his PhD in Cognitive Psychology from UCLA in 2006. Chris' academic research has been published in numerous scientific journals. This article has been fact-checked, ensuring the accuracy of any cited facts and confirming the authority of its sources. This article has been viewed 313,128 times.

You'll be required to undertake and complete research projects throughout your academic career and even, in many cases, as a member of the workforce. Don't worry if you feel stuck or intimidated by the idea of a research project, with care and dedication, you can get the project done well before the deadline!

Development and Foundation

• Don't hesitate while writing down ideas. You'll end up with some mental noise on the paper – silly or nonsensical phrases that your brain just pushes out. That's fine. Think of it as sweeping the cobwebs out of your attic. After a minute or two, better ideas will begin to form (and you might have a nice little laugh at your own expense in the meantime).

• Some instructors will even provide samples of previously successful topics if you ask for them. Just be careful that you don't end up stuck with an idea you want to do, but are afraid to do because you know someone else did it before.

• For example, if your research topic is “urban poverty,” you could look at that topic across ethnic or sexual lines, but you could also look into corporate wages, minimum wage laws, the cost of medical benefits, the loss of unskilled jobs in the urban core, and on and on. You could also try comparing and contrasting urban poverty with suburban or rural poverty, and examine things that might be different about both areas, such as diet and exercise levels, or air pollution.

• Think in terms of questions you want answered. A good research project should collect information for the purpose of answering (or at least attempting to answer) a question. As you review and interconnect topics, you'll think of questions that don't seem to have clear answers yet. These questions are your research topics.

• Don't limit yourself to libraries and online databases. Think in terms of outside resources as well: primary sources, government agencies, even educational TV programs. If you want to know about differences in animal population between public land and an Indian reservation, call the reservation and see if you can speak to their department of fish and wildlife.
• If you're planning to go ahead with original research, that's great – but those techniques aren't covered in this article. Instead, speak with qualified advisors and work with them to set up a thorough, controlled, repeatable process for gathering information.

• If your plan comes down to “researching the topic,” and there aren't any more specific things you can say about it, write down the types of sources you plan to use instead: books (library or private?), magazines (which ones?), interviews, and so on. Your preliminary research should have given you a solid idea of where to begin.

Expanding Your Idea with Research

• It's generally considered more convincing to source one item from three different authors who all agree on it than it is to rely too heavily on one book. Go for quantity at least as much as quality. Be sure to check citations, endnotes, and bibliographies to get more potential sources (and see whether or not all your authors are just quoting the same, older author).
• Writing down your sources and any other relevant details (such as context) around your pieces of information right now will save you lots of trouble in the future.

• Use many different queries to get the database results you want. If one phrasing or a particular set of words doesn't yield useful results, try rephrasing it or using synonymous terms. Online academic databases tend to be dumber than the sum of their parts, so you'll have to use tangentially related terms and inventive language to get all the results you want.

• If it's sensible, consider heading out into the field and speaking to ordinary people for their opinions. This isn't always appropriate (or welcomed) in a research project, but in some cases, it can provide you with some excellent perspective for your research.
• Review cultural artifacts as well. In many areas of study, there's useful information on attitudes, hopes, and/or concerns of people in a particular time and place contained within the art, music, and writing they produced. One has only to look at the woodblock prints of the later German Expressionists, for example, to understand that they lived in a world they felt was often dark, grotesque, and hopeless. Song lyrics and poetry can likewise express strong popular attitudes.

Expert Q&A

• Start early. The foundation of a great research project is the research, which takes time and patience to gather even if you aren't performing any original research of your own. Set aside time for it whenever you can, at least until your initial gathering phase is complete. Past that point, the project should practically come together on its own. Thanks Helpful 1 Not Helpful 0
• When in doubt, write more, rather than less. It's easier to pare down and reorganize an overabundance of information than it is to puff up a flimsy core of facts and anecdotes. Thanks Helpful 1 Not Helpful 0

• Respect the wishes of others. Unless you're a research journalist, it's vital that you yield to the wishes and requests of others before engaging in original research, even if it's technically ethical. Many older American Indians, for instance, harbor a great deal of cultural resentment towards social scientists who visit reservations for research, even those invited by tribal governments for important reasons such as language revitalization. Always tread softly whenever you're out of your element, and only work with those who want to work with you. Thanks Helpful 8 Not Helpful 2
• Be mindful of ethical concerns. Especially if you plan to use original research, there are very stringent ethical guidelines that must be followed for any credible academic body to accept it. Speak to an advisor (such as a professor) about what you plan to do and what steps you should take to verify that it will be ethical. Thanks Helpful 6 Not Helpful 2

You Might Also Like

• ↑ http://www.butte.edu/departments/cas/tipsheets/research/research_paper.html
• ↑ https://www.nhcc.edu/academics/library/doing-library-research/basic-steps-research-process
• ↑ https://library.sacredheart.edu/c.php?g=29803&p=185905
• ↑ https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/general_writing/common_writing_assignments/research_papers/choosing_a_topic.html
• ↑ https://www.unr.edu/writing-speaking-center/student-resources/writing-speaking-resources/using-an-interview-in-a-research-paper
• ↑ https://www.science.org/content/article/how-review-paper

About This Article

The easiest way to get started with a research project is to use your notes and other materials to come up with topics that interest you. Research your favorite topic to see if it can be developed, and then refine it into a research question. Begin thoroughly researching, and collect notes and sources. To learn more about finding reliable and helpful sources while you're researching, continue reading! Did this summary help you? Yes No

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How to Do a Research Project?

• Updated on  
• Mar 21, 2023

To begin your thesis, the first step is to find a suitable topic per your interests and selecting a good topic is only the beginning of it all. Carrying out a research project, scholars aim to provide answers to the research questions through an in-depth study of the topic. Many universities require their students to submit a research project as part of their course, especially at the master’s level of study and doctoral degrees . So if you are wondering how to do a research project, this blog is for you! Read on to know the different steps to follow to write an excellent research project.

This Blog Includes:

Select a topic of your interest, find a supervisor, invest time in secondary research, locate and analyse primary sources, start drafting your paper, put proper citations, proofread the research project, tips & tricks for doing a research project.

The first step towards doing a research project is choosing a relevant topic. Many students find it difficult to select a topic for their research project since they want to research a popular but less researched topic, something which is difficult to find. Browse through the recent studies and works in your chosen field and then find the best one that you are inclined towards. It is essential to have an innate interest and passion for the topic you have chosen since it will help you work out through all the challenges and hurdles during your research.

An expert supervisor plays an essential role in mentoring the student throughout the journey of the research project. Supervisors are generally professors and scholars in a university who guide students throughout their research addressing their queries regarding the topic along with familiarising them with different research methodologies and processes. So choosing a research knowledgeable supervisor in your field of study is very important in the development of your research project.

You need to have a good grasp of the contemporary work and studies done related to your topic to find out the gaps that you can address in your research project. For this, you need to invest your time in reading the published papers related to your topic diligently. Reading a huge volume of secondary sources will add to your knowledge about the topic and also present you with different primary sources which you can look for.

Primary sources are the backbone of your research. You can look for primary sources in different archives or libraries depending on your discipline, and you can also find out about primary sources and their location from papers already published on your chosen and related topics. Make sure to find and analyse the primary sources in detail and note down your findings.

Use your notes while drafting your paper. Remember that you need to make any changes through multiple drafts before you come up with a paper worthy of commendation. Make sure to send your drafts to your supervisor for feedback and corrections and doubts, and work on the suggestions they provide on your paper.

Citations are an important part of your research project. Not putting proper citations can mark your project as plagiarized. Since universities take plagiarism quite seriously, it is better to know the proper way of citation as specified by the research project format provided by your university. You can also get in touch with your research mentor or supervisor and ask for their advice on citing the sources in your project. 

You should not skip proofreading your paper after completing it. Spelling or grammar mistakes are inevitable while working on a lengthy research project and therefore it is necessary to check it multiple times for such errors. Re-reading your draft can not only help you in making it better by fixing the errors, but also you may identify any gaps or issues in the paper that you can rectify. 

Now that you are familiar with the process of doing a research project, here are some more tips and tricks that you might find useful:

• Create a schedule mapping down every step of your research and adhere to the same.
• Research your topic online and offline to know about the different sources you can explore.
• List down all the sources, both primary and secondary that you consulted for your project as this will help you in adding the citations. 
• Always keep notes to write new ideas and findings of your research as you can easily use them later to add to your project.
• Stay in touch with your supervisor throughout the course of your research project as they can help you efficiently tackle all the challenges and problems and make your thesis as comprehensive as possible.

Ans. These types of questions you can ask in a research project What exactly do you want to study? What is your research question or questions? Why is it worth studying? What is the purpose or significance of your study? Does the proposed study have practical significance?

Ans. There should be no uncertainty in the research topic. Clarity also requires that the research topic be goal-oriented and that it establish the entire research methodology. Half of the formula for good research is a clearly defined and well-phrased research topic.

Ans. Research is the process of looking for solutions to a certain issue. It can be carried out to comprehend a phenomenon, observe behaviour, or test a theory, among other things. Systematic research is carried out, adding to the corpus of knowledge and bolstering numerous theories.

Thus, carrying out a research project is not everyone’s cup of tea as it will need meticulous studying and preparation to finally accomplish it as you have hypothesized. Planning to pursue a research degree? Our Study Abroad experts are here to help you find the best course and university along with sorting out the admission process to ensure that you send a winning application. Sign up for a free session with us today!

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Frequently asked questions

What is a research project.

A research project is an academic, scientific, or professional undertaking to answer a research question . Research projects can take many forms, such as qualitative or quantitative , descriptive , longitudinal , experimental , or correlational . What kind of research approach you choose will depend on your topic.

Frequently asked questions: Writing a research paper

The best way to remember the difference between a research plan and a research proposal is that they have fundamentally different audiences. A research plan helps you, the researcher, organize your thoughts. On the other hand, a dissertation proposal or research proposal aims to convince others (e.g., a supervisor, a funding body, or a dissertation committee) that your research topic is relevant and worthy of being conducted.

Formulating a main research question can be a difficult task. Overall, your question should contribute to solving the problem that you have defined in your problem statement .

However, it should also fulfill criteria in three main areas:

• Researchability
• Feasibility and specificity
• Relevance and originality

Research questions anchor your whole project, so it’s important to spend some time refining them.

In general, they should be:

• Focused and researchable
• Answerable using credible sources
• Complex and arguable
• Feasible and specific
• Relevant and original

All research questions should be:

• Focused on a single problem or issue
• Researchable using primary and/or secondary sources
• Feasible to answer within the timeframe and practical constraints
• Specific enough to answer thoroughly
• Complex enough to develop the answer over the space of a paper or thesis
• Relevant to your field of study and/or society more broadly

A research aim is a broad statement indicating the general purpose of your research project. It should appear in your introduction at the end of your problem statement , before your research objectives.

Research objectives are more specific than your research aim. They indicate the specific ways you’ll address the overarching aim.

Once you’ve decided on your research objectives , you need to explain them in your paper, at the end of your problem statement .

Keep your research objectives clear and concise, and use appropriate verbs to accurately convey the work that you will carry out for each one.

I will compare …

Your research objectives indicate how you’ll try to address your research problem and should be specific:

Research objectives describe what you intend your research project to accomplish.

They summarize the approach and purpose of the project and help to focus your research.

Your objectives should appear in the introduction of your research paper , at the end of your problem statement .

The main guidelines for formatting a paper in Chicago style are to:

• Use a standard font like 12 pt Times New Roman
• Use 1 inch margins or larger
• Apply double line spacing
• Indent every new paragraph ½ inch
• Include a title page
• Place page numbers in the top right or bottom center
• Cite your sources with author-date citations or Chicago footnotes
• Include a bibliography or reference list

To automatically generate accurate Chicago references, you can use Scribbr’s free Chicago reference generator .

The main guidelines for formatting a paper in MLA style are as follows:

• Use an easily readable font like 12 pt Times New Roman
• Set 1 inch page margins
• Include a four-line MLA heading on the first page
• Center the paper’s title
• Use title case capitalization for headings
• Cite your sources with MLA in-text citations
• List all sources cited on a Works Cited page at the end

To format a paper in APA Style , follow these guidelines:

• Use a standard font like 12 pt Times New Roman or 11 pt Arial
• If submitting for publication, insert a running head on every page
• Apply APA heading styles
• Cite your sources with APA in-text citations
• List all sources cited on a reference page at the end

No, it’s not appropriate to present new arguments or evidence in the conclusion . While you might be tempted to save a striking argument for last, research papers follow a more formal structure than this.

All your findings and arguments should be presented in the body of the text (more specifically in the results and discussion sections if you are following a scientific structure). The conclusion is meant to summarize and reflect on the evidence and arguments you have already presented, not introduce new ones.

The conclusion of a research paper has several key elements you should make sure to include:

• A restatement of the research problem
• A summary of your key arguments and/or findings
• A short discussion of the implications of your research

Don’t feel that you have to write the introduction first. The introduction is often one of the last parts of the research paper you’ll write, along with the conclusion.

This is because it can be easier to introduce your paper once you’ve already written the body ; you may not have the clearest idea of your arguments until you’ve written them, and things can change during the writing process .

The way you present your research problem in your introduction varies depending on the nature of your research paper . A research paper that presents a sustained argument will usually encapsulate this argument in a thesis statement .

A research paper designed to present the results of empirical research tends to present a research question that it seeks to answer. It may also include a hypothesis —a prediction that will be confirmed or disproved by your research.

The introduction of a research paper includes several key elements:

• A hook to catch the reader’s interest
• Relevant background on the topic
• Details of your research problem

and your problem statement

• A thesis statement or research question
• Sometimes an overview of the paper

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NSF funds 12 projects to advance open and equitable research in the geosciences

The U.S. National Science Foundation is investing $10.4 million to advance open and equitable research in the geosciences, in alignment with the goals of the federal 2023 Year of Open Science . Through its new Geosciences Open Science Ecosystem (GEO OSE) program, NSF is funding 12 new projects to support sustainable and networked open science activities. The program will foster an ecosystem of inclusive access to data, physical collections, software, advanced computing and other resources toward advancing research and education in the geosciences. The GEO OSE program in the newly created Division of Research, Innovation, Synergies, and Education (RISE) in NSF's Directorate for Geosciences leverages expanding information resources and computing capabilities to address interdisciplinary grand challenge research questions at the forefront of the geosciences.

NSF is supporting two tracks of GEO OSE projects that acknowledge the range of readiness levels across the geosciences. Six projects in Track 1 will advance early-stage GEO OSE activities, including two-year projects to develop pilot capabilities or community-building activities. These awards have the potential to guide the future design, development and deployment of GEO OSE resources. Six projects in Track 2 will advance larger-scale activities aimed at providing an accessible and sustainable ecosystem of GEO OSE resources. All 12 projects facilitate broad stakeholder involvement and address community-driven open science needs in the geosciences — major goals of the new RISE Division. Four of the projects utilize commercial cloud computing resources through the NSF CloudBank facility , which simplifies cloud access for research and education.

The 12 projects are:

Enhancing the Accessibility of Novel Geostatistical Inversion Workflows for Cryosphere Research

Led by the University of Florida, this project will create and share freely available geostatistical software to make it easier for researchers to create maps of topography beneath glaciers and ice sheets developed from big data sets.

Community-driven Enhancement of Information Ecosystems for the Discovery and Use of Paleontological Specimen Data

Led by the University of Colorado Boulder, the Smithsonian Institution and Arizona State University, this project will improve discovery and use of millions of fossil specimen records for paleontology research. This project is jointly supported by RISE and the Infrastructure Capacity for Biological Research program in NSF’s Directorate for Biological Sciences.

Facilitating Reproducible Open GeoScience

Led by the University of Southern California and Northern Arizona University, this project will lead a series of workshops to provide training on the use of open-source tools and to catalyze open, reproducible and replicable practices among geoscientists. This project is jointly supported by RISE and  NSF's Office of Integrative Activities.

Advanced Cloud-based Data- and Visualization-Integrated Simulation EnviRonment (ADVISER) to Advance Computational Glaciology

Led by Vanderbilt University, the University of Washington and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, this project will build an open cloud computing platform and cloud-deployed software package to enable broad access to glacial modeling within a high-performance computing environment. This project is jointly supported by RISE and NSF’s Office of Advanced Cyberinfrastructure (OAC) in support of a National Discovery Cloud for Climate (NDC-C).

SUNCAST: Software Unified Collaboration for Advancing Solar Tomography

Led by the New Jersey Institute of Technology, this project will develop a user-friendly, open-source software framework for data analysis and modeling on the solar corona, which will inform understanding of the sun and its impact on the Earth.

Transforming Volcanology Towards Open Science in the Cloud With VICTOR

Led by Columbia University, the University of South Florida and Tufts University, this project will continue the development and expansion of the Volcanology Infrastructure for Computational Tools and Resources project, which provides a platform for executing numerical simulations of volcanic processes.  

Project Pythia and Pangeo: Building an Inclusive Geoscience Community Through Accessible, Reusable, and Reproducible Workflows

Led by the University at Albany, the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research and Code for Science and Society/2i2c, this project will advance the development and use of Pythia Cookbooks, which are web-based interactive computing platforms embedded in open, cloud-based computational environments for executing common geoscience workflows.

Enhancing Usability of the Parallel Ice Sheet Model (PISM) to Accelerate Innovative Sea-level Research

Led by the University of Alaska Fairbanks, this project will increase the accessibility and usability of PISM for glaciology and sea-level research. This work includes cloud-based deployment of PISM and training workshops to support user adoption. This project is jointly supported by RISE and NSF's OAC in support of an NDC-C.

QGreenland-Net: Open, connected Data Infrastructure for Greenland-focused Geoscience, and Beyond

Led by the University of Colorado Boulder and the University of California, Santa Barbara, this project will develop QGreenland-Net, a cloud-based geospatial data infrastructure for Greenland-focused research and education. This project is jointly supported by RISE and NSF's OAC in support of an NDC-C.

Sustainable Open Science Tools to Democratize Use of 3D Geomaterial Data

Led by The University of Texas at Austin and Virginia Tech, this project will create cloud-based open science tools for curation and analysis of geomaterial image data. This project is jointly supported by RISE and the Division of Chemical, Bioengineering, Environmental and Transport Systems in NSF’s Directorate for Engineering.

Developing CI-enabled Collaborative Workflows to Integrate Data for the SZ4D (Subduction Zones in Four Dimensions) Community

Led by the University of Kansas, the University of Wisconsin–Madison, Texas A&M University, the University California, Santa Cruz, the University of Washington and Northern Arizona University, this project will build tools to enable collaborative workflows for collecting and interpreting field- and laboratory-based geological data via the existing StraboSpot data system. Tool development will be guided by the community workflow needs of cross-disciplinary subduction zone science.

Building a Multiscale Community-led Ecosystem for Crustal Geology Through the Integration of Macrostrat and StraboSpot

Led by the University of Wisconsin–Madison and the University of Kansas, this project will integrate the existing StraboSpot and Macrostrat data systems to support streamlined user workflows for data capture and development of geologic maps toward creation of integrated models of Earth's crust.

Research areas

Project 2025 partner lays foundation for Trump to ignore congressional spending in major power grab

Some close observers worry that a second Trump administration could use the “impoundment” power to defund the Dept. of Education and other conservative targets

Written by John Knefel

Published 07/08/24 9:57 AM EDT

A partner organization in a large conservative effort to provide policy and personnel recommendations to the next Republican administration, known as Project 2025, has become a leading advocate for the radical position that the president should have broad latitude to refuse to carry out Congressionally mandated spending. 

The ramifications of such a policy would be wide-reaching and could potentially threaten funding for the Department of Education, the Environmental Protection Agency, or other conservative targets within the federal government. 

The group pushing for this major expanse of presidential power is the Center for Renewing America , a MAGA-aligned think tank that has deployed several of its top figures to make its argument across right-wing broadcast and digital media. Its most recent salvo came in June, when CRA released a white paper arguing that a 1974 law restricting a president from unilaterally refusing to spend funds allocated by Congress — the so-called “impoundment” power — represented an improper break from historical precedent. Instead, CRA argued that the White House should have the authority to halt Congressional spending virtually at will.

“Congress’s use of its power of the purse to make it illegal for the President to intentionally spend less than the full amount of what appropriated was norm-breaking, unprecedented, and unconstitutional,” CRA senior fellow Mark Paoletta wrote with his co-authors David Shapiro and Brandon Stras. Paoletta and Shaprio have written op-eds advancing the same argument at The Hill and right-wing blog The Federalist . 

Paoletta’s executive branch power grab is an implicit goal of Project 2025 , the right-wing policy and staffing initiative organized by conservative think tank The Heritage Foundation. The Center for Renewing America is one of more than 100 partner organizations on Project 2025’s advisory board; its founder, Russ Vought , was the director of the Office of Management and Budget under former President Donald Trump and remains a major figure in MAGA media, in addition to being an open Christian nationalist . 

As Vought told The New York Times, describing his organization’s broader goal of remaking the federal government: “What we’re trying to do is identify the pockets of independence and seize them.”

Although the impoundment power doesn’t come up in Project 2025’s policy book — Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise — it’s easy to see how it fits in with the effort’s larger goal of transforming the federal government. A second Trump administration could theoretically withhold funds outright or use that threat to pressure career staffers perceived to be insufficiently deferential to the White House.

The potential targets of such a scheme are laid out in black and white in Project 2025’s Mandate . The book takes aim at the Department of Health and Human Services for its pro-LGBTQ programs and directs the department to “issue guidance reemphasizing that states are free to defund Planned Parenthood in their state Medicaid plans.” It also calls for drastic cuts to the Department of Energy, shrinking the EPA, and for the total elimination of the Department of Education. The Department of Justice would likely be empowered to target reformist district attorneys and directed to slash anti-discrimination efforts. 

The CRA paper is an attempt to undermine the 1974 Impoundments Control Act, which Congress passed after former President Richard Nixon refused to spend federally allocated funds on “water pollution control, education and health programs and highway and housing construction,” according to The New York Times. Nixon approached the impoundment power as a tool to further centralize power within the office of the President and pursue a reactionary agenda that ran counter to the will of Congress, providing a possible historical template for CRA. 

Like Paoletta, Vought has publicly opposed the 1974 law. On X (formerly Twitter), Vought wrote: “Making Impoundment Great Again!”

Citation From Russ Vought's Twitter/X profile, accessed July 1, 2024

In another post , the Center for Renewing America’s X account paraphrased Vought’s description of the impoundment power as “our secret weapon to totally dismantle the WOKE & WEAPONIZED federal bureaucracy.” That post linked to a Real Clear Politics article that directly quoted Vought as arguing that “when you think that a law is unconstitutional,” referring to the Impoundment Control Act, a future Trump administration should “push the envelope.”

In February, Vought appeared on Fox Business to foreshadow the recently released CRA report. “The loss of impoundment authority — which 200 years of presidents enjoyed — was the original sin in eliminating the ability for a branch-on-branch to control spending,” Vought said. Other budgetary goals he named included “spending reductions,” “bureaucracy crushing,” and “welfare reform.”

Citation From the February 12, 2024, edition of Fox Business' Kudlow

According to The Washington Post, Vought made a similar comment on former Trump adviser Steve Bannon’s War Room podcast. “Presidents had the ability to impound funds for 200 years until a bad law got passed that we think is unconstitutional under President Nixon,” Vought said, “We want to go back in a different direction.”

Another CRA figure, who has advanced a radical theory of executive authority in other contexts, has also argued against the Impoundment Control Act. Last July, CRA senior fellow Jeffrey Clark also appeared on War Room to discuss his “fight against the administrative state,” in the host’s words.

“President Nixon really cracked the whip and was really using his historical impoundment powers,” Clark said. “And then when he was weak during Watergate, Congress passed this Impoundment Control Act to try to take that power away from the president.”

“So what I’m working on, essentially, are the constitutional arguments for why that was wrong and various ways in which the Impoundment Control Act is just flatly unconstitutional,” Clark continued.

Citation From the July 3, 2023, edition of Real America's Voice's War Room

During the final weeks of Trump’s administration, Clark — then a lawyer in the Department of Justice — attempted to overturn the results of the 2020 election by pressuring the department to claim it had “identified significant concerns” with vote totals in crucial states and should send “a separate slate of electors supporting Donald J. Trump,” according to congressional testimony.

Though it remains publicly unclear which departments, agencies, or programs a second Trump administration could arbitrarily defund, he’s already shown a willingness to use federal funds as a bludgeon in his own personal protection racket. During his first term, Trump tried to withhold  roughly $400 million in foreign military aid in order to pressure Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to provide him with dirt on the Biden family, which led to his first impeachment.

On X, Vought celebrated his organization’s white paper arguing against the Impoundment Control Act, which he promised was the “first of many” on the topic. 

“Why did we found the Center for Renewing America?” he wrote. “To write papers like this.”

WORKSHOP FULL: Online ISSR Summer Methodology Workshops | Qualitative Research Design and Methods | Alexandra Lauterbach

NOTE: This is the second session (July 16-17) for this workshop.  The May 28-29 session is full. 

This 2-day (12-hour) workshop provides an overview of how qualitative researchers think (research design) and what they do (research methods). Participants will gain hands-on experience with qualitative research by working through exercises related to their own current, past, or possible future projects. Group experiences are punctuated by brief discussions of key ideas in qualitative research. Topics covered in this workshop include research ethics, the philosophical underpinnings of qualitative methods, common qualitative approaches, observation, interviews, focus groups, media-based qualitative methods, qualitative data analysis, and writing about qualitative findings. This workshop is suitable for those with limited exposure to qualitative research or with current qualitative work that they wish to refine further.

Instructor:  Alexandra Lauterbach

Dr. Alexandra Lauterbach is an Associate Professor of special education in the College of Education at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Within special education, Dr. Lauterbach’s scholarship centers on effective literacy instruction for students with high incidence disabilities, and effective professional development for teachers of such students. More broadly, Dr. Lauterbach’s research is dedicated to developing and applying innovative qualitative research methods, both to inform research and practice within special education and other fields. She has served as a qualitative consultant on projects funded by the Institute of Education Sciences, and had her own work funded by the Office of Special Education and Rehabilitation Services and the Massachusetts Department of Education. Dr. Lauterbach’s research has been published in Learning Disabilities Quarterly, Journal of Learning Disabilities, The Qualitative Report, and the Annals of Dyslexia . She has used multiple methodologies in her own work, including phenomenology, ethnography, case study, grounded theory, and mixed methods, and enjoys teaching others about using a variety of methodologies in their own work. 

Questions? For more information about this or any of the ISSR Summer Methodology Workshops, please contact ISSR Director of Methodology Programs Jessica Pearlman ( [email protected] ).

REGISTRATION INFORMATION | 12-HOUR WORKSHOP

Important: If you are registering for more than one workshop, please verify that all workshops are in your cart with the correct institutional and career status selected, for accurate pricing .

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Registration note:  The Five Colleges include: UMass Amherst, Amherst College, Hampshire College, Mount Holyoke College, and Smith College.  Faculty, students and staff from University of Massachusetts Boston, Dartmouth and Lowell campuses and UMass Chan Medical School pay the five college rates.  Registration closes for each workshop 2 full business days prior to the start date. If paying with departmental funds, contact Sue Falcetti ( [email protected] ).

Cancellation note:  In cases where enrollment is 5 or less, we reserve the right to cancel the workshop.  In cases where the registrant cancels prior to the workshop, a full refund will be given with two weeks notice, and 50% refund will be given with one week notice.  We will not be able to refund in cases where registrant does not notify us of cancellation at least one week prior to the beginning date of the workshop.

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New CULVERT Tool

Introducing CULVERT, the Climate & Upland Loading Vulnerability Evaluation & Risk Analysis Tool 

• Research Topics
• Science Centers and Work Units
• Economics of removing fuels
• Modeling supply chains
• Removing biomass
• Safer prescribed fires
• Eastern Innovation Landscape Network
• Experimental Forests and Ranges
• Research Natural Areas

Culverts for climate resilience: Developing the CULVERT tool

Road culverts are part of the transportation infrastructure on national forest lands. Current national forest road infrastructure was designed to accommodate historical climate conditions.

Climate change brings increasing threats, such as extreme precipitation, to roads and culverts. Floods, sediment-laden floodwaters, and debris flows after wildfires are among the threats. Damaged culverts can adversely impact traffic, safety, economies, and aquatic species passage.

We are developing a new tool that can help identify culverts that may be under-sized and in need of upgrades: CULVERT, the Climate and Upland Loading Vulnerability Evaluation and Risk Analysis Tool. This tool will be useful for anyone assessing culvert vulnerability to floods, soil erosion and post-wildfire debris flow. 

The U.S. Department of Transportation is a major funding source and the work is also supported by the USDA Forest Service. 

• Project Milestones

A box culvert on the Francis Marion National Forest in South Carolina. 

The CULVERT tool is being designed to predict which culverts may be vulnerable to failure and could need restoration or rebuilding. 

The tool is an automated quasi-dynamic hydro-geospatial model-based decision support system. The results will also be available through an online static and interactive dashboard built into the tool. 

The tool is being developed with data from two pilot sites, the Santee Experimental Forest in South Carolina, and the Hubbard Brook Experimental Forest in New Hampshire. 

If successful, there is potential to expand across all National Forest System lands and beyond, to all lands where high resolution climatic and geospatial data for road stream crossings are available. 

The project is expected to facilitate informed decision-making ahead of field visits and on future design, restoration, and adaptation strategies.  

Phase 1: Developing the Model

In this phase, the team collected, processed, and analyzed multiple datasets. The datasets describe current and projected precipitation, streamflow from specific watersheds, culverts, terrain, flood risk, and much more.

Flooded road and bridge after an extreme precipitation event in 2015 at the Santee Experimental Forest, SC. Agency roads are important to nearby community residents, visitors to national forests, partners, and employees. 

Forest Service engineers from the White Mountain National Forest in New Hampshire, where Hubbard Brook Experimental Forest is located, helped select USGS stream gauge locations within and near the White Mountain National Forest boundary, and provided culvert data for the Hubbard Brook Experimental Forest region. Similarly, Forest Service engineers for the Francis Marion National Forest helped provide details of culvert data for the Santee Experimental Forest.

Phase 1 is nearing completion. The team’s Phase 1 activities included:

• Collect and process culvert data, geospatial and high-resolution hydro-meteorological data, and LiDAR for both sites. 
• With geospatial technology and LiDAR, identify additional culverts and other road-stream crossings on sites where culvert datasets are not available.
• Analyze current precipitation and downscaled future precipitation projections for both sites. Current/historic data come from Forest Service long-term on-site gauges as well as the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the future projections from Environmental Protection Agency.
• Assess risks of culvert failure due to flooding and erosion using multiple hydrology and geospatial models. Using hydro-met data and site characteristics in the models, the team assessed the range of flood discharge and sediment export potentials causing overtopping and siltation of culverts, respectively. The models were also calibrated with on-site data, where available, and validated with expert judgement.
• The team may also include a modified NRCS Curve Number, a new concept, developed by collaborators from the University of Agriculture in Krakow, Poland.
• Use future climate model projections based downscaled high resolution precipitation intensity information, as an option for engineers/managers for climate resilient culvert sizing, provided by the Environmental Protection Agency under a memorandum of understanding with the USDA Forest Service.
• Assess culvert failure risk due to flooding by comparing their estimated hydraulic capacities to projected design discharges for a flood frequency (25-yr, 50-yr or 100-yr) of interest.
• Assess culverts for their risk of failure due to stream-bank erosion, siltation, and other hydro-geomorphological phenomena driven by extreme precipitation and flooding.
• Develop new and/or modify existing erosion prediction models to assess pre-fire and post-fire flooding and associated debris flow.
• Publish the papers on hydrological and hydro-geomorphological risk assessment model applications.
• Create a hands-on Toolbox (Geospatial Models) for easy dissemination and replication.

Phase 2: Developing the Decision Support System (DSS) 

In this phase, the team will build the two types of web applications that comprise the tool: a static interactive dashboard that showcases results of culvert vulnerability assessments stored in the server, and a quasi-dynamic tool released in two different versions.  Both versions of the quasi-dynamic tool will let users generate culvert vulnerability assessments. Version 1 is designed for users who have their own culvert geodatabase. Version 2 will identify potential culvert locations from road and stream intersections. Version 2 will also allow users to save the location of these potential culvert locations to their own geodatabase. During Phase 2, the team will be working to: 

A damaged culvert in a forest. 

Design and develop the DSS user interface with the ArcGIS platform.

• Integrate vulnerability assessment and flood discharge models into the DSS.
• Test a Quasi-Dynamic Decision Support Tool Dashboard for Road Culverts Vulnerability Assessment using the Forest Service ArcGIS Enterprise portal.
• Develop functionalities for data input, visualization, and output reporting. 
• Conduct beta testing and incorporate user feedback for refinement.
• Finalize and deploy the tool.
• Ensure the tool is fast, runs smoothly for all users, and can cache raster data.
• Develop a user guide and tutorials. 

Phase 3: Training and Evaluation

In this phase, the team will monitor the effectiveness of the tool in real-world applications and prepare a final report summarizing project outcomes and recommendations for future improvements. The team will also conduct workshops on how to use the tool and interpret the results. The workshops will be designed for experts at the Forest Service, Department of Transportation, Environmental Protection Agency, U.S. Geological Survey, and other interested collaborators.  

Principal Investigators

Devendra M. Amatya

Sudhanshu panda, key personnel.

Sourav Mukherjee

Shawna L. Reid

Laura (lola) d. roghair, related programs.

Center for Forest Watershed Research (RWU-4353)

Publications.

• D. M. Amatya, S. Tian, D. A. Marion, P. Caldwell, S. Laseter, M. A. Youssef, J. M. Grace, G. M. Chescheir, S. Panda, Y. Ouyang, G. Sun, J. M. Vose. 2021. Estimates of precipitation IDF curves and design discharges for road-crossing drainage structures: Case study in four small forested watersheds in the southeastern US
• S.S. Panda, D.M. Amatya, J.M. Grace, P. Caldwell, D.A. Marion. 2022. Extreme precipitation-based vulnerability assessment of road-crossing drainage structures in forested watersheds using an integrated environmental modeling approach
• Sourav Mukherjee, Devendra M. Amatya, Anna M. Jalowska, John L. Campbell, Sherri L. Johnson, Kelly Elder, Sudhanshu Panda, Johnny M. Grace, Duncan Kikoyo. 2023. Comparison of on-site versus NOAA’s extreme precipitation intensity-duration-frequency estimates for six forest headwater catchments across the continental United States
• Sourav Mukherjee, Devendra M. Amatya, John L. Campbell, Landon Gryczkowski, Sudhanshu Panda, Sherri L. Johnson, Kelly Elder, Anna M. Jalowska, Peter Caldwell, Johnny M. Grace, Dariusz Młyński, Andrzej Wałęga. 2024. A watershed-scale multi-approach assessment of design flood discharge estimates used in hydrologic risk analyses for forest road stream crossings and culverts
• R. B. Foltz, W. J. Elliot, N. S. Wagenbrenner. 2011. Soil erosion model predictions using parent material/soil texture-based parameters compared to using site-specific parameters

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Teacher Burnout Addressed in Research Project Investigating Yoga as an Intervention Strategy

Driven by her compassion for fellow educators, doctoral student and seasoned K-12 teacher and administrator explores whether yoga can work as a proactive intervention strategy to mitigate teacher stress.

July 9, 2024 | By Brenda Gillen

Over the last decade, a growing number of public schoolteachers have experienced burnout, and many of them have left the field. Leslie Hillen, an educator with more than 20 years of experience as a K-12 teacher and administrator, is concerned about veteran teachers' well-being. Her research focuses on using yoga to promote wellness in educators.

"There was a time when you could go back to your old elementary school and that teacher was still there from 20 years ago; you could go and hug them. That doesn't happen anymore. There is a lot of turnover, a lot of movement and teaching is no longer a lifetime profession," Hillen said.

As a student in the University of Northern Colorado's Educational Leadership Ed.D. program , her dissertation delves into compassion fatigue or secondary traumatic stress. Though they may not experience trauma directly, after hearing about their students' firsthand trauma, many teachers can develop symptoms similar to post-traumatic stress disorder, including flashbacks, nightmares and severe anxiety.

"As a caregiver, you end up taking it on. And so I value the importance of teachers taking care of themselves and feeling like the care is vital versus something they should do on their own," she said.

In 2018, Hillen became a certified yoga instructor, largely to bring yoga into schools and help teachers benefit from self-care. She teaches a trauma-informed vinyasa style of yoga that incorporates smooth transitions between postures or asanas and pairs movement with breathwork. This safe, gentle approach aims to build confidence and reduce trauma response symptoms.

Hillen's research is unique in that it's a mixed-methods study with a pre-post design incorporating qualitative and quantitative data. The 21 study participants have been teachers in K-12 schools since before COVID. She surveyed participants about their compassion satisfaction, secondary traumatic stress and burnout. Then, she led them through weekly yoga classes, available in person, live on Zoom or via recordings. After six weeks, she gave the teachers a post-assessment survey and interviewed them again.

"I didn't want to just interview teachers about their stress, but also to think about a way to alleviate it, if possible. My goal was to get a more holistic picture of their experience as teachers, learn how participants felt about the research project and whether the yoga classes helped ease their stress," she said.

Her research advisor is Amie Cieminski , an associate professor in the College of Education and Behavioral Sciences ' Leadership, Policy, and Development: Educational Leadership and Policy Studies program .

"She was really open minded to me working on this topic. She knows a lot about education, so she could talk about whether the writing would make sense to teachers and where I might define things a little bit better," Hillen said.

Cieminski said while Hillen is very knowledgeable about her topic, her compassion for teachers experiencing stress has driven her to this research area and helped her progress toward its completion.

"Leslie was an English teacher and has strong writing skills. She doesn't need as much feedback in that area, but I work with her on her research design. Moving forward, she'll work on the data analysis, and I'll provide guidance and feedback," she said.

She said there is little research on proactive intervention strategies for alleviating teachers' stress, so Hillen's contribution to the field fills a much-needed gap.

"It may have broader implications across other fields in terms of quality of life when it comes to work. It's not about trying to prove yoga works. What's important is listening to the voices of study participants about their perceptions and experiences with stress and burnout as well as yoga," Cieminski said.

Hillen plans to communicate her results in educational journals, hoping it will serve as a wake-up call for school administrators to recognize teachers' need for support. After graduating with her fourth degree from UNC in December 2024, Hillen anticipates continuing to work with teachers to help them develop wellness practices. She also wants to conduct more research to benefit today's teachers and those who will come into the profession in the future.

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Statistical Literacy Research to Benefit Students in Introductory Courses

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The School of Information is UC Berkeley’s newest professional school. Located in the center of campus, the I School is a graduate research and education community committed to expanding access to information and to improving its usability, reliability, and credibility while preserving security and privacy.

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The School of Information offers four degrees:

The Master of Information Management and Systems (MIMS) program educates information professionals to provide leadership for an information-driven world.

The Master of Information and Data Science (MIDS) is an online degree preparing data science professionals to solve real-world problems. The 5th Year MIDS program is a streamlined path to a MIDS degree for Cal undergraduates.

The Master of Information and Cybersecurity (MICS) is an online degree preparing cybersecurity leaders for complex cybersecurity challenges.

Our Ph.D. in Information Science is a research program for next-generation scholars of the information age.

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The School of Information's courses bridge the disciplines of information and computer science, design, social sciences, management, law, and policy. We welcome interest in our graduate-level Information classes from current UC Berkeley graduate and undergraduate students and community members.  More information about signing up for classes.

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Research by faculty members and doctoral students keeps the I School on the vanguard of contemporary information needs and solutions.

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Master of Information and Data Science

Master’s in data science online from uc berkeley.

The number 2–ranked Master of Information and Data Science (MIDS) program,* delivered online, prepares students to be leaders in the data science field.

The online master’s program brings UC Berkeley to students, wherever they are. The WASC-accredited program blends a multidisciplinary curriculum, experienced faculty from UC Berkeley and top data-driven companies, an accomplished network of peers, and the flexibility of online learning.

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Complete a Rigorous, Holistic Curriculum

The multidisciplinary online data science master’s curriculum draws upon computer science, social sciences, statistics, management, and law. Students use the latest tools and analytical methods to work with data at scale, derive insights from complex and unstructured data, and solve real-world problems.

The core curriculum focuses on the following key skills:

• Research design
• Data cleansing
• Data engineering
• Data mining and exploring
• Data visualization
• Information ethics and privacy
• Statistical analysis
• Machine learning

Experiential, project-based learning is a hallmark of the MIDS program. Students work collaboratively with the latest tools, environments, and processes on real-world data science problems, so they are prepared to work as leaders in the industry.

Online Learning Experience

The online master’s in data science combines advanced technology and in-person experiences to ensure you benefit from the full UC Berkeley School of Information (I School) experience.

Find all of the online tools you need to succeed in one place: the virtual campus.

• Access your weekly Zoom classes, where you will engage in meaningful discussions.
• Complete coding work through seamless GitHub integration in the virtual campus.
• View upcoming course work and deadlines with one click on your dashboard.
• Attend class or complete course work from anywhere.

Online Data Science Program Paths

The 27-unit online program is designed for the working professional and can be completed at a flexible pace.

The standard path is designed for working professionals to complete part-time and can be completed in 20 months, with two courses per semester.

The accelerated path gives students the opportunity to take three courses per semester to complete the program in only 12 months.

The decelerated path allows students to drop down to one course per semester after the first term and complete the program in no more than 32 months.

Learn more about about upcoming webinars, deadlines, and more

Featured courses.

The MIDS curriculum features a wide range of courses that provide students with a comprehensive understanding of how data science can be used to inform decision-making in their organizations. Students will complete programming-focused courses, like the featured courses below, in concurrence with courses that focus on the ethical impact of data science and how to effectively communicate results.

Applied Machine Learning

Students will learn how to apply crucial machine learning techniques to solve problems, run evaluations and interpret results, and understand scaling up from thousands of data points to billions.

Behind the Data: Humans and Values

This course examines the legal, policy, and ethical issues that arise throughout the full life cycle of data science. Students use case studies to explore these issues across various domains, such as criminal justice, national security, health, marketing, politics, education, and employment.

Natural Language Processing with Deep Learning

This course is a broad introduction to linguistic phenomena and our attempts to analyze them with machine learning. The course covers a wide range of concepts, with a focus on practical applications such as information extraction, machine translation, sentiment analysis, and summarization.

Admissions Requirements

The master’s in data science program is seeking applicants who can make a positive impact on the I School community and beyond. A complete application must include the following:

• Online application
• Official transcripts
• Statement of Purpose and additional admissions statements
• Two professional letters of recommendation
• Current resume
• Application fee
• TOEFL scores (if applicable)
• GRE or GMAT scores are optional.

* Best Online Master’s in Data Science Programs in 2023 . (2022). Fortune Education . Retrieved August 22, 2023.

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How Pew Research Center Uses Its National Public Opinion Reference Survey (NPORS)

In 2020, Pew Research Center launched a new project called the  National Public Opinion Reference Survey (NPORS) . NPORS is an annual, cross-sectional survey of U.S. adults. Respondents can answer by paper, online or over the phone, and they are selected using address-based sampling from the United States Postal Service’s Computerized Delivery Sequence File. The response rate to the latest NPORS was 32%, and previous years’ surveys were designed with a similarly rigorous approach. 

NPORS estimates are separate from the  American Trends Panel  (ATP) – the Center’s national online survey platform. Pew Research Center launched NPORS to address a limitation that researchers observed in the ATP. While the ATP was well-suited for the vast majority of the Center’s U.S. survey work, estimates for a few outcomes were not in line with other high-quality surveys, even after weighting to demographics like age, education, race and ethnicity, and gender.

For example, in 2018, roughly one-quarter of U.S. adults were religiously unaffiliated (i.e., atheist, agnostic or “nothing in particular”), according to the General Social Survey (GSS) and the Center’s own telephone-based polling . The ATP, however,  estimated the religiously unaffiliated rate at about 32%. The Center did not feel comfortable publishing that ATP estimate because there was too much evidence that the rate was too high, likely because the types of people willing to participate in an online panel skew less religious than the population as a whole. Similarly, the ATP estimate for the share of U.S. adults identifying as a Democrat or leaning to the Democratic Party was somewhat higher than the rate indicated by the GSS and our own telephone surveys .

From 2014 to late 2020, the Center approached these outcomes slightly differently. We addressed the political partisanship issue by weighting every ATP survey to an external benchmark for the share of Americans identifying as a Republican, Democrat or independent. For the benchmark, we used the average of the results from our three most recent national cellphone and landline random-digit-dial (RDD) surveys. 

During this time period, ATP surveys were not weighted to an external benchmark for Americans’ religious affiliation. The ATP was used for some research on religious beliefs and behaviors, but it was not used to estimate the overall share of Americans identifying as religiously affiliated or unaffiliated, nor was it used to estimate the size of particular faith groups, such as Catholics, Protestants or the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. NPORS allows us to improve and harmonize our approach to both these outcomes (Americans’ political and religious affiliations). 

Design and estimates

Read our fact sheet to find the latest NPORS estimates as well as methodological details. Data collection for NPORS was performed by Ipsos from 2020 through 2023 and is now performed by SSRS. 

Why is the NPORS response rate higher than most opinion polls?

Several features of NPORS set it apart from a typical public opinion poll. 

• People can respond offline or online.  NPORS offers three different ways to respond: by paper (through the mail), online, or by telephone (by calling a provided phone number and speaking to a live interviewer). The paper and telephone options bring in more conservative, more religious adults who are less inclined to take surveys online.
• Monetary incentives.  When sampled adults are first asked to respond to NPORS online, the mailing contains a $2 incentive payment (cash visible from the outside of the envelope) and offers a $10 incentive payment contingent on the participant completing the survey. When nonrespondents to that first stage are sent the paper version of the survey, the mailing contains a visible $5 bill. These incentives give people a reason to respond, even if they might not be interested in the questions or inclined to take surveys in general. 
• Priority mailing.  The paper version of the survey is mailed in a USPS Priority Mail envelope, which is more expensive than a normal envelope, signaling that the contents are important and that the mailing is not haphazard. It helps people distinguish the survey from junk mail, increasing the likelihood that they open and read what is inside. 
• Low burden.  The NPORS questionnaire is intentionally kept short. It’s about 40 questions long, including demographics such as age, gender and education. This means that NPORS takes about seven minutes to finish, while many polls take 10 minutes or longer. 
• Bilingual materials.  In parts of the country with sizable shares of Hispanic Americans, the materials are sent in both English and Spanish. 
• No requirement to join a panel.  NPORS respondents are not required to join a survey panel, which for some people would be a reason to decline the request. 

These features are not possible in most public polls for a host of reasons. But NPORS is designed to produce estimates of high enough quality that they can be used as weighting benchmarks for other polls, and so these features are critical.

Why a ‘reference’ survey for public opinion?

The “R” in NPORS stands for “reference.” In this context, the term comes from  studies  in which researchers calibrate a small sample survey to a large, high-quality survey with greater precision and accuracy. Examples of reference surveys used by researchers include the Census Bureau’s American Community Survey (ACS) and the Current Population Survey (CPS). NPORS is not on the scale of the ACS or CPS, nor does it feature face-to-face data collection. But it does have something that those studies lack: timely estimates of key public opinion outcomes. Other studies like the American National Election Survey (ANES) and the General Social Survey collect key public opinion measures, but their data is released months, if not years, after data collection. The ANES, while invaluable to academic researchers, also excludes noncitizens who constitute about 7% of adults living in the U.S. and are included in the Center’s surveys.

NPORS is truly a reference survey for Pew Research Center because researchers weight each American Trends Panel wave to several NPORS estimates. In other words, ATP surveys refer to NPORS in order to represent groups like Republicans, Democrats, religiously affiliated adults and religiously unaffiliated adults proportional to their share of the U.S. population. The ATP weighting protocol also calibrates to other benchmarks, such as ACS demographic figures and CPS benchmarks for voter registration status and volunteerism.

Pew Research Center is weighting on political party affiliation, but isn’t that an attitude?

It’s correct that whether someone considers themselves a Republican or a Democrat is an attitude, not a fixed characteristic, such as year of birth. But there is a way to weight on political party affiliation even though it is an attitude and without forcing the poll’s partisan distribution to align with a benchmark. 

Pew Research Center started implementing this approach in 2021. It begins with measuring the survey panelists’ political party affiliation at a certain point in time (typically, each summer). Ideally, the reference survey will measure the same construct at the same point in time. We launched NPORS because we control its timing as well as the American Trends Panel’s timing, allowing us to achieve this syncing.

NPORS and ATP measurements of political party are collected at approximately the same time each summer. We may then conduct roughly 25 surveys on the ATP over the next year. For each of those 25 surveys, we append the panelists’ party affiliation answers from the summer  to the current survey. To illustrate, let’s say that a survey was conducted in December. When researchers weight the December ATP survey, they take the measurement of party taken in the summer and weight that to the NPORS estimates for the partisan distribution of U.S. adults during the summer time frame. If, for example, Democrats were more likely than Republicans to respond to the December survey, the weighting to the NPORS target would help reduce the differential partisan nonresponse bias. 

Critically, if the hypothetical December poll featured a fresh measurement of political party affiliation (typically asked about three times a year on the ATP), the new December answers do  not  get forced to any target. The new partisan distribution is allowed to vary. In this way, we can both address the threat from differential partisan nonresponse and measure an attitude that changes over time (without dictating the outcome). Each summer, the process starts anew by measuring political party on the ATP at basically the same time as the NPORS data collection. 

Is the NPORS design connected to the American Trends Panel?

A key feature of NPORS is that respondents are not members of a survey panel. It is a fresh, random sample of U.S. adults. This matters because some people are willing to take a onetime survey like NPORS but are not interested in taking surveys on an ongoing basis as part of a panel. That said, in certain years, NPORS serves as a recruitment survey for the ATP. After the NPORS questions, we ask respondents if they would be willing to take future surveys. People who accept and those who decline are both part of the NPORS survey. But only those who consent to future surveys are eventually invited to join the ATP.

Can other survey researchers use NPORS?

Yes. As a nonprofit organization, we seek to make our research as useful to policymakers, survey practitioners and scholars as possible. As with the Center’s other survey work, the estimates and data are freely available. 

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ABOUT PEW RESEARCH CENTER  Pew Research Center is a nonpartisan fact tank that informs the public about the issues, attitudes and trends shaping the world. It conducts public opinion polling, demographic research, media content analysis and other empirical social science research. Pew Research Center does not take policy positions. It is a subsidiary of  The Pew Charitable Trusts .

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