A surprising amount of one' s time as a student and professional is spent
reporting the results of one' s research projects for presentation to teachers,
managers, and clients. Indeed, without basic research skills and the ability to
present research results clearly. and completely,an individual will encounter
many obstacles in school and on the job. The need for some research -writing
ability is felt nearly equally by college students in all fields, engineering and
science as well as business and the humanities. Graduate study often makes
great demands on the student' s research-writing skills, and most professions
continue the demand; education, advertising and marketing, economics and
accounting, science and engineering, psychology, anthropology, the arts, and
agriculture may all require regular reporting ofresearch data. The standard research
report, regardless of the field or the intended reader, contains four major_ sections.
These sections may be broken down into a variety of subsections, and they may be
arranged in a variety of ways, but_ they regularly make up the core of the report.
Problem Section. The first required section of a research report is the statement of
the problem with which the research project is, concerned. This section requires a
precise statement of the underlying question which the researcher has set out to
answer. In this same section there should be an explanation of the significance of the
question; in other words, why the investigation was worth conducting. Thus, if we set
out, for example,. to answer the question" What is the effect of regular_ consumption
of fast foods on the health of the American teenager?” we must explain that the question
is thought to have significant relevance to the health of this segment of the population
and might lead to. some sort of regulations on such foods. A frequent subsection of this
problem section is a review of past research on the topic being investigated. This would
consist of summaries of the contributions of previous researcher to the question under
consideration with some assessment of the value of these contributions. This subsection
has rhetorical usefulness in that it enhances the credibility of the researcher by
indicating that the data presented is based on a thorough knowledge of what has been
done in the field and, possibly, grows out of some investigative tradition. Procedures
Section. The second major section of the research report details, with as
much data as possible, exactly how the study was carried
out. This section includes description of any necessary equipment, how the subjects were
selected if subjects were used, what statistical technique was used to evaluate the
significance of the findings, how many observations were made and when.