Writing an analytic paper

So, you've decided to write an analytic paper. That means you are seeking to explore or describe a certain problem, incident, or group. Since you have your topic in hand, you need to find some good sources to start off with. One place to start, which is often decried as a horrible source, but is often a good jumping point, Wikipedia.

You can start off by searching Wikipedia for some relevant articles. Skim over the articles and, more importantly, look at the cited sources. Those sources, if they are credible sites and articles, can be a great place to begin feeling out this field. Read some of those sources to get a general idea of what you will be looking for.

I would recommend getting a notebook to keep with you to jot down your notes and thoughts as you're reading these articles. You don't need to write absolutely everything down, but I would recommend that you write the name of the article before any of your notes in order to keep it all organized.

While reading these first articles, see if you can identify certain areas in the articles that are not totally clear or are completely left out. There is no article in existence that explains absolutely everything there is to know about any particular subject matter, so you should be able to come up with a few things that you can research to expand upon. Write these down!

Chances are, you have other concerns while you are writing this paper, be they other classes, work, children, parents, or flesh-eating bacteria, so the likelihood that you will remember without any memory aid every clever question you ask about each article is slim to none.

Once you have finished these first articles about the subject (make sure you do save these sources), take the list of questions and areas of expansion and use those to search for new sources with more "academic" search engines. If you attend a college or university, you most likely have access to academic articles and journals either via the campus library, or online. If you aren't sure how to use the online system and want to, ask a librarian in the campus library for help.

Other possible academic search engines include Google Scholar, LexisNexis, JSTOR, and EBSCO. Make sure that you only look at works that have been peer reviewed. If a work is peer reviewed, then it usually has a reasonable methodology and reasonable conclusions that can be derived from the results of the experiment. That does not mean that the work is flawless.

As you go through your second round of sources, be sure to highlight key points that are relevant to your paper topic as well as the weaknesses of the article. For example, if the researcher collected data from only college students (as many do) then the findings may not be generalizable to the rest of the population. There are a variety of different problems that a study may have, and if you want your paper to be very good, you need to consider both the strengths and the weaknesses of your sources. And, as you did with the first round of articles, think about your second round: what questions come up after reading these articles? What else could someone conduct research on in this area?

At the end of the paper, discuss some of the more interesting questions that come up after examining all of these sources. For example, if the article explains that people tend to spend more money when they're feeling very happy, then you might hypothesize that a society will likely experience higher shopping rates during times of great triumph and patriotism (which would presumably, make most people feel happy). Suggesting hypotheses at the end is the ultimate goal of the paper, so make sure you think about it!

If you want to be successful without completely burning yourself out, then pace yourself with your thesis work. Really allow yourself to digest information, and while you're not reading and jotting down notes, try to observe things happening around you as you think about what you've read. You may have some eureka moments while you're out in the world as opposed to sitting at your desk surrounded by notes and books. Reading lots and lots is great, but giving yourself the chance to observe and think is absolutely necessary! It may also give you some additional information to discuss in your paper.